Shiny Epi People

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews, MPH on Indigenous research and shark tank diving

December 18, 2021 Lisa Bodnar Season 2 Episode 54
Shiny Epi People
Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews, MPH on Indigenous research and shark tank diving
Show Notes Transcript

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews is a rockstar PhD student in epidemiology at the University of British Columbia School of Population and Public Health.  She is a member of the Sachigo Lake First Nation, which is an Oji Cree First Nation band government in an area that colonizers now call Northwestern Ontario Canada. Chenoa  is an indigenous health researcher and epidemiologist. She studies the impacts of overdose and COVID-19 on urban Indigenous young people, and develop recommendations for a holistic, self-determined, Indigenous response. Chenoa talks with me about her Indigenous background and research and how they conflict with her current training and how she takes care of herself in a time when Indigenous Nations and Peoples’ human rights are violated. Chenoa and I discuss how she pushes back on academic norms, how she stays connected to her culture, and many of the enriching outside of work activities that make her a very whole person. You'll learn something here as I did! Enjoy!

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Lisa Bodnar:

What's your favorite thing to wear?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Sweatpants. No. No. Let me answer that one again. Let me answer that one again.

Lisa Bodnar:

Hello. shiny friends. Welcome back to Shiny Epi people. I'm Lisa Bodnar. I'm so happy you're here. I appreciate you listening. And if you're someone who actually needs to, or likes to read the transcripts of the show instead of listening, then I'm glad you're reading along with us. I promise there's a lot of laughter in the show that doesn't really translate into the transcripts. Also, I was very belated in putting up the latest show transcripts, and now they're all there. So sorry about that. You can find the show on Twitter and Instagram at Shiny Epi People. I post additional content there. And I really love getting messages and tweets from you. When you engage with the show, it really helps to keep me going. If you could rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts, and also download the show, you can delete it right after, that really helps with my numbers and getting the word out.

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              Today, I am bringing you my conversation with Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews. Chenoa is a member of Oji Cree First Nation in an area that colonizers now call Northwestern Ontario, Canada. Chenoa is a rockstar PhD student in epidemiology at the University of British Columbia School of Population and Public Health in Vancouver. Chenoa is an Indigenous health researcher and epidemiologist. Her doctoral research aims to explore the impacts of overdose and COVID-19 on urban and Indigenous young people. And her goal is to develop recommendations for a holistic, self-determined Indigenous response. Chenoa plans to be a mixed-methods, community-based researcher and epidemiologist. She would like her work to center on Indigenous wellness, ways of knowing and methodologies and work that contributes to social justice. Chenoa is also interested in Indigenous land stewardship, environmental advocacy and social justice, and anti-racism work.

              This is also really impressive. As a PhD student, Chenoa was a member of a Royal Society of Canada Task Force on COVID-19. She helped to co-author the report, COVID-19 and Indigenous Health and Wellness: Our Strength is in Our Stories. And as she says, at the end of this episode, she is going to be looking for a job in about a year. So if you have one, listen and see if she might be a good fit. So today Chenoa talks with me about her Indigenous background and research, and how they conflict with her current training and how she takes care of herself in a time when Indigenous Nations and people's human rights are violated. And for a little education, for those of us who unfortunately, need reminding, that's, including myself, Indigenous people's human rights are violated in a number of ways.

              And for disclosure, I got this summary from the UN Human Rights page, "Indigenous peoples and Nations are denied control over their own development based on their own values, needs, and priorities. They're politically underrepresented and lack access to social and other services. And they're often marginalized when it comes to projects affecting their lands and have been the victims of forced displacement as a result of ventures, such as the exploitation of natural resources." Chenoa and I also discuss how she pushes back on academic norms and how she stays connected to her culture, as well as many of the enriching outside work activities that make her a very whole person. I think that she is a great example of having a life as a PhD student that reflects balance. And I think we all could use more balance in our lives. I hope you enjoy this chat. Hi, Chenoa!

