Andrea Paul inspires tradition of female Mi'kmaw chiefs wearing headdresses

When Andrea Paul of Pictou Landing First Nation is sworn in as Nova Scotia's regional chief of the Assembly of First Nations on Thursday, she'll be making history as the first woman to hold the role.

But it won't be her first time challenging normsas a female chief.

Paul said from her knowledge, no woman of any Mi'kmaw community has ever worn a headdress as chief until she started doing so during her times as Pictou Landing's chief.

Mainstreet Halifax host Jeff Douglas spoke with Paul at the Millbrook Cultural and Heritage Centreon Sunday.

Their conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

LISTEN | Why this female Mi'kmaw chief chooses to wear a headdress:

Mainstreet NS6:59Andrea Paul on wearing a headdress as Nova Scotia's first female regional chief

Andrea Paul is the first woman to be elected as Nova Scotia's regional chief of the Assembly of First Nations. Host Jeff Douglas spoke with Chief Paul at the Millbrook Cultural and Heritage Centre on Sunday, not long after her brand new official headdress was delivered.

How did you become the first female Mi'kmaw chief to wear a headdress?

When I became chief [of Pictou Landing First Nation], I often found I was being not disregarded but not noticed, right? The men had their headdresses and I didn't have a headdress. I didn't even have the peaked cap, so sometimes when I was at events, people would be like, 'Oh, hi chief, hi chief,' and then I would be like, 'I've been chief, too?'

So then I put a post out about women wearing headdresses, and a lot of the stuff that I got back was women wear peaked caps and I said, 'Exactly, but chiefs wear headdresses,' so I decided I wanted to wear a headdress.

At the time when he was chief, Chief Rufus Copage, hewas actually the one who helped me find someone that would design or make a headdress for me. My husband gifted me the headdress.

It took me a little bit before I would wear it because, I don't know, I was a little bit nervous because I was a woman. I actually decided to wear it at Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupr in Quebec, because I was like, nobody can get mad at me, I'm at church.

I remember being in the lineup and it was women from Millbrook that were behind me, and I said,'I have a headdress, should I wear it?' And they just went absolutely, so they put the headdress on me. From that moment, Chief Deb [Robinson of Acadia First Nation]got a headdress and now the women wear the headdresses.

I'm not saying it was because of me, but someone needed to break the ice.

How did it feel when you put that headdress on the first timeas chief?

Absolutely proud, nervous.I didn't want to be disrespectful and so I had a lot of mixed emotions. I remember when I was walking into the church and the women were giving me second looks, like with pride, and they were taking pictures. And then after the massthey were coming up, 'Can I get your picture? Can I get your picture?' and so I knew I had done something right.

Can we talk about this new one for the regional position? Congratulations by the way.

Thank you so much. I'm very excited.

Have you started in the role?

Yes,I actually started two weeks ago, so the day that they let me know that I had won the seat, Iaccepted the position right away and I left my role as chief. I only had like a few weeks left anyway, but I wanted to start right away, especially because we have the special chiefs assembly coming up.

I wanted to make sure that I was getting prepared and getting the chiefs prepared for that, so I decided I needed a new headdress for the new role.

I put a call out on Facebook asking who can make me a headdress on a very, very short notice. People were tagging Shanna Francis, and so Shanna reached out to me, and I was so happy that she reached out to me and I said I would love for you to make my headdress, and her and I started talking and then she asked me what are some of the things that are important to you?

So right off the hot bat I said, my grandson, my family, I said the environment. I'm very passionate about environment and the water and the people, of course, so she put hieroglyphics on the headdress that represent the things that are important for me.

Interestingly, I forgot to do education, which is my other passion, but I take that for granted, right?So then she started putting the pieces together. She went with her four owl feathers in the back to represent women, for the four women chiefs and the nineeagle feathers in the front, they're all from Pictou Landing,which is something else that she did.

She was able to get eagle feathers from my community so she put those in there and the 13 feathers represent the 13 communities and she left a spot in the centre. I'm beading the centrepiece for it and I'll be putting that on once I'm done beading it.

You're beading that yourself?

I'm beading that myself, because she said,'Where you'rea beader,I think it's important that you incorporate your piece into it, too.'

So the beaded medallion that I'm doing is the seven districts, which is also the logo that Senator P.J. [Prosper] had been using and so I wanted to keep with that logo and to keep that petroglyph strong in the headdress.

There's another lady in my community that made me a ribbon skirt, so I have to actually go see her and she incorporated the logo on my ribbon skirt and also the seven feathers which will represent the seven districts.

I can't wait to see it and I love that women came forward to say, 'I want to help you,' and I'm so blessed.I really have been feeling so blessed with all the support and I just want to make everyone proud.