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Indigenous peoples of Canada
2014 STUDY CANADA Summer Institute
Nicolas HoudeDépartement de science politique, UQAM
June 2014
Some considerations• Canada’s colonial legacy
• Critical thinking
• Sources
• Terminology
• Indigenous knowledge systems; “western” academia
Teaching about Indigenous peoples
Layers of understanding• Canada’s history is a colonial history
• Legacy of colonisation
• The meaning of colonisation: not just inhabiting “new” lands
• ex.: maps
Ancestral landvs reserve
Overlaps
Layers of understanding• Be aware of these hidden layers when teaching
• Tell different stories (homeland vs wilderness)
• Question mainstream narrative
• Question concepts (indian, nature, public land, etc.)
• Review the relationship
Reviewing the relationship• More than 400 landclaims
• Acts of resistance in the media
Aljazeera.com
• Getting out of the canadian political margin… while nurturing distinct identities and cultures
Aljazeera.com
Reviewing the relationship
Today’s presentation• What brought us to the current situation?
Loss of access to land and resources
Marginalisation of ways of knowing and seeing the world, of ways of learning and doing
• Contemporaries strategies for strenghtening Indigenous rights, political cultures, views of history and land base
Note on terminology First Nation, Indigenous, Aboriginal,
Indian, Métis, Inuit…
Band, nation, tribe
Reserve, ancestral land, land claimed
Aboriginal
ab origine: from origin, source
Australia and English Canada?
United Nations
Indigenous communities, peoples and nations are those which, having a historical continuity with pre-invasion and pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories…
consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the societies now prevailing in those territories…They form at present non-dominant sectors of society…
are determined to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral territories, and their ethnic identity, as basis of their continued existence as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions and legal system
(Martinez Cobo, 1987)
Who’s Indigenous? Who decides?
an Indigenous person self-identifies as belonging to an Indigenous group and is being accepted by this group
Not only a biological concept
Self-identification in the census
Who’s Indigenous? Who decides?
In Canada
contemporary identity linked in part to:
Indigenous
In Canada
contemporary identity linked in part to:
Discriminatory policies
Attempts at forced assimilation
Forced settlement and life on reserves,
Urban identities
Indigenous
In Canada Self-identification not enough
The state gives a legal definition
Three recognised groups First Nations members (Indians) Métis Inuit
First Nations Early 1980s
Here first
Nation-to-nation
Declaration of Dene Nationhood (1975)
"We the Dene of the Northwest Territories insist on the right to be regarded by ourselves and the world as a nation. Our struggle is for the recognition of the Dene Nation by the Government and peoples of Canada and the peoples and governments of the world"
Indian Identity constructed around the norms imposed
by the Indian Act
Status Indians: Part of AANDC’s Register Clearly recognised as Indigenous by CDN gov.
Non-status: “Forgotten” when register first appeared Have been ”emancipated”, voluntarily or forcibly Exogamous marriages (for women and their children,
before 1985)
Which word to use?
Which word to use? Anishnabe, Nehirowisiw, Innu, etc.
Métis Refers historically to the descendants
of the métis of the Red River. Current definition larger (see Powley)
Cultural dimension: Ancestors both Europeans and Indigenous, with a distinct culture
read: Prison of Grass; Howard Adams
Gained constitutional recognition as a group in 1982
Peter LougheedLouis Riel
Métis
Inuit
Recognised as “Aboriginals” in 1939
Supreme Court then forces federal government to provide services to Inuit
Band Anthropological concept
Becomes political unit through the 1876 Indian Act
Group of people under the same local government
Historic nations vs bands
GroupsTribe, bands, nations
GroupsTribe, bands, nations
Tribe: anthropological concept transferred into the canadian legal world; group sharing the same ancestors, language
Indigenous identities in Canada: several dimensions: social, cultural, biological, legal
Today’s presentation• What brought us to the current situation?
Loss of access to land and resources
Marginalisation of ways of knowing and seeing the world, of ways of learning and doing
• Contemporaries strategies for strenghtening Indigenous rights, political cultures, views of history and land base
Three phases in Indigenous/non-
Indigenous relations• Contact – 1815: Alliances
• 1815 – 1969: Marginalisation/assimilation
• since 1969: New relation?
A European point of view
• Ideal civilisation
• Land title > individual prop
• Horizontal vs vertical political organisations: looking for a chief (preferably male)
• Rational use of the land (agriculture vs nomad.)