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Hi.

Lisa Bodnar:

The universe has brought us together after many attempts. I think we tried this last spring, maybe?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

I think so. Wow, it would've been 2020.

Lisa Bodnar:

Was it 2020?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

I think so.

Lisa Bodnar:

Oh, my gosh. That is a long time that I've been chasing you. So thank you.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

I'm just excited to be here and that you were still interested after all that time.

Lisa Bodnar:

Chenoa, I found you on Twitter, because you were an epidemiologist tweeting about Indigenous health inequalities, Indigenous rights and your own Indigenous roots. Could you tell us a little bit about your family and your community growing up?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Sure. And this is great, because the traditional way to introduce yourself at any time is to start by introducing your family and where you're from. So on my dad's side, we are Oji-Cree, which is in Northwestern Ontario. I would have to show you on a map, but it's a very remote fly-in community and we didn't actually grow up there. My kokum, which is grandmother, my dad's mom, went residential school and then never moved back to her community after that. And so we've been living an urban or rural off-reserve family for, I guess, two generations now. And so my mom is from Halifax. We are, I think, four are generations of Scottish and Irish settlers on that side. And then there's British on both sides as well. So my parents met in Ottawa.

              And we were raised in a small town, just south of Ottawa called Kemptville. It's about 3,000 people. Great little town, but pretty homogenously white. And so my brother and I were the token Indigenous kids in school. And I think there was one Black family in town at the time we were growing up and then one Chinese family. And that was it. So it was very much an interesting place to be trying to reconnect with our culture. And we've always been really connected to our family and our family's spread out all over the place.

Lisa Bodnar:

Do you have family that still live on a reserve?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Oh, yeah. Yeah. So my kokum was one of 13 kids, I want to say. And so they grew up living off the land until they were taken to residential school. And then now, the families have been dispersed, everywhere from on-reserve to nearby, which is, I guess, the nearest settler area would be at Thunder Bay and to Lookout, lots of family there.

Lisa Bodnar:

I wanted to talk a little bit about work. Well, you had wanted to talk about work and school. I'd like to get into those in a little bit, but it seemed to me the struggles that you described in the academic setting really stemmed from what you called a culture clash that you experience on a daily basis. Can you share what this means to you and how it feels?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Yeah, so I feel it in a couple different ways. So in the academic setting, I have been trained in a Western worldview. So everything I've done academically and professionally has been through Western institutions, universities. And so it's this Western frame of thinking, call it positivist, or postpositivist, or whatever you want, but this very scientific way of looking at things. And in gaining experience working in Indigenous health and trying to apply Indigenous research methodologies and Indigenous ways of looking at the world, they don't complement each other very well. There's also a very important power dynamic there. One is privileged more over the other in pretty much all colonial spaces. And the invitation to incorporate Indigenous ways of knowing into colonial spaces is more tokenizing than really of the desire for substantial change and meaningful change. And so it's just an ongoing battle.

              For example, in my master's degree, I did a practicum placement. I did a master's in public health. And so we had a practicum semester and I did mine in Australia. And I had the opportunity to work with an Aboriginal research team down there. And my focus was on global Indigenous health in my masters. And it's still something that I care a lot about. I think it's a really cool space full of lots of really passionate folks around the world. And it's pretty awesome to be a part of it. And when I was down there, the team I was working with, the epidemiologist on the team was struggling with how to conduct this epi study with data that is in oral story form. And in many of our cultures, oral traditions are pretty sacred. And this is how knowledge has been transmitted for a long time. And there are various, I guess, not rules, but just customs around this transmission of oral knowledge.

