Students and staff from a Mi'kmaw high school in Nova Scotia are honouring the stories of missing and murdered Indigenous people in Canada with a song and music video. https://t.co/o8hDChP90Apic.twitter.com/PyyPLpJf70
WARNING: This story has disturbing details about residential and boarding schools. If you are feeling triggered, here is a resource list for trauma responses
from the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition in
the US. The National Indian Residential School Crisis Hotline in Canada
can be reached at 1-866-925-4419. If you're in Treaty 4 territory, call
306-522-7494.
Another
First Nation is reporting the discovery of unmarked graves near the
site of a former residential school, St. Eugene’s Mission School.
It
follows two other reports of similar massive findings at two other such
church-run schools, one of more than 600 unmarked graves at the former
Marieval Indian Residential School and another of 215 bodies at the
former Kamloops Indian Residential School.
The community of
ʔaq’am, also known as St. Mary’s band, situated within the traditional
territory of the Ktunaxa Nation near Cranbrook, British Columbia,
located 182 unmarked graves in 2020 using ground penetrating radar. It
is close to the former St. Eugene’s Mission School, which was operated
by the Catholic Church from 1912 until the early 1970s.
But it only recently notified the nearby Lower Kootenay First Nation about the find.
Cranbrook is 524 miles east of Vancouver
“In
the ground search conducted by the community of ʔaq’am, the findings
revealed 182 human remains in unmarked graves,” said a news release from
Lower Kootenay shared with APTN News Wednesday. Some unmarked graves were about 3 feet deep, it said.
“It
is believed that the remains of these 182 souls are from the member
Bands of the Ktunaxa nation, neighbouring First Nations communities,
& the community of aqam.”
Chief Jason Louie of the Lower
Kootenay Band, which is also a member of the Ktunaxa Nation, called the
discovery “deeply personal” since he had relatives attend the school.
“Let’s call this for what it is,” Louie told CBC radio in an interview. “It’s a mass murder of Indigenous people."
“The
Nazis were held accountable for their war crimes. I see no difference
in locating the priests and nuns and the brothers who are responsible
for this mass murder to be held accountable for their part in this
attempt of genocide of an Indigenous people.” KEEP READING
The doors of a Catholic church in Canada were marked with red paint on
June 24 after the announcement from Cowessess First Nation that up to
751 unmarked graves graves had been identified near the former Marieval
Residential School. (Photo/Facebook – Donna Heimbecker)
By Aaron Payment |
While the emerging stories
about Indian residential school cemeteries in Canada are shocking to
many, they are not to many Native Americans and First Nation citizens.
When I wrote my master’s thesis for my first master’s degree in
public administration 30 years ago in 1991, it was focused on federal
Indian policy. It focused all of the Indian policy periods throughout
U.S. history.
Included in the various periods was the Indian boarding school era.
It was by far the hardest part of my thesis. Because I was interested in
understanding this fully, I read all kinds of accounts of the
experience lived from individuals who were part of this dark chapter in
history. It took me two and a half years to write my thesis because it
was heartbreaking to delve deep into the boarding school experience.
One of the most psychologically challenging accounts to read was how
the missionaries used wooden blocks to stop Indian children from
speaking their language. Some of the Indian boys and girls were told
their parents had died so they wouldn’t try to escape the boarding
school. When these children tried to mourn their parents because they
believed they had died, the missionaries prohibited them from exercising
their traditional funeral rituals.
Many American Indian boarding schools have their own cemeteries.
Could you imagine sending your child off to a boarding school today if
they had a graveyard in the backyard?
For all of those counterculture people or those who claim that
critical race theory should not be taught, they are on the side of
whitewashing American history. In psychology and sociology there is a
term called cognitive dissonance. Those terms as well as the concept of
collective denial, is why we don’t learn about these facts in American
history.
Most aspects of American Indian history are not taught in schools.
Certainly, the Indian boarding school era is not part of the curriculum.
Did you know U.S. Japanese internment camps were modeled after the first Indian reservation experience?
Did you know that germ warfare and ethnocide was born in American Indian history?
Did you know the concept of Indian blood quantum, the amount of
Indian blood you have, initially a system the federal government placed
on tribes in an effort to limit their citizenship, was created to under
count and eventually eradicate the American Indian population?
Did you know that Hitler modeled the Jewish concentration camps after
the American practice of concentrating American Indians onto a
reservation and introducing disease by gifting Tribes with smallpox
infected blankets?
Each of these experiences of genocide at the hands of the American
government over the generations explains what is called historical and
intergenerational trauma. This explains in large part why tribal
governments are sometimes openly hostile towards their own people. It
also explains why American Indians have the worst of the worst
statistical outcomes on every dimension. This includes the lowest high
school graduation rate, the highest rates of suicide, the highest rates
of drug and alcohol addiction, the highest rates of unemployment.
