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CANADA
- CANADA'S ABORIGINAL PEOPLES |
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Nearly a million Canadians can
claim at least partial
aboriginal ancestry.
Aboriginal populations
continue to increase, and
interest in their cultural
heritage, by aborigines and
nonaborigines alike, continues
to grow. However, the term
"aborigine" does not
indicate a common or shared
culture, only descent from
groups of people who arrived
on the continent long before
Europeans. Canada's
constitution specifies three
categories of "aboriginal
peoples": Indian, Inuit
and Métis.
The term "Indian"
is now recognized as a
misnomer, but other attempts
to be more specific, such as
"Amerindians" or
"Native Canadians",
have been no more successful
and you're likely to hear
several different terms on
your travels. The terms
"First Nations" and
"aboriginals" are in
vogue but again there is the
possibility of more change.
Treated as wards of the
federal government since the
birth of Canada, the Indians
were put in a different legal
category from all other
Canadians by the Indian Acts
in the nineteenth century.
Modern legal distinctions
divide this group further into
those who are recognized as
"Indian" by the
federal government - a status
bestowed on more than 800,000
Canadians - and those who are
denied this recognition, the
so-called "non-status
Indians". Amongst status
Indians there are 633
aboriginal bands (the term
"tribe" has also
become outmoded) across
Canada. Some communities
number fewer than 100
inhabitants and others more
than 5000. Status enables
rights to fishing, hunting and
living on a reservation, while
nonstatus denies these rights
but allows a person to vote,
buy property and alcohol.
Status can be lost and gained
through marriage, an act of
parliament or even a band
taking a vote on the matter.
Later, as Canada's
attention turned to its vast
nothern regions, the Inuit
were also recognized as
falling under federal
jurisdiction. The Inuit have a
separate origin, arriving much
later to North America and
inhabiting the inhospitable
lands of Arctic Canada. The
term Inuit totally replaced
use of the derogatory term
"Eskimo" in the
1970s. Eskimo is an Algonkian
word for "eaters of raw
meat". The Inuit share a
common origin and a single
language and at present number
around 27,000.
With a current population
of 400,000, the Métis
are the product of the unions
between male fur traders,
usually French-Canadians, and
native women, particularly
Cree. For centuries they were
not recognized as Canadians or
aborigines, and with no rights
they wandered the country,
unable to settle. After a
failed rebellion in 1885, they
almost disappeared from social
and political life and became
"the forgotten
people", largely
poverty-stricken squatters on
Crown land. Finally, in 1982,
they were recognized as a
First Nation in the
Constitution.
Because of the distances
separating them, each nation
and even each community has
its own characteristics. Their
personality and culture are
fashioned by history, the
environment and by their
surrounding neighbours. A
large part of the aboriginal
people live in relatively
close contact with
nonaboriginal people and
interact on a daily basis with
cultures that have a
determining influence on their
way of life.
If there is any thread
linking these groups, it is
the cultural revival
experienced over the last
forty years. Under the banner
of national political
movements, all of these groups
have renewed their commitment
to organizing their social
world, to re-establishing
legal relationships to the
land, and to maintaining and
revitalizing their cultures
and languages.
Aboriginal population
Population in Canada
defining itself as
aboriginal: number of
individuals and percentage
of local population of each
region (1996)
|
|
| Percentage |
| Atlantic |
37,785 |
6.1 |
| Québec |
71,415 |
1.0 |
| Ontario |
141,525 |
1.3 |
| Manitoba |
128,685 |
11.7 |
| Saskatchewan |
111,245 |
11.4 |
| Alberta |
122,840 |
4.6 |
| British
Columbia |
139,655 |
3.8 |
| Yukon |
6,175 |
20.1 |
| Northwest
Territories |
39,690 |
61.9 |
| Total |
799,010 |
2.8 |
Note: 2001 Census data not
available by the time of
publication
Colonization
When Europeans first arrived
in northern North America
they saw it as a terra
nullius - empty land -
but in reality it was a
complex environment
containing many cultures and
communities. On the west
coast the peoples had built
societies of wealth and
sophistication with
plentiful resources from the
sea and forest; in the
prairies and northern
tundra, the aborigines lived
off the vast herds of
buffalo and caribou; in
central Canada the forests
were home to peoples who
harvested wild rice from the
marshes and grew corn,
squash and beans by the
rivers, supplementing their
harvest with fishing and
hunting; on the east coast
and in the far north, the
sea and land supplied their
needs, and with incredible
ingenuity enabled the
inhabitants to survive harsh
conditions.