              And one of them for this Nation in Australia at the time was that you can't break up an oral story into pieces, because the minute you do that, the story loses its meaning or the words lose their meaning. And so thinking of it from at first, a qualitative perspective, how you break down the themes in something somebody says that is problematic. And then to do that one step further and to try to quantify what was said in this oral story, just even further, and to the point where people were kind of feeling like it's not possible in this Western way of looking at things. And so there needs to be this, if we want to have something like in this instance, an epi study using traditional knowledge, it actually can't come from the Western side. It has to be something that comes out of the Nation itself and comes from that world view, because they just clash. You can't combine the two.

Lisa Bodnar:

What would it look like coming from the Nation itself?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

That's a great question. I don't know how it is in the States, but I know in Canada there is a bit more of a push to fund and support Indigenous research from the communities themselves. And so it would be great to have communities hold their own research funds, have their own research teams that they have trained in their own traditional practices and ways of researching, which exists. An elder that we work with once said something to the effect of, "Of course, we count. It's insulting to assume that we have never used numbers. We are environmentalists. We take care of our holistic ecosystem beyond just the people in our communities. We care about the animals and the rivers." So it's kind of insulting to assume that there aren't rigorous ways of evaluating circumstances among Indigenous Nations.

              So it's just about supporting them, and giving them the space to actually be respected, and value on the same level. In New Zealand, they do a better job of this. But I don't know a ton about Maori research. But I know that they are able to do research that is not even for the external eye. So it's research for community by community and some of their findings, and all of their findings in certain studies and things like that, never leave communities, because it's actually not relevant to settler communities or even international communities. And I think that's really powerful.

              And I think that's an example of what it looks like coming from the Indigenous community's perspective. And all Indigenous communities are very different, really diverse. We're only painted the same as a result of our similar experience with settler colonialism. So otherwise, we are very distinct, and vibrant, and have different protocols, and beliefs. It's really hard to paint with one brush. You can't.

Lisa Bodnar:

I interrupted you. You were saying the second thing.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Oh, yeah. The second thing. The other place that I feel this clash is in academia. It's so cutthroat. There's this pressure to be constantly working and the idea of publish or perish, and all of these different things that are considered normal in academia that I don't really vibe with. I just find that it's not a good fit for me, because I am starting to learn that I don't necessarily have one thing that I feel so passionate about that I just want to do it 24/7. I have other things that I like to do with my time outside of work. And I want to do something that I like to do, but I don't think I'm ever going to find something that's work that I'm going to just want to be consumed by all the time. And so I find it hard to balance the two.

Lisa Bodnar:

When you were in Australia and you were learning more about this sort of difference between Western ways of doing research and how Indigenous communities feel, are you trying to work in some of those other approaches into kind of the traditional Western view? Or how are you handling this clash as you're calling it?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

I will say, I'm pretty hardheaded and stubborn. And in my program, you have to defend your proposal for you can actually officially start your research project. And so in talking about how niche our project is and how much we try to honor our participants in the study by, we don't publish fast or a lot. Everything that we write is meaningful and impactful to the community and has been specifically asked for by governance. And so it's all deliberate, I guess. And it's not always the most agreeable to this Western idea of publishing frequently, I guess. The issue that I face in my defense, because they were concerned that I wouldn't get enough publications out of my dissertation to make me a competitive candidate for an academic job afterwards, I guess, or whatever I choose to do, if in the worlds where publications matter.

              That was just something that isn't a concern for me, because it's not a concern for the project. It's not that it's not something that we want to do. It's not prioritized in the same way it is in other settings. I got yelled at a little bit in my defense, because I said that it wasn't a priority for me, getting my papers published. And that in no way means that I don't want to. Obviously, I would love to. And I am willing to take however long it takes to get to that point, if that's something that everybody wants in the project. But it's this idea of collective working and collective representation that we don't just do anything. There's not a superstar researcher that gets to just run away with all of these papers that've have come out of their head.

              Everything is done together with a specific purpose and with the utmost responsibility to participants and protecting participants. I don't know, I guess it just ruffled some feathers a little bit, just in that room. And so in that room, it was on Zoom. Everything has been online this entire time, but.

