Canada and britain relationship timelime9/20/2023 ![]() First Nations peoples are still enduring the consequences of colonialism. It was this, specifically, that the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada would go on to describe in 2015 as ‘cultural genocide’, when it determined that the schools deliberately prevented ‘the transmission of cultural values and identity from one generation to the next’.Ĭanada has much work to do towards reconciliation. It was ingrained in the system.’ All this was designed to alienate children from their indigenous identities as they were removed from their families – often forcibly. Bud Whiteye, who attended the Mohawk Institute Residential School, recently explained the extensive and oppressive cultural regime within these institutions. This had disastrous implications for the self-esteem of many indigenous children. First Nations children were isolated from their families and forced to give up their own languages and cultures. Not all students had negative experiences, but there were many cases at these schools of extreme emotional and physical abuse, including deaths. These schools were, for much of their existence, run by church denominations and later by the state, from the late 19th to late 20th centuries, the last of the schools closing in 1996. This thinking led to the horrors of the Indian residential school system. Other reasons were more malicious, such as the belief that this process would invalidate the claims of indigenous peoples to their lands, meaning it could be divided up and seized for Canadians. Some were well intentioned, albeit condescending, such as the belief that it was only by assuming Western culture that indigenous peoples could survive in a modern world. There were many reasons why Canadians wanted to assimilate indigenous peoples into their society. In 1920, Duncan Campbell Scott, the Canadian Deputy Superintendent General of Indian Affairs said of his government’s policy: ‘Our objective is to continue until there is not an Indian that has not been absorbed into the body politic, and there is no Indian question, and no Indian Department.’ This was all part of a larger process by which Canadian authorities were consciously trying to eliminate indigenous identities and assimilate these peoples into Canadian culture, largely because they wanted them, as an ethnic minority group with unique treaty statuses, to disappear. ![]() ![]() ![]() The Potlatch festival for example, a practice which could be used to redistribute wealth or as a rite of passage depending on the culture, was made into a criminal offence in section 3 of An Act Further to Amend the Indian Act (1880). Within these spaces, Canadian authorities attempted to suppress indigenous cultural practices. It limits the self-governance of First Nations peoples, their control over indigenous lands and services they use, such as education and health care.ĭuring this period, First Nations peoples, like Native Americans in the US, were also confined on reservations. It was, and still is, a legal reaction to Canada’s treaty obligations. The Indian Act (1876), which is still upheld with amendments in Canadian law, was imposed on First Nations peoples without their consultation. Soon after its independence, Canada asserted control over indigenous peoples and lands. With this, it inherited treaty obligations – agreements that had been signed between First Nations peoples as sovereign nations and the British crown. Although remaining a British colony for many decades afterwards, it became independent from the UK in 1867. The traditions of many of these cultures tell us that it is their land of origin. ![]() The context of why reconciliation is needed relates to dark aspects of Canadian history, which linger on today.įirst Nations peoples inhabited North America, or Turtle Island, as some cultures call it, for thousands of years before Europeans arrived in the continent. It is beginning to acknowledge its own colonial history and there is discussion of how reconciliation might be achieved. The country is at an important moment in its relationship with First Nations. The Commission determined that this is a relationship that Canada does not presently have. Documenting the effects of the Indian residential school system (governmental boarding schools for indigenous children), the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (2015) recently defined reconciliation as ‘establishing and maintaining a mutually respectful relationship between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal peoples’. ![]()
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