Encounters between
aboriginal and nonaboriginal
people began to increase in
number and complexity in the
1500s. There was an
increased exchange of goods,
trade deals, friendships and
intermarriage as well as
military and trade
alliances. For at least two
hundred years, the newcomers
would not have been able to
survive the rigours of the
climate, succeed in their
businesses (fishing,
whaling, fur trading), or
dodge each other's bullets,
without aboriginal help.
Meanwhile diseases
(typhoid, influenza,
diptheria, plague, measles,
tuberculosis, venereal
disease and scarlet fever)
killed tens of thousands -
it is estimated that within
a 200-year period aboriginal
populations were reduced by
as much as 95 percent.
As the fur trade
intensified, the animal
populations were wiped out
in certain areas. This not
only removed the traditional
hunting practices but
sparked off inter-tribal
wars , all the more
bloody now firearms were
involved.
During this period, the
French and British were few
in number, the land seemed
inhospitable and they feared
attack from the aboriginal
nations surrounding them.
They were also fighting wars
for trade and dominance -
they needed alliances with
Indian nations, so many treaties
were consequently
negotiated. The treaties
seemed to recognize the
nationhood of aboriginal
peoples and their equality
but also demanded the
authority of the monarch
and, increasingly, the
ceding of large tracts of
land (particularly to
British control for
settlement and protection
from seizure by the French
and Americans). Usually what
was agreed orally differed
from what actually appeared
in the treaties. The
aborigines did accept the
monarch, but only as a kind
of kin figure, a distant
"protector" who
could be called on to
safeguard their interests
and enforce treaty
agreements. They had no
notion of giving up their
land, a concept foreign to
aboriginal cultures:
In my language, there
is no word for
"surrender". There
is no word. I cannot
describe
"surrender" to you
in my language, so how do
you expect my people to
[have] put their X on
"surrender"?
- Chief François Paulette.
In 1763, the Royal
Proclamation was a
defining document in the
relationship between the
natives and the newcomers.
Issued in the name of the
king, it summarized the
rules and regulations that
were to govern British
dealings with the aboriginal
peoples - especially in
relation to the question of
land. It stated that
aboriginal people were not
to be "molested or
disturbed" on their
lands. Transactions
involving aboriginal land
were to be negotiated
properly between the Crown
and "assemblies of
Indians". Aboriginal
lands were to be acquired
only by fair dealing:
treaty, or purchase by the
Crown. The aboriginal
nations were portrayed as
autonomous political
entities, with their own
internal political
authority. Allowing for
British settlement, it still
safeguarded the rights of
the aborigines.
By the 1800s, the
relationship between
aboriginal and nonaboriginal
people began to tilt on its
foundation of rough
equality. Through
immigration the number of
settlers was swelling, while
disease and poverty
continued to diminish
aboriginal populations - by
1812, whites outnumbered
indigenous people in Upper
Canada by ten to one. The
fur trade, which was
established on a solid
economic partnership between
traders and trappers, was a
declining industry. The new
economy was based on timber,
mining and agriculture and
it needed land from the
natives, who began to be
seen as "impediments to
progress". Colonial
governments in Upper and
Lower Canada no longer
needed military allies, the
British were victors in
Canada, and the USA had won
its independence. There was
also a new attitude of
European superiority over
all other peoples and
policies of domination and
assimilation slowly replaced
those of partnership.