Lisa Bodnar:

Someone yelled at you? That's horrible!

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

They said I had a bad attitude about it. I think that was the tipping point, where I was like, "Yeah, I said what I said. And actually, it feels kind of good to be like, 'Your publish-or-perish culture doesn't have as much power over me anymore.'" If it doesn't work out for me in this space, I'm not going to just change and live this super stressful life, if I doesn't work for me. I can still get a PhD and finish my dissertation without publishing any of it. That's the other thing that they don't tell you. You can absolutely just do a PhD and then that's it.

Lisa Bodnar:

For all of these reasons, academia is a question mark when you're done. Do you think that there are academic settings in which you would feel more comfortable doing the type of work you want to do or living the type of life that you would like to have with more balance?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Yeah, definitely. I like research a lot. And I have learned that I really like study design. In particular, I love being given a question or a problem. I love figuring out how to answer it. I would love a job working for a specific community or Nation. So I'm a visitor, an uninvited visitor, in Coast Salish territories, which is the west coast of Canada and the, I guess, well, the Pacific Northwest, I would say. And because the Nation's on the border. The border is just a colonial thing that kind of separated lots of families and Clans and whole Nations. So anyways, but here, I would love to do something that would support a local Nation and work for their interests and apply everything that I know how to do and have learned how to do in a more local or community-based setting. I think that would be super fun. But I also, I just really love the practice of epidemiology, so a non-research-based position.

Lisa Bodnar:

If you took a position like that, would you be disappointing people that you work for? Is that a worry of yours, I guess?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Yeah. I mean, I'm like a retired athlete. Pleasing people and impressing people is so horribly ingrained in me. So, yeah, of course it's something I think about. But it's just such an important decision that I also don't want to let people down by taking it and then doing a bad job of, a job like that. Or by taking it and then leaving quickly and leaving people high and dry. Not that I'd ever do that, but then I'd be stuck in a position that I don't want to be in. Realizing that a lot of my mentorship, most of my mentorship are academics. They're all so wonderful and so helpful. And I have a lot of really good connections, particularly with Indigenous women in this space and who have supported me and would absolutely, no question, support me no matter what I chose to do.

              But there are definitely some that I feel would be a little bit disappointed that I don't pursue academia, because from their perspective, I could like possibly "walk" into a job just by my own demographics. And that does not sit well with me at all. And it's sad. I know when people look at it and say, "If I had that kind of opportunity, I would take it in a heartbeat." And I've actually heard people say that to me before. And that's just not something that I want. I'm very white passing. I'm not somebody who experiences racism in the same way that my brown cousins do. It doesn't sit well with me that there would be a job for me just because of my Indigenous identity.

              And I joke all the time that I'm the most palatable Indian, most palatable Native person to the academy, because of how well I speak the language. And I don't want to use that. That does not interest me. I want a job that interests me and not one where I'm going to just constantly be fighting against pretty old, strong forces of Western colonial oppression. I don't know. Trying to think what will make me happy in the long run.

Lisa Bodnar:

So with all of these extra layers added on to kind of just the general stress of a PhD student, how do you take care of yourself, Chenoa? How do you make sure that your mental health is okay?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Yeah. I got on a wait list for a therapist that I really thought was going to be a good fit. I've been seeing her for the past year, maybe almost. And so that honestly is just, that's one of the best things. She is Indigenous also. And so I wanted somebody who can understand. I don't have to explain Indigenous experiences or intergenerational trauma or residential schools or any of that. She just gets it already. So that takes a lot of that anxiety out. And she just commiserates with me, because a lot of my experiences she has had in her career, too. And then also gives me a lot of really great places to look for resources and has encouraged me to take a more active role in cultural activities.

