Qátsya7 Mason Ducharme knew he was going to end his acceptance speech with Yoda’s famous words, “Do or do not. There is no try.”
He just wasn’t sure if he was going to do the voice.
In the end, he swung for the fences, imitating Frank Oz’ classic tone for the tiny green Jedi. The crowd laughed.
Ducharme, now Lil’wat Nation’s second-ever PhD, was onstage at the Polygon Gallery in North Vancouver to receive the Dedicated Alumni Award of Excellence from Capilano University. He studied at the school from 2010 to 2014, graduating with a Bachelor of Business Administration. He went on to earn a master’s and PhD in public administration at the University of Victoria.
Ducharme was honoured alongside artist and reconciliation advocate Irwin Oostindie, musician and entrepreneur Reuben Avery, neuro-oncologist Susan Chang and general manager of BC Place Chris May on March 26.
“It felt cool to be included with that group of people,” he said. “You know, maybe what I'm doing doesn't feel as fancy as what they're doing, but for me, it feels just as meaningful.”
Ducharme saw his CapU business degree as a way to help lift himself, his family and his nation out of poverty.
“Growing up both on-reserve and off-reserve, you realize that a lot of Indigenous people are living in poverty compared to non-Indigenous people,” he said. “So when I grew up noticing that, I thought, ‘what can I do to kind of help us address this?’”
But at CapU, Ducharme realized research and advocacy, rather than the corporate world, would be his vehicle to help build capacity and reduce poverty.
He was inspired by one of a number of “colourful profs” at CapU. One professor in particular, with whom Ducharme would transit off campus and grab the occasional slice of pizza, stuck out.
At the time, Capilano was a college, and didn’t require a PhD to teach. Still, this prof had a doctorate.
“So I just thought, ‘this guy's just going to school for the sake of going to school,’ and I was like, ‘I want to have all those acronyms after my name,’” Ducharme recalled.
He successfully defended his thesis, Turnover and the Retention of Indigenous Executives in Indigenous Organizations, in December 2024, earning his PhD.
Balancing act
During his acceptance speech, Ducharme spoke to the crowd about the balancing act between being Indigenous and navigating academia, when the latter comprises some of the oldest colonial institutions in the world.
“In the Indigenous academic community, they call it walking in two worlds,” he said. “Sometimes when you're Indigenous and you're going off to school, it feels like you're a bit ‘too res’ to be in this new environment. But then you go back home to your community, and it almost feels like you become too colonized."
So it's important for students to consider, he added: "what can you do to retain that sense of your Indigenous self?”
Ducharme remembered calling to chat with a group of Lil’wat elders as a way to keep in touch with his roots.
He also acknowledged that, while immersing himself in academia with a professorship is a valuable pursuit, the skewed work-life balance isn’t something he’s interested in. After raising two daughters—Riel and Macy—during his PhD program, he places family time first.
“Maybe one day I'll get there. Maybe when my kids are teenagers, I'll be like, ‘yeah, I think we could both use a break,' then I’ll become a professor,” he joked.
“But right now, I have an awesome job.”
What’s next?
Ducharme wears plenty of hats.
He’s the co-executive director of the Centre for First Nations Governance and national community research director for the Rebuilding First Nations Governance Projects. In both capacities, he carries out application-based research on how Nations can transition out of the Indian Act and towards genuine self-government.
“I'm also having an opportunity to build capacity and a next generation of Indigenous researchers and non-Indigenous researchers to say, ‘this is an awesome career I want to consider, and this is how we can help our Indigenous peoples,’” he said.
He’s also looking ahead to new research exploring lateral violence—oppression between members of an oppressed group—in Indigenous communities. The incidence of lateral violence was a key part of his findings from interviews with Indigenous executives during his PhD.
Ducharme's hypothesis for future research is that lateral violence occurred much earlier in the colonial project than currently understood, rather than the current theory that residential schools are mostly to blame.
For Ducharme, it’s deeply personal research. At 23, he became the youngest band administrator for the Nuchatlaht Tribe. After three years on the job, he left, burnt out—in part due to the effects of lateral violence. It inspired his PhD research into Indigenous executive turnover and retention.
“This is depressing stuff,” he said. “It's across all of Canada. But I know if we don't talk about it, nothing's going to happen.”
Part of Ducharme’s focus lies in knowledge mobilization—bridging the gaps between academic research and application. To that end, The Rebuilding First Nations Governance Project is looking to launch a podcast later this year, with multiple hosts and guests to talk about the concept of self-governance.
“Research is great, but what I love about the podcasts is it's relational, it's storytelling” said Ducharme. “That's a great way of getting that knowledge out there in a more accessible way to our communities.”
The podcast is part of an effort to spark discussions of moving past the Indian Act, instead of settling into a status quo with a still-uneven modern treaty process and sectoral initiatives. Instead, he’d like to see a country-wide discussion on true self-governance.
And while Ducharme is sometimes loath to appear in the spotlight, he later underscored the importance of recognizing Indigenous achievement within community as another important step towards healing from the ongoing damage done by residential schools and colonialism.
“We're stuck in a grieving process a lot here in Pemberton, so you probably see how many deaths the one nation experiences, and everything shuts down. It's hard to celebrate when that happens,” he said.
“We have a tremendous amount of intergenerational trauma, [and] we’re putting in the work to heal ourselves for the next generations. I think celebrating each other is a way to kind of get some of that healing in too.”
Ducharme is set to take the stage again to present his thesis research at the upcoming Feeding our Fire event at Carleton University in May.
