‘We claim her, end of story’: Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Piapot family hurt by allegations

Indigenous icon Buffy Sainte-Marie's identity was brought into question by a CBC investigation, her Piapot family says the accusations are "ignorant, colonial -- and racist."

Artist and activist Buffy Sainte-Marie’s Indigenous identity has been challenged by a CBC investigation but her Piapot First Nation, Sask. family stands by the 82-year-old, calling the narrative “ignorant,” “colonial” and “racist.”

Ntawnis Piapot, speaking for the family, says the bombshell claim that Sainte-Marie has no Indigenous blood has no bearing on her belonging to the Cree family.

Piapot is the great-granddaughter of Emile Piapot and Clara Starblanket, both deceased, who adopted Sainte-Marie some six decades ago.

Piapot says Sainte-Marie connected with the Piapot First Nation after she met her grandfather at a powwow in Ontario.

“There was just things that kind of lined up to her story too,” she told Global News.

“My grandparents had 10 children and some of them died because of the Indian Act system, because they couldn’t get proper health care on the reserve and so she was at that age where one of their children passed away and they kind of connected on that.

“The adoption process, it took years — it took days and months and years of getting to know each other and trusting each other and going to ceremony and getting her Indian name (from my mushum) to finally look at her and be like, I acknowledge you as my daughter, you’re officially part of our family.”

It was done in Cree custom and while Sainte-Marie didn’t claimed proof of blood relations, she is accepted as kin because of that ceremony.