              So one of the biggest things that she prescribed was learning to bead. And so has bead work has been something that we practiced in our culture for a really long time. And also in my family, in particular, we have a lot of really gorgeous bead work that's been handed down. And my kokum doesn't bead anymore, because she says her eyes are too bad to see that small anymore. But she used to be really great at it. And so we have a lot of really cool family heirlooms and family designs that are passed down for many generations. So it's in the same kind of style and the same kind of stitch work. So just using two needles, and the same kinds of beads, and same sort of color patterns, although that's hard to stick tom because nowadays there's so many amazing colors, pretty much anything you can imagine. So it's really fun to be able to take a contemporary take on old designs. I can actually show you one.

Lisa Bodnar:

Yeah. I would love to see some.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Okay. So this is one that I made from our family designs.

Lisa Bodnar:

Oh, that's so pretty.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

I'm so very much a novice beader, but I'm getting there.

Lisa Bodnar:

What do you think is one of the most adventurous things you've ever done in your life?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

One of the most adventurous things, I went shark cage diving when I was in Australia. That was really cool.

Lisa Bodnar:

Tell me about that.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Oh, my gosh. This was so fun. It's been on my bucket list forever. And so I was staying at this hostel. And the hostel is just all for, pretty much everyone who goes there is going shark cage diving. So you just stay there and then they take you out in the boat. And it's a couple hours out into the ocean. And then to this protected area called the Neptune Islands, I think. And there's New Zealand fur seals there. And, I guess, that's like, great white sharks, they were food. You'd jump in the water. And it was my first time using a regulator, so when you scuba dive, the breathing apparatus for underwater. That was scary, honestly, just because you can't breathe through your nose. But anyways, it was fine. And you're in this tank, or this cage, sorry. And it's like a washing machine. So you hold on. But you're in the open ocean and so there's big swells. It was just gnarly.

Lisa Bodnar:

What? You were jostled around?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

It was just so turbulent. So they create this oil slick in the water to attract the sharks. So they don't use bait in this. At a lot of places they do, but ethically, it's better to not actually feed the sharks. So they just make the water smell really good around you and then hope that a shark comes. And so sure enough, there's a bunch of other fish that come, because they're like, it smells like food. And they're massive fish. At the corner of my eye, I'm just like, "Oh my God, is that a shark? Is that a shark?" They're just these massive fish. And then all of a sudden you see a great white shark. And it's just the biggest thing ever. It's just so huge. But it was so peaceful and non-threatening. I don't know, it was just so curious.

              It just would coast. I think the one that we saw was a female. Her name was Maggie. And she was monstrous. And she swam by at eye level and looked each one of us in the eye. I remember seeing her eyes. She had blue eyes. And she looked right at me. And I got a chill. You are a crazy, cool animal. Kind of, they come out of nowhere. It's crazy. They blend in so well with the water. She comes out of nowhere. And then, two feet away, she's gone. You can barely see a shadow of her once she blends in. I've been living off that high ever since, I think, a little bit.

Lisa Bodnar:

That's pretty adventurous. That's far more adventurous than anything anyone has said on this show. Ignoring the date on the calendar, how do you know when winter starts in Vancouver?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

It's the morning that, after it's been raining for a while, the clouds clear and there's a fresh dusting of snow on the North Shore Mountains. It's just a good time.

Lisa Bodnar:

What do you think is the best food to eat when you're sad?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Pasta and cheese. When I'm stressed and just needed something that's going to make me feel better, it's absolutely, I just grab a bag of, I always have a bag of dry noodles somewhere. And I boil that. And then I cover it in the shitty Parmesan. Not even just nice, grated Parmesan. I have the emergency, sprinkled cheese.

Lisa Bodnar:

The shaker! Shaker Parmesan, who doesn't love shaker Parmesan? Would you rather be stung by a bee or have five mosquito bites on your ankle?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Stung by a bee. Mosquitoes on the ankle, that's the absolute worst.

