We’re thrilled to welcome Julian Brave NoiseCat to Explore to talk about his award winning documentary Sugarcane, the powerful and very personal story of the multi-generational trauma caused to his family and members of the Williams Lake First Nations by the physical and sexual abuse endured for almost a century at St. Joseph’s Mission Residential School in British Columbia. NoiseCat and co-director Emily Kassie’s first documentary feature won the Directing Award: U.S. Documentary at the Sundance Film Festival and is showing in cinemas across North America and around the world.

Julian will be familiar to many of you for his work as contributing editor at Canadian Geographic and his many smart and thoughtful articles in the magazine around First Nations issues. His award-winning journalism has appeared in dozens of publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post and The New Yorker. His first book, We Survived the Night, will be published by Knopf and Penguin Random House in fall 2025.