DOCTRINE OF DISCOVERY
Alliances
• Trade: Knowledge of the land Trade networks Trapping + hunting
• Military
Alliances• Indigenous peoples were allies protected by
the Crown; not subjects of her Majesty
• Living outside European laws
• Crown incapable of imposing unilateraly its will on local peoples
Royal Proclamationof 1763
• Crown has to extinguish Aboriginal title before proceeding with settlement of new lands
“Consensual” process
With the Crown (Discovery right)
Source: Canadiana.org
Royal Proclamation of 1763
Historical treaties• Land cessions
• Starts in Ontario
Land for settlers
Access to natural resources
Population, Great lakes area
Early 19th: 500 000
1850: 920 000
Early 20th: 2 180 000
Historical treaties
Historical treaties
Three phases in Indigenous/non-
Indigenous relations• Contact – 1815: Alliances
• 1815 – 1969: Marginalisation/assimilation
• since 1969: New relation?
Marginalisation/assimilation
• 1815: End of the war of 1812
• Land cessions
• Creation of reserves
• Indian Act (1876)
• Settlement and education
A colonial state
• Political and legal system promoting and justifying the occupation and the exploitation of the land in the interest of the Euro-canadian society
• System aiming at the political, social, and cultural assimilation of local populations
Three strategies
• Treaties
• Indian Act
• Education Source: CNA
Three strategiesTreaties and reserves
• Dispossession
• Forced settlements / discontinuity of old economic systems
• Economic exploitation to the benefit of a minority
• Legalisation of dispossession
Three strategiesIndian Act
• Creation of a hierarchy of identities
• Creation of a political hierarchy; exclusion of women from political life
• Divide to conquer
Three strategiesEducation
• Education / residential schools
• Naturalises colonial system• Ancient practices vanish
• Erosion of pre-colonial identities
• Teach kids to become good British (or Canadian) citizens
Reserves
• Small enclaves where it becomes impossible to pursue traditional ways of living
Isolate
Educate
Assimilate
Free up the land for development
Indian Act
• Formerly allies of the Crown, Indigenous people become pupils of the State
• Creation of band councils
• Federal agents supervise every aspects of peoples’ lives (Dis)approbation of elections, bylawsControls mobility of peopleEmancipation clauses
An end to the “Indian problem”
• “I want to get rid of the Indian problem. I do not think as a matter of fact, that the country ought to continuously protect a class of people who are able to stand alone… Our objective is to continue until there is not a single Indian in Canada that has not been absorbed into the body politic and there is no Indian
question, and no Indian Department,that is the whole object of this Bill”
- Duncan Campbell Scottdeputy superintendent,
Department of Indian affairs, 1913-1932
• But…
• Situation after 2nd world war
• Colonial segregation seems to have played a role in preserving/creating Indigenous identities
• Local
• Global: Panindianism, panindigenism
• Indigenous nationalisms
An end to the “Indian problem”
• Second world war as a pivotal moment for Indigenous rights and political activism
• 1951: Revisions to the Indian Act
• White paper on Indian policy (1969)
An end to the “Indian problem”
1969 White paper on Indian policy
« Nous devons aujourd'hui modifier le cours de l'histoire. Être Indien, ce doit vouloir dire être libre - libre de faire progresser les cultures indiennes dans un contexte d'égalité juridique, sociale et économique avec les autres Canadiens » - Jean Chrétien, 1969
Three phases in Indigenous/non-
Indigenous relations• Contact – 1815: Alliances
• 1815 – 1969: Marginalisation/assimilation
• since 1969: New relation?
What happens then?Contemporary political and legal strategies
• Fight against abolition of status and treaties
• Political, intellectuel, and legal strategies
Ancestral rights
Treaty rights
Human rights
Political activism• From 1951: Rise of large political coalitions
• 1968: National Indian Brotherhood (APN en 1982)
• Political pressures for the recognition of Indigenous rights
Legal activism
• 1969-1973: Calder
• Crees of Quebec
Franck Calder
• Alternative narratives
• An other history• Prison of Grass (H. Adams)• Pour une autohistoire amérindienne (G. Sioui)• The myth of the Savage (O. Dickason)
• Counter-cartographies; toponymy
Intellectual activism
Source: Sahtu monitoring project
Results• Claims Commission
Comprehensive claims Specific claims
• Constitution of 1982
• Negociation of new treaties
Unfinished business• Diverging meanings of treaties
• Public interest vs Indigenous rights; deep questioning of current structures and processes
• Media/academic/bureaucratic bias
• Agenda setting and language
• Traditional knowledges and the difficulty to question « truths »
• Internet: platform for an alternative voice? Photo: NH
Imagining Indigenous autonomies
Thank youNicolas Houde
Département de science politique, UQAM
Twitter.com/nicopiedstounus
http://politique.uqam.ca/corps-professoral/professeurs/
774-houde-nicolas.html