Lisa Bodnar:

Chenoa, what's something you always procrastinate on?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Work. Nah, to be honest, actually, it's not really work. It's admin stuff of my personal life. So if I have to get my driver's license renewed, if I have to mail something, yeah, that is where I procrastinate. Truly, honestly, more than work.

Lisa Bodnar:

I'll always have a stack of shit in my car on the passenger seat. I'm like, "I need to go to the post office. I need to go to the Amazon Dropbox. I don't have time today!" And I just ignore it. So I hope that this question makes sense. In your group of friends, what role do you usually play? Does that make sense?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Oh, that's a good question. Yeah, that makes sense. I don't know. I feel like I am the planner, I've been called. And I will admit, I do identify with Monica Geller on Friends. And so I think I was in denial of it for a long time, but yeah, I guess, I would be the one that plans things like, "Hey, you guys want to do this?"

Lisa Bodnar:

What's your favorite thing to wear?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

I really like a nice fitting pair of jeans. Well, my necessity for dressing for leaving the house versus just being at home is a really nice pair of earrings. I have a collection of mostly Indigenous-made earrings and some of them are pretty dramatic and some of them are a little bit more understated, depending on what the affair calls for.

Lisa Bodnar:

Could you rank for me the following fictional characters in order from least to most annoying? Here we go. Bella Swan from Twilight, Austin Powers, Joffrey Baratheon from Game of Thrones and Piper Chapman from Orange is the New Black.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Oh, Piper. She was the main character, right? Yeah.

Lisa Bodnar:

That she is.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Okay. So I would put Bella up there as the most annoying.

Lisa Bodnar:

OK. Poor Bella.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

I would put, oh gosh... Joffrey, though, he's in a league of his own. He was a monster. Okay, so maybe not... Maybe... Ah, but he's such a good character, though. So easy to hate. Okay, I put Piper up there, also. Yeah.

Lisa Bodnar:

All of these people, Chenoa, are on the top of your list.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Of the most annoying.

Lisa Bodnar:

Yeah. Who's the least annoying, Piper, Joffrey, Bella or Austin Powers?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Austin Powers as least annoying.

Lisa Bodnar:

Yeah. All right. Then who?

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Joffrey, because he wasn't annoying. He was awful. But yeah, I love a good, bad, like a villain, you know? And then Piper and then Bella as the most annoying. Something about relying so much on men as your whole reason for existence. I just hate it. Or a love interest of any kind. Yeah. I really like the actors themselves. I didn't like her character, but.

Lisa Bodnar:

Stephanie Meyer, you know, do better.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Yeah, sorry.

Lisa Bodnar:

Chenoa, I'm so happy that I got a chance to meet you, finally.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Me, too.

Lisa Bodnar:

I'm so grateful that you'd be willing to share these things that are so close to you and so personal to you and teach us something. I had a ball getting to know you.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Thank you for having me on. It was so fun. And I love your podcast. It's cool to be a part of it.

Lisa Bodnar:

Thank you.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

I told my friend that I was doing this. And he also listens to your podcast. And we had been talking about careers outside of academia, basically jobs that are adjacent to it, without being bogged down in the system. And so he said that I should use this as a way to put out there that I am interested in post docs and job postings for PhDs newly graduated in epidemiology. Preference for community-based work, but open to a lot of different things, even including learning infectious diseases epi. Yeah. I'm just, put a little personal ad in there for myself that I will be looking in the next year.

Lisa Bodnar:

I'm glad that you did.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Cool. Well, thanks for the opportunity.

Lisa Bodnar:

Thank you. This was such a pleasure. (silence)

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

I mean, in hindsight, Twilight is a terrible series.

Lisa Bodnar:

But boy, I tore through those books.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Oh, same. As a kid, I was so obsessed with it. And as an adult, it's just, you know, did not.

Lisa Bodnar:

Well, Chenoa, I was an adult when I read them, so I have no excuse.

Chenoa Cassidy-Matthews:

Sorry.