Whitewashing our history and these facts is intended to suggest there
is something inferior about American Indians. That we are
intellectually inferior to other races. Early scholars in anthropology
wrote about our ancestors as if they were less than human and not
civilized. We didn’t even have the right to vote until 1924. We were the
last of Americans to be granted this right. Our religious practices
were illegal until 1978. Our children were stolen from our families
until the Indian Child Welfare Act was passed in 1978. Even today—in
certain states and jurisdictions—Indian children are still stolen from
their families.
None of this is intended to blame anyone who is alive today. But we
all have a duty to understand the facts, our history, and how this
impacts us today. One important reason is so that we don’t repeat
history. Immigrant children locked in cages and disconnected from their
parents is the same as the Indian boarding school experience. The
atrocity of separating a child from their family is inexcusable and
unforgivable. No matter who is president or who locked up these
children, it is really no different than the Indian boarding school
experience. Those who argue cancel culture would have you believe this
is no big deal. Again, if we don’t know our own history, we are doomed
to repeat it.
So while I am grateful that the world is becoming “woke” to the
experience of Indian children being slaughtered, beaten to death, or
driven to suicide based on a broken heart at these boarding schools, we
have known this for some time but we’re just unwilling to look more
closely.
I appreciate Secretary Deb Haaland’s commitment to go back and
examine these boarding schools to get an account of how many Indian
children were murdered at the hands of the American government. It is my
hope that this will lead to repatriation of the remains of these
children back to the respective families and tribes.
Finally, the concept of critical race theory is not about blaming
anyone. It’s about understanding the truth and looking for explanations
for why certain populations have the worst of the worst statistical
outcomes.
As documented in the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights Broken Promises report, American Indians have the worst of the worst statistical outcomes.
Aaron A. Payment is Tribal Chairperson of the Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians. Payment
holds a doctorate degree in education, a master’s in education
specialist, a master’s in education administration and a master’s in
public administration. He also serves as the 1st Vice
President of the National Congress of American Indians, President of the
Midwest Alliance of Sovereign Tribes, and President of the United
Tribes of Michigan.
The remains of the Chopaka Church on Lower Similkameen land on Saturday morning. (Photo/Courtesy of Chief Keith Crow)
By Levi Rickert|
BRITISH COLUMBIA, Canada — Two
more Catholic churches burned down in western Canada early Saturday. The
churches were located near Indigenous communities at St. Ann’s Church
and Chopaka Church, which are located within an hour of each other in
British Columbia.
It’s been 51 years since Deedee Lerat, 60, attended the Marieval Indian Residential School on her home reservation of Cowessess in Saskatchewan, Canada. But the memories of the abuses the Salteaux Cree woman endured there still haunt her.https://t.co/7gEAOkFy4A
Residential school group photograph, Regina, Saskatchewan, 1908. Photograph Source: John Woodruff – Public Domain.
+++
"Many groups have issued apologies for the wrongs they have committed
towards indigenous peoples. Without changing our ways, however, these
apologies fall flat"
Over the years, Anglicans have learned more of the truth about the residential schools we ran. According to Anglican Church records, the church operated around three dozen schools between 1820 and 1967. Before Confederation in 1867, Anglican missionaries ran these schools with the purpose of converting indigenous peoples to Christianity. After Confederation, the Anglican Church operated these schools on behalf of the Canadian government. These schools were used by the church not only to convert students to Christianity, but to assimilate them into a British culture. Due to underfunding, many residential schools were ill-equipped to provide a quality education for children.
Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) identified 3,200 children (566 in Saskatchewan) who died while attending the schools as a result of poor care. Since the TRC published its report more missing children have been identified and more pain and hurt is being felt.
Injustices towards Indigenous peoples continue today.
The search involved the use of ground-penetrating radar. Flags mark the positions of the once-concealed burial plots.
Delorme told Gormley on Friday morning that when the search began,
technicians brought just 200 flags, running out on the first day.
“We’re like, ‘What are we getting into here? What is the reality of
this?’ And by the end of the week, it got very emotional, very heavy,”
Delorme said.
At first glance, the burial ground appears to be an empty field.
Delorme recalled running through the area as a child. “Just kids being
kids,” he said. But it was known that the graves were beneath their
feet. Oral stories told of their existence.
“We were always told, ‘Walk on the path, walk on the path,’ ” he said.
Delorme said the Oblates arrived in 1886. (Catholic Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate) That location was the
gravesite for the Roman Catholic Church, so there were non-Indigenous
people buried there as well. The Marieval Indian Residential School
opened in 1898.
He said the search started June 2 on the east side of the field, going west.
“We were doing two metre by two metre the first day, and then we were
like, ‘Oh, maybe we should do one metre by one metre,’ ” Delorme said.
That’s when the flags were planted and it became apparent there were children buried.
“OK, so one metre by one metre, that means that there’s not full adults here,” Delorme said.
In 1970, the burial ground became a community cemetery, no longer
under control of the Oblates and priests, Delorme said. Grave markers
from that point on are there today.
“So that’s why it’s somewhat challenging to talk about because it is
the community gravesite today. We honour that,” he said. “But there was
almost 80 years where the priests had a say, who did and who didn’t
belong in that gravesite.”
Delorme’s advice for people to play a role in reconciliation is a mental “reset.”
“There is real anger and pain amongst many of my people. And that
anger and pain is there because of the ignorance and the accidental
racism and it just triggers,” he said.
He said Indigenous people are “trying to get out of this dependence
state,” while also focusing on political sovereignty and cultural
rejuvenation.
When asked about those who wish to “cancel” Canada Day, Delorme said
he was “in no capacity to tell anybody what they should or should not
celebrate.”
Delorme said while the fruits of colonialism like the residential
school system, Indian Act, and ’60s Scoop were created in the past,
people of today have inherited the aftermath.
“We must accept the good and what we inherited,” he said.
He challenged people to read the Calls to Action by the Truth and
Reconciliation Commission, share them, and act on any of them that
“click with you.”
“We’ve got some work to do,” he said, “and if we all just grab a
little bit of it, this country would and will be the greatest in the
world.”
Orange Shirt Day happens every year on September 30th.
With
the recent spike in interest for Orange Shirt Day events the team is
designing special programming for both primary grades and ages 13+. Save the Evidence
is a campaign to raise awareness and support for the restoration of the
former Mohawk Institute Residential School, and to develop the building
into an Interpreted Historic Site and Educational Resource
In
order to lock in a spot and date for your class or corporation, visit: website.
Brace yourself, says Splatsin and Secwépemc Tribal Chief Wayne Christian.
In the wake of the grisly discoveries of 215-plus unmarked graves in
Kamloops and another 751 in Saskatchewan, the ’60s Scoop survivor said
it’s important for the public — both Indigenous and non-Indigenous — to
be prepared for more discoveries.
“It’s such a shock and I feel so horrific for all of us,” Christian said.
“For those of you who attended the residential schools or were
connected to it in some way, I want to ask you to think about the
support you may need,” he said. “If you didn’t attend a residential
school yourself, I want you to reach out to people in your community who
did attend or might be impacted by it, and check-in with them.”
Christian said people can support each other by learning Canada’s history and listening to survivors’ stories.
“A lot of people still won’t talk about the horrors that took place
in these so-called schools,” he said. “A lot of people will not believe
that there are unmarked burials at these sites. There are many, many
stories that our people heard and knew – these recent discoveries
confirm what our oral histories taught us.”
Crown lands are viewed as storehouses of resources to be
exploited and Indigenous Peoples have no say over what happens on most
of it
By David Suzuki | Jun 23, 2021
Nick Lachance PHOTO| Six Nations Land Defenders rally at Queen's Park in October 2020.
The Indigenous Land Back movement isn’t new, but it’s gaining increasing public attention and support.
In this time of facing uncomfortable truths about past and ongoing
harms inflicted on Indigenous Peoples and others, it’s important to
understand the history of colonial oppression, and the roots and goals
of Land Back and what it means.
It’s not just about land. In the first of three short Land Back videos (about 12 minutes each) – Past, Present and Future
– Ojibwe journalist Jesse Wente says, “It’s about self-determination
for our Peoples here that should include some access to the territories
and resources in a more equitable fashion, and for us to have control
over how that actually looks.”
Throughout Canada’s history, Indigenous Peoples have been forced from
the lands that sustained them for millennia to ever-diminishing
“reservations” so colonizers could exploit “resources.” Even national
parks, including Jasper and Banff, and municipal parks like Vancouver’s Stanley Park, were created after the original people living there were expelled.
As Jasper’s website says
of the park’s creation in 1907, “Indigenous peoples were considered
incompatible with nature and so couldn’t live in, hunt or harvest within
park boundaries. First Nation and Métis peoples were physically removed
from the landscape, blocked from accessing it and banned from
harvesting plants and animals, holding gatherings and accessing cultural
sites.”
Most federal and provincial Crown lands are viewed as storehouses of
timber, oil, gas and minerals to be exploited and mostly exported.
Indigenous Peoples have no say over what happens on most of it, so land defenders have to step in.
Wente argues that Canada was established more as an “extractionist corporation” than a country.
Anishinaabe storyteller and artist Bomgiizhik agrees: “When Canada
formed and became its own country, they created something called the
Indian Act, which was to force people off their traditional lands, have
them contained onto reservations and then filtered into colonization so
that they would never, ever become a threat to resource extraction.”
As with the recent finding of 215 children
buried on the grounds of the former Kamloops Residential School (and
evidence of many more throughout the country), growing awareness of
missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, the appalling foster care and “’60s scoop” systems and more, these issues are not history; they’re ongoing, with impacts that continue through generations.
Ultimately, Land Back is about confronting these colonial abuses and
charting a new path. But it holds different meanings for different
people.
Anishinaabe-Ininew 4Rs Youth Movement co-ordinator Ronald Gamblin writes in a blog,
“When I hear Indigenous youth and land protectors chant ‘Land Back!’ at
a rally, I know it can mean the literal restoration of land ownership.
When grandmothers and knowledge keepers say it, I tend to think it means
more the stewardship and protection of mother earth. When Indigenous
political leaders say it, it often means comprehensive land claims and
self-governing agreements. No matter what meaning is attached, we as
Indigenous nations have an urge to reconnect with our land in meaningful
ways.”
It’s about responsibilities as well as rights. Beverly Jacobs, acting
dean at the University of Windsor’s law faculty and a member of the
Haudenosaunee Confederation, says Indigenous laws are about
responsibility, relationships and reciprocity. “It isn’t until we bring
in the colonial law that all of a sudden we’re talking about rights,”
she says, noting that rights are based on the individual whereas
Indigenous law is based on responsibility to “all our relations,”
including land.
That’s important, as western ways are unsustainable. “It’s not that
the earth can’t sustain all of humanity. It’s that the earth can’t
sustain what humans are doing,” Wente says.
The goal is to move forward together, not return to some idealized
past. “Every relationship evolves, and our relationship with land has to
be one that accepts our modern circumstances as Indigenous People,”
Anishinaabe-Métis associate professor Aimée Craft says.
Bomgiizhik says Canada must listen to Indigenous Peoples not just
when they’re protesting or blockading. “How we’re going to win is by
people working together and actually getting on the land and building
sustainable economies with their bare hands.”
Land Back is rooted in Indigenous Peoples’ rights and
responsibilities, but it’s also about finding a better way forward for
everyone who lives here.
Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Senior Writer and Editor Ian Hanington. Learn more at davidsuzuki.org.
Teepees at the Legislative grounds return, with a permit this time
One of the organizers of the Justice For Our Stolen Children camp looks
back on the protest during National Indigenous Peoples Day.
Alec Salloum | Jun 21, 2021
North
and west of the Saskatchewan, Canada and United Kingdom flags flying at
the Saskatchewan Legislative Building on Monday sat two teepees, one
flying the Kahnawake Warrior Society flag.
On National Indigenous Peoples Day (NIPD), Prescott Demas was in Wascana Park near two teepees and a musician playing songs on an acoustic guitar to a crowd of spectators.
The teepees were set up on the West Lawn of Wascana Centre following
the new bylaws brought in by the Provincial Capital Commision on June
21, 2021.Photo by TROY FLEECE /Regina Leader-Post
'In their silence, they woke the world': Squamish Nation releases powerful video
“We are the original caretakers.
"We are still here.
“We are the children and grandchildren of stolen lives. And we will not be buried."
The video ends with Squamish Nation Elder Jackie Gonzales saying, “In
their silence, they woke the world" and 215+ appearing on the screen.
The short but impactful video was produced by Ayás Mén̓men team
leader and filmmaker Calder Cheverie, along with McReynolds and Hailey
Jacobs in youth services, with the support of other team members.
There were 139 residential schools in Canada including 28 in B.C.
where thousands of Indigenous children were forced to attend, stripped
of their culture and language, and subjected to brutal treatment as part
of a program to assimilate them into Canadian society, which began in
the late 1800s. It wasn't until 1984 that all residential schools in the
province were closed down; the last one in Canada didn't close until 1996.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission says the exact number of
children who died "may never be known, but the death rates for many
schools, particularly during times of epidemic or disease, were very
high." Through its work with survivors and Aboriginal organizations on
the Missing Children Project, the TRC has identified more than 4,100 children who died at institutions across Canada so far.
The National Native American Boarding
School Healing Coalition says that for healing to occur, the full truth
about the boarding schools and the policy of forced assimilation must
come to light in our country, as it has in Canada. The first step in a
truth, reconciliation, and healing process, they say, is truth telling. A
significant piece of the truth about the boarding schools is held by
the Christian churches that collaborated with the federal government’s
policy of forced assimilation.
Quakers were among the strongest
promoters of this policy and managed over 30 schools for Indian
children, most of them boarding schools, during the nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries. The coalition is urging the churches to research
our roles during the boarding school era, contribute this research to
the truth and reconciliation process, and ask ourselves what this
history means to us today.
Quaker teachers, families, and students at the Ottawa School, Indian
Territory, 1872. Courtesy of the Quaker Collection at Haverford College.
REGINA, Saskatchewan (AP) — A First Nation in southern Saskatchewan said Wednesday that it has discovered hundreds of unmarked graves at the site of another former residential school for Indigenous children. A statement from the Cowessess First Nation and the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous First Nations, which represents Saskatchewan's First Nations, said that "the number of unmarked graves will be the most significantly substantial to date in Canada.
As First Nations in Quebec plan possible searches of former residential school sites, documents that could help that process have still not been turned over by the Quebec government and the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate.
"Recent events have definitely given some urgency to the
situation," he said, adding the oblates seem willing to work on
releasing more records and that a meeting has already been set up.
The central repository of oblate records on Quebec's
residential schools is the Archives Deschâtelets in Richelieu, about 35
kilometres east of Montreal.
Students and staff of the Fort George Roman Catholic Indian Residential School, Fort George Que., Aug. 8, 1948. (National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation / Deschatelets-NDC Archives )
Melissa Patriquin of the Mnaasged Alternative Care program speaks in Muncey, Ont. in June 2021. (Bryan Bicknell / CTV News)
LONDON, ONT. --
On National Indigenous Peoples Day, a day that celebrates First Nations
culture, there was a major announcement for Indigenous children and
youth in Southwestern Ontario.
The Muncey-based Mnaasged Alternative Care program has secured a foster care license.
It means Indigenous children in the foster system can now find love and
care in culturally appropriate environments, no longer solely under the
care of the Children's Aid Society (CAS).
“The system is old, the framework just doesn’t work, and it’s not
appropriate for Indigenous children and youth,” said Melissa Patriquin,
Mnaasged’s director of Child and Family Services.
The agency will now take direct referrals from the CAS, and will work
to match Indigenous children from First Nations communities across
southern Ontario with caring foster families.
Currently, there are more than 100 Indigenous children in the catchment
area that would benefit from the services of the agency.
Patriqin says the goal is to bring them closer to their cultural identity.
“I don’t think that there’s any Indigenous person who hasn’t been
affected in some way, shape, or form by the inter-generational effects
of residential schools, the '60s Scoop, child welfare. Indigenous people
are so over-represented in the child welfare system right now.”
The agency also has a new headquarters on the Muncey reserve west of
London. It’s equipped with various amenities like a healing lodge,
arbour centres for ceremonies, and a playground.
It will also serve as an administrative and cultural hub for the agency, said Executive Director Mike George.
“This is a really significant piece for us because it helps us
repatriate some of the children who were placed in non-Indigenous
families. It will help us repartriate them back to their communities,
and provide that additional connection to their communities, their
elders, their clans, and their culture.”
Mnaasged is actively seeking foster families. Alternative care
supervisor Kyliegh Alexander said they don’t have to be Indigenous.
Education and training that recognizes First Nations culture and supports children will be provided.
“Like every other child, right? Like they’re just looking for a home,
they’re looking for care and love. They’re going to thrive when their
needs are met and when their care is quality.”
Those interested in becoming a foster family can check here.
My aunt tells me she and my mother are both survivors of the '60s Scoop, a period of time when government policies allowed child welfare authorities to easily take Indigenous children from their families, place them in foster homes, and in many cases adopt them out to white families. It’s all part of a cycle of trauma and I’m finally beginning to see my place within it.
It was against this backdrop that I found myself covering the confirmation of those 215 school children’s remains buried on the grounds of the Kamloops Indian Residential School, and the emotions I had so carefully kept in check all these years came unexpectedly flooding out.
I sobbed my way through the report, barely able to pronounce the words, as all of the forces that have shaped my life, and my family’s lives, and the lives of so many generations of my fellow Indigenous people, seemed to swirl around me.
Initially, I was embarrassed. But with reflection over the past few days, I realize that I have nothing to be ashamed of, but clearly a lot of work to do.I am still figuring out what that will look like, but I know it will involve an effort to reclaim my cultural identity and learn how I fit within the 'Na̱mg̱is First Nation, and establish stronger ties with my people.We also have a lot of work to do as a country, to confront the terrible atrocities that led us to this place where we are all burdened by a dark and shameful legacy that begins with the residential school system, leading to the '60s Scoop, and continuing today with blatant inequality in the child welfare and criminal justice systems.
It is time for all Canadians to learn the true history of this country’s terrible and ongoing mistreatment of Indigenous people — because only then can true healing and reconciliation begin. For me, that journey of understanding begins now.
The Chief of the Association Of Iroquois & Allied Indians said that while Ontario’s $10-million announcement is a good start, it’s a small portion of what is needed to uncover all the unmarked graves at residential schools.“It’s a good gesture for sure, and it’s going to be appreciated, but the reality is the amounts the federal and provincial governments have put in are going to be a drop in the bucket as to what will be needed,” said Grand Chief Joel Abram.
On Tuesday morning, the Ford government announced $10 million in funding over the next three years to help identify and commemorate unmarked burial sites at former residential schools.
This announcement comes in the wake of the discovery of the remains of 215 children in unmarked graves at the former Kamloops residential school.The graves have lead to calls for action investigations on the grounds of all residential schools across the county.
...
with the last relative that has the knowledge of what happened during
the time he and all of his siblings were taken from his home in the '60s scoop.
For about the first 25 years or so, when students died, they were almost
invariably buried here at the school,” said Jim Gerencser, an archivist
at the Carlisle Indian School Digital Research Center, run by nearby Dickinson College.
CARLISLE, Penn. — The remains of 10 Native American and Alaska Native children who died more than 100 years ago while attending Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania are scheduled to be returned home to their communities in Alaska and South Dakota this week, according to a notice from the Department of the Army, which oversees the cemetery.
According to Northern Arapaho Tribal Chairman, Jordan Dresser, tribal member Yufna Soldier Wolf fought for the return of three Arapaho children who are now re-buried on the reservation in Ethete, Wyo.
In light of the recent discovery of a mass unmarked children’s grave in Canada at the site of a former residential school in Kamloops, British Columbia, Dresser said he’d be surprised if there weren't more buried children at Carlisle.
“The records are not as accurate as we want to believe,” he said. “You’ve got to assume the worst.”
Through the Northern Arapaho Tribe’s leadership, 11 children were exhumed between 2017 and 2019. In addition to the Northern Arapaho, those children belonged to the Piegan/Blackfeet Tribe, the Oglala Sioux Tribe, Oneida Nation, the Iowa Nation and the Modo Nation.
The current exhumation will begin on June 19 and is slated to take about a month, according to a report from the U.S. Office of Army Cemeteries. The cemetery will be closed during that time. Objections from family members and public comments can be mailed to Lt Col. Scott Tasler and Capt. Jason Netteler, the OAC project managers, or emailed.
Deb Haaland, the U.S. interior secretary, is the first Native American to serve as a Cabinet secretary.
As I read stories about an unmarked grave in Canada
where the remains of 215 Indigenous children were found last month, I
was sick to my stomach. But the deaths of Indigenous children at the
hands of government were not limited to that side of the border. Many
Americans may be alarmed to learn that the United States also has a
history of taking Native children from their families in an effort to
eradicate our culture and erase us as a people. It is a history that we
must learn from if our country is to heal from this tragic era.
OPINION: White violence not a historical truth: it’s a reality with a history
Although
slavery was abolished and much progress has been made for the First
Nations and all minority groups in these countries, the ideology of
white supremacy and the danger of white violence are still very much
with us today
News Service |
Just
a few days ago, a white man killed a Muslim family in Ontario Canada.
Though widely reported as a singular incident not connected to any other
recent or historical acts of violence, it was in fact the latest in a
long series of ideologically-driven white supremacist violence. The most
immediate connection that springs to mind, also from Canada, is the
horrifying discovery of an unmarked mass grave in which are buried at
least 215 indigenous children who had perished at the hands of white
supremacists.
The remains of these 215 children were discovered at
a site that used to house Canada’s biggest residential school for
indigenous children. It was run by the Catholic Church from the 1890s
through the 1970s, until the federal government shut it down. These
latest reports on the mass graves are part of a twenty-year effort by
Tk’emlups te Secwepemc First Nations people in order to find the missing
children in many of the unmarked mass graves at former school sites
such as Kamloops. Between 1883 and 1996, around 150,000 children passed
through the Canadian version of this system, which was eventually
abolished. Thousands of unaccounted-for children have yet to be found.
They were never seen again by their families. When pressed for answers,
the schools would tell families that their children had died, run away
or simply disappeared, and they would generally refuse to return the
body in case of death.
The brand of hatred that has motivated
white people to assault Muslims in New Zealand, the United Kingdom, the
United States, and Europe is intimately connected to the ideology that
created the “Indian boarding school system” in the US and Canada. Indian
boarding schools were part of America’s and Canada’s so-called
“civilizing mission”. They were the quintessential example of how white
supremacy had been at the heart of both of these countries since the
earliest days of their founding, rather than being a marginal, radical,
and fringe ideology. European settlers wanted to civilize these
“savages”, seeing their own Anglo-Saxon Christian culture as vastly
superior to the many different tribal languages and cultural practices
that the indigenous peoples had.
Richard Henry Pratt, an American
general, had captured a group of indigenous men as prisoners of war. He
taught them how to speak, read and write English, dressed them in
military uniforms and trained them to do labor. He photographed the
results of this assimilation experiment and presented them to the
federal government. This is how he was able to secure funding for the
first Indian American boarding school, set up to “kill the Indian and
save the man,” as Pratt called it. The schools quickly spread across the
US and other colonial countries like Australia, New Zealand, and, of
course, Canada.
With the aid of Christian missionaries, the
Canadian and American governments forcibly removed thousands of
indigenous children from their families and made them attend these
schools, where speaking indigenous languages and their cultural
traditions and spiritual practices were prohibited. Children who did not
comply with the rules were subjected to physical, emotional and sexual
abuse, as well as violence. According to some eyewitness accounts,
priests, for example, would rape students, and when they got pregnant
and gave birth, the babies would be killed, in some cases brutally by
being burned in furnaces.
Indigenous children were forced to cut
their braids, a very important part of their culture. Their names were
changed. As punishment for speaking in their native language, some were
forced to wash their mouths with soap, as if to imply that their mother
tongues were dirty.
In his account of the incidents, a survivor of
one of these schools said [1] that braids were a token of mourning in
his tribal culture, and they were cut only when a relative died; the
closer the relative, the closer the cut to the head. When the
missionaries cut almost all of his hair, he was left wondering whether
his mother had died.
Boarding schools proved to be a very
effective strategy in harming native family networks, culture, and way
of life, by targeting the most valuable members of these communities:
the children. Many children forgot their mother tongues almost
completely, so they were unable to communicate with their families.
While assimilating children, governments continued to steal land from
the First Nations. If a native family refused to send their children to
these schools, they were threatened with imprisonment or the loss of
much-needed food rations. Some families were seen camping outside these
schools just to be closer to their children. Many children were reported
trying to run away, but even if they succeeded, their families and
tribes were located too far away from these schools, making it
practically impossible for them to reunite.
The National Truth and
Reconciliation Commission, set up by the Canadian government, heard
thousands of witness testimonies over the course of six years. The
commission released a report in 2015 with the conclusion that the Indian
residential school system was a form of cultural genocide. They also
requested the Pope to issue a formal apology, which he did not do.
The
indigenous activism that peaked in the 1960s and 1970s, along with the
civil rights movement in the US, campaigned for the closure of these
schools in the US. During the same time period, most of the Canadian
boarding schools also closed.
As the boarding school era came to
an end, white supremacy morphed into a new systematic form of
oppression: the Indian adoption project [2], a government program that
promoted the adoption of native American children by white families.
This was a cheaper way to assimilate indigenous people than running
boarding schools. It was claimed that these indigenous children, dubbed
“the forgotten children”, were not wanted by their own families. The
truth, however, was far from that. These children were ripped apart from
their families based on shady reports prepared by the social services
about child neglect, unfit parenting, or even a household with too many
people. The last one was particularly strange because extended family
was a big part of many indigenous cultures. As a result, hundreds of
children were placed with white families, and some of them later in life
reported that they had been physically, verbally and sexually abused by
these adoptive and foster families. After many years of activism, the
Indian Child Welfare Act was passed in the US in 1977, finally
preventing the removal of Indian children from their families unless
absolutely necessary, and when such a case arises, the child is placed
with their extended family if possible or another indigenous family. To
this day, some conservative white families oppose this act.
When
the mass grave was discovered earlier this month, Canadian Prime
Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted that it was a chapter in a dark history
of his country. One of the biggest lies about violence against
indigenous people in Canada and the US is that it is a historical truth,
while, in actuality, it is a present reality with a history. These
kinds of statements just serve to reinforce the false notion that white
violence is a thing of the past, if at all acknowledged.
White
supremacy and white violence are neither from the past, nor are they
marginal. The US and Canada were both built by slave labor on stolen
indigenous lands. Although slavery was abolished and much progress has
been made for the First Nations and all minority groups in these
countries, the ideology of white supremacy and the danger of white
violence are still very much with us today, as evidenced by recent
events such as the murder of a Muslim family and the discovery of a mass
grave.
By Didem Kaya-Bayram
* The author received her BA in
American Studies from Yale University and her MA in Science Technology
Society Studies from Istanbul Technical University. She has spent the
last five years with TRT as a digital content and strategy specialist.
* Opinions expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Anadolu Agency.
Haudenosaunee boarding school survivors seek justice
Kanentiio, whose name means “handsome pine,” describes life at an Indian boarding school, also known as a residential school, in the 1960s.
The first such facility, Carlisle Indian Industrial School, was founded
in the 1870s by military Capt. Richard Pratt. It was a way to
assimilate Native American children into “white” society and, in Pratt’s words, “kill the Indian to save the man.”
“The intent was to extinguish us as
Aboriginal people and destroy whatever sense of self-worth we had, and I
can say that they succeeded to a large degree,” Kanentiio said. “They killed our spirit. They killed us.”
Many students sent to these schools went missing. Last month, 215
children’s remains were discovered in British Columbia at one of nearly
500 boarding schools in Canada and the U.S.
The discovery has sparked renewed calls for justice from Indigenous
communities and for further investigations — forensic and archeological —
into more residential schools.
“It’s
high time that this American country recognizes the great value and
resource in its indigenous populations and celebrates and promotes and
supports,” said Michael Galban, curator at the Seneca Art and Culture Center at Ganondagan State Historic Site.
Last year, Democrats in the U.S. Senate introduced a bill that would
create a Truth and Healing Commission, which would investigate and
document past injustices of what they call the federal government’s
cultural genocide. So far, the bill has not progressed in any fashion.
Undoing this magnitude of injustice would take multiple long-term solutions, Galban said, starting with policy changes.
“It would involve language restoration,” he said. “It would involve environmental restorations. It would involve, in some cases, restoring people to their original homelands.”
It would also mean recording oral histories of survivors’ experiences.
“Every day, we’re losing the stories from the survivors as they age out and pass away,” he said. “Hopefully they’re sharing their stories with their families.”
Survivors’ stories Galban’s grandmother, Evelyn Evans Galban, was a residential school survivor.
In the 1920s, she was taken from her home in California and sent to
the Stewart Indian School in Nevada, where Galban said she experienced
abuse.
“The idea was that you could strip these
Indian children of their culture and their ideologies and create a new
cheap labor class that certain areas of the country could exploit,” Galban said.
During the school year, she was taught how to fold laundry, set
tables and make beds, he said. During school breaks, she couldn’t go
home.
“During the summers, these schools would
hire out the students under the guise that they would be learning how to
live amongst the whites,” Galban said. “But really, they were being farmed out to hotels and resorts to be their domestic labor.”
She attempted to run away multiple times. On one occasion, she was caught “in the middle of the winter. They took away her shoes and basically whipped her back to school with no shoes on,” Galban said.
Finally, with the help of a cousin, she managed to run away to Montana, Galban said.
No choice Indian boarding schools were compulsory at the time. It
would be another 12 years before the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978
would give Native American parents the legal right to refuse their
children’s placement in these kinds of schools off reservations.
Until then, Native leadership and families were essentially held hostage by the federal governments of the U.S. and Canada.
“If there was ever, whether it be by
leadership or families, any action to stop or take their children
(back), they were often persecuted and arrested and faced problems for
that as well,” said Mohawk Grandchief Abram Benedict.
In 1966, Kanentiio was 11 years old when police and social services
took him from the St. Regis Mohawk Reserve near Ottawa, Canada, and sent
him nearly 350 miles west to the Mohawk Institute in Brantford,
Ontario.
He’s now one of about 40 remaining Mohawk survivors.
At the school, Kanentiio said the abuse came not just from staff but
also from older students who he said were encouraged to discipline the
younger students.
After a few years, he managed to escape — first by way of expulsion: He and his classmates were non-compliant, troublemakers.
“Our rude behavior was our survival,” Kanentiio said. “We couldn’t just simply be compliant. We had to fight, physically if necessary, to stop these things from happening.”
Still, when he was expelled, he wasn’t sent back to the reservation.
He was put into foster care and bounced around from one home to the
next until he eventually managed to run away back home, he said.
More than 50 years later, Kanentiio wishes he could confront those
personally responsible for the brutal treatment, abuse, and for ripping
families apart.
“It’s a terrible thing to walk around believing that you’re not truly a human being or a complete human being,” he said. “Something deep and wonderful has been lost. And that’s the terror of this thing.”
Stephen Bronstein was suspended for one month and fined $4,000 after admitting to mishandling the cases of Sixties Scoop survivors. A
First Nation in B.C.’s Cariboo region is condemning the B.C. Law
Society’s handling of a Vancouver lawyer’s mishandling of residential
school survivor cases.
Bronstein was fined $4,000 after admitting
to mishandling the cases of residential school survivors. He was also
barred from acting as counsel for any ’60s Scoop claimants in the
future.
The
’60s Scoop was a large-scale program that allowed child welfare
organizations to remove Indigenous children from their families and
place them in the foster care system and allow them to be adopted by
white families.
The
Tŝilhqot’in Nation on Wednesday condemned the law society for not
adequately punishing Bronstein, noting that many of his clients were
from the First Nation.
The bill codifies provisions from the federal Indian Child Welfare Act in state law and will ensure that Oregon's practices better serve Indian children, ...
Phyllis Webstad was 6 years old when the new orange shirt she chose for
her 1st day of school was stripped off her back. It was the early 70s
& she was the 3rd generation to attend St. Joseph’s Residential
School in Williams Lake, BC.
While the suggestion is daunting, the 53-year-old member of the
Stswecem’c Xgat’tem First Nation said she cannot help but think about a
picture of a bridge hanging on her living room wall that her Aunt Agnes
Jack purchased at a yard sale.
“The bridge is woven together with rope and tree roots,” she said.
“It’s not pretty, it’s not perfect, but it’s enough that you could walk
across it.”
Webstad said she keeps thinking about that.
“That’s been my life it seems because I grew up on the reserve, I’m
half Secwepemc, I’m half white and I have lighter skin so I’ve been more
readily accepted in the non-Indigenous community and I’ve been able to
be a bridge builder or gap person.”
She described the time period since the announcement confirming the
remains of 215 children buried at the former Kamloops Indian Residential
School as a whirlwind.
Webstad’s mom Rose Wilson gave birth to her in July 1967 at her grandmother Lena Jack’s home in Dog Creek. She found her birth father in Kamloops a few years ago. “I have eight other siblings, one passed away, so there are seven. They all live in Kamloops.”
