Bruce, June

Dr.

English crg (Michif)

English eng (English)

June Bruce was born in St. Laurent, Manitoba on June 14, 1947 to parents Roland Bruce and Annette Boudreau Bruce. She has two brothers and three sisters, and attended school in St. Laurent from Grade 1 to Grade 10, when she quit school to get married. In the course of her marriage, I had three children, Les, James and Shelley. Because of work shortage in Manitoba, the family moved to Alberta and stayed there for 30 years, from 1969 to 1999, but returned to St. Laurent in 1999. In late 1999 we moved back to Winnipeg. Because of her dreams to graduate from Grade 12, she went back to school in St. Laurent in 2010 and graduated with her diploma. That was about the time that she along, with other local Michif women, started working on a Michif French dictionary. It took them five years to do this, as their Michif French was spoken but never written. The book was published in. Juen Bruce continues to be quite busy with teaching Michif French in her community, in Winnipeg and also in Selkirk, Manitoba. She along with The ladies also meet every week when possible to do some Michif crafts, ie: 100% wool moccasins, mitts, purses with embroidery and or beading. In 2020, in recognition of their efforts to keep the culture and language alive, each of the Dictionary Ladies received their Honorary Doctorate for Doctors of Letters from University of Winnipeg in a special graduation ceremony.
As of 2020, June Bruce has 4 grand children, and 4 great grand-children. She says that her reasons for continuing to work with the Michif French is to keep our language and culture alive for her children, grand-children and great-grand children within the Metis community.

R00098

June Bruce and estate of.