Dr. Vicki Kelly (M.A., Ph.D.) is an Anishinaabe/Métis visual artist, art therapist, educator, scholar and an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Education at Simon Fraser University.
Vicki completed a two-year traditional apprenticeship at the Freda Diesing School of Northwest Coast Art as part of her research on Indigenous Art as a knowledge practice. Vicki’s areas of interest and teaching include Indigenous Education, Art Education, Ecological Education, Health Education, and Contemplative Education. Her research involves Indigenous knowledge practices; art as a site of ecological activism; Many-Eyed Seeing; Indigenous ethics; Indigenous pedagogies and Indigenous ways of knowing. She works with Indigenous and Arts-based Narrative methodologies as well as Indigenous Métissage and practioner inquiry. Her scholarship and practices are grounded in Indigenous knowledge traditions, Indigenous ethics, and Indigenous ceremony. She plays the Native American Flute as an integral part of all her work.
Vicki has been involved in POLIS Watersheds forums since 2016, supporting the co-creation of space for the gatherings, by generously sharing her words and flute playing in ceremonial openings and closings. At Watersheds 2016, she co-facilitated a workshop on Water Ethics and Cross-Cultural Values, and at Watersheds 2020, she provided reflections as a witness to the keynote presentation and discussion on Indigenous law, reconciliation, and governance. Vicki is an essential Advisor, Mentor and Collaborator in our Biocultural Ethics initiative, and part of the Ethics Circle who developed new Ethical Guidance for Knowledge Sharing Across Indigenous and Western Scientific Knowledge Systems.
