In terms of the Edmonton 2 Spirit Society, I know that we've made several applications—and not just E2S. E2S is short for Edmonton 2 Spirit Society. There's the 2 Spirits in Motion Foundation, which has made several grant applications to Canadian Heritage, as well as to Women and Gender Equality Canada. At this point, I think that all have been denied because of certain—I'm just looking at this....
Apparently they didn't fit the criteria. It's trying to address the health of two-spirits, but it's a heritage grant looking at cultural aspects or vice-versa. It's hard for us, at E2S specifically, to incorporate our cultural practices within the western paradigm of how to structure these kinds of things because when you apply for these grants, you have to spend the money and do it in a certain way. Sometimes that doesn't recognize the culture, the way the storytelling happens or how we come together in ceremony.
We don't have a lot of two-spirit elders and knowledge keepers left. We know that there is a lot of funding that does go to indigenous organizations. I know that in Edmonton alone there are Bent Arrow and other organizations, but they don't have two-spirits on staff. They don't have that knowledge of the language there, and some of them are not bringing in two-spirit elders and knowledge keepers to actually share that with the youth and others.