Ironically, the
transformation from
respectful coexistence to domination
by nonaboriginal laws and
institutions began with the
main instruments of the
partnership: the treaties
and the Royal Proclamation
of 1763. These documents
offered aboriginal people
not only peace and
friendship, respect and
approximate equality, but
also "protection".
Protection was the leading
edge of domination. At
first, it meant preservation
of aboriginal lands and
cultural integrity from
encroachment by settlers.
Later, it meant
"assistance", a
code word implying an
encouragement to stop being
a part of aboriginal society
and merge into the settler
society.
Protection took the form
of compulsory education,
economic adjustment
programmes, social and
political control by federal
agents, and much more. These
policies, combined with
missionary efforts to
civilize and convert, tore
wide holes in aboriginal
cultures, autonomy and
identity.
Reserves
In 1637, with a Jesuit
settlement at Sillery in New
France, the establishment of
" reserves
" of land for
aboriginal peoples (usually
of inadequate size and
resources) began. Designed
to "protect", they
instead led to isolation and
impoverishment. In 1857 the
Province of Canada passed an
act to "Encourage the
Gradual Civilization of the
Indian tribes" -
Indians of "good
character" could be
declared
"non-Indian" by a
panel of whites. Only one
man, a Mohawk, is known to
have accepted the
invitation.
Confederation in
1867 was negotiated without
reference to aboriginal
nations. Indeed, newly
elected Prime Minister John
A. Macdonald announced that
it would be his government's
goal to "do away with
the tribal system, and
assimilate the Indian people
in all respects with the
inhabitants of the
Dominion".
The British North
America Act , young
Canada's new constitution,
made "Indians, and
Lands reserved for the
Indians" a subject for
government regulation, like
mines or roads. Indians
became wards of the federal
government and Parliament
took on the job with vigour
- passing laws to replace
traditional aboriginal
governments with band
councils who had
insignificant powers, taking
control of valuable
resources located on
reserves, taking charge of
reserve finances, imposing
an unfamiliar system of land
tenure, and applying
nonaboriginal concepts of
marriage and parenting.
These and other laws were
codified in the main Indian
Acts of 1876, 1880 and
1884. The Department of the
Interior (later, Indian
Affairs) sent Indian agents
to every region to see that
the laws were obeyed. In
1884, the potlatch
ceremony , central to
the cultures of west-coast
aboriginal nations, was
outlawed. A year later the sun
dance , central to the
cultures of prairie
aboriginal nations, was
outlawed. Participation was
a criminal offence.
In 1885, the Department
of Indian Affairs instituted
a pass system . No
outsider could come onto a
reserve to do business with
an aboriginal resident
without permission from the
Indian agent (a sort of
government official with
law-enforcement powers).
Occasionally all aboriginal
persons could not leave
the reserve without
permission from the Indian
agent, either. Reserves were
beginning to resemble
prisons.
In 1849, the first of
what would become a network
of residential schools for
aboriginal children was
opened in Alderville,
Ontario. Church and
government leaders had come
to the conclusion that the
problem (as they saw it) of
aboriginal independence and
"savagery" could
be solved by taking children
from their families at an
early age and instilling the
ways of the dominant society
during eight or nine years
of residential schooling far
from home. Attendance was
compulsory. Aboriginal
languages, customs and
native skills were
suppressed. The bonds
between many hundreds of
aboriginal children, their
families and whole nations
were broken.
During this stage
Canadian governments moved
aboriginal communities from
one place to another at
will. If aboriginal people
were thought to have too
little food, they could be
relocated where game was
more plentiful or jobs might
be found. If they were
suffering from illness, they
could be sent to new
communities where health
services, sanitary
facilities and permanent
housing might be provided.
If they were in the way of
expanding agricultural
frontiers, or in possession
of land needed for
settlement, they could be
removed "for their own
protection". If their
lands contained minerals to
be mined, forests to be cut,
or rivers to be dammed, they
could be displaced "in
the national interest".
The result of centuries
of mistreatment is that by
almost every statistical
indicator the aboriginal
population is highly disadvantaged
compared to all other
Canadians. The problems
affecting aboriginal peoples
are grim, as alcoholism,
drug use and sexual abuse
continue to plague reserves.
Infant mortality is twice as
high among natives than
nonnatives, suicide rates
among young people are five
times higher among Indians
than other Canadians, and
life expectancy is seven
years less for natives.
Native peoples are also
vastly overrepresented in
jails across the country.
Resurgence
The 1940s were the
beginning of a new era.
Around 3000 aborigines and
unrecorded numbers of Métis
and nonstatus Indians had
fought for their country in
both World Wars , and
although accepted on the
battlefield they were still
badly treated at home.
Aboriginal leaders emerged,
forcefully expressing their
people's desire to gain
their rightful position of
equality with other
Canadians and maintain their
cultural heritage, and in
British Columbia, Alberta,
Saskatchewan and Ontario,
aboriginals formed
provincially based
organizations to protect and
advance their interests. The
Canadian public became more
aware of the shocking way
native society was being
treated and how far their
living standards had fallen
behind all other groups of
citizens. The 1951 Indian
Act rescinded the laws
banning the potlatch and
other ceremonies and
aboriginal members were
given the freedom to enter
public bars to consume
alcohol. But, on the whole,
government oppression
remained formidable. The right
to vote in federal
elections was granted only
in 1960.
The rebirth of Canada's
indigenous people can be
traced to 1969, when a
federal " white
paper " proposed
the elimination of Indian
status. The result was a
native backlash that forced
the Trudeau Government to
retreat and led to the
creation of the National
Indian Brotherhood , the
forerunner of today's Assembly
of First Nations .
Also in 1969, all Indian
agents were withdrawn from
reserves, and aboriginal
political organizations
started receiving government
funding. Increasingly, these
organizations focused on the
need for full recognition of
their aboriginal rights and
renegotiation of the
treaties. They believed that
only in this way could they
rise above their
disadvantaged position in
Canadian society. By 1973,
aboriginals had local
control of education and
today more than half of all
aboriginal students who live
on reserves attend their own
community schools.
Reclaiming the land
Land reserved for
aboriginal people was
steadily whittled away after
its original allocation.
Almost two-thirds of it has
"disappeared" by
various means since
Confederation. In some
cases, the government failed
to deliver as much land as
specified in a treaty. In
other cases, it expropriated
or sold reserved land,
rarely with aboriginals as
willing vendors. Once in a
while, outright fraud took
place. Even when aboriginals
were able to keep hold of
reserved land, the
government sometimes sold
its resources to outsiders.
Some aboriginal nations have
gone to court to force
governments to recognize
their rights to land and
resources, and some have
been successful. A series of
court decisions in the 1970s
confirmed that aboriginal
peoples have more than a
strong moral case for
redress on land and resource
issues - they have legal
rights.
In recent years, Canada
has come to a few new
treaty-like agreements
. The Innu and Cree took Québec
to court in 1973, to stop a
major hydroelectric project
that threatened to decimate
their traditional hunting
grounds. The consequent James
Bay and Northern Québec
Agreement , signed in
1975, gave Innu and Crees
(and later the Naskapi) $225
million over 20 years in
return for 981,610 square
kilometres of territory.
They were also given lands
with exclusive hunting and
trapping rights,
native-controlled education
and health authorities. With
their funds the Cree have
set up successful businesses
such as Air Creebec and the
Cree Construction Company.
The Cree-Naskapi Act
, passed in 1984, followed
and enabled the Cree and
Naskapi to establish their
own forms of self-government
- the first such legislation
in Canada.
In 1973, the Supreme
Court of Canada's decision
on the Haida Indians led the
federal government to
establish a negotiating
process to resolve land
claims by recognizing
two broad classes of claims
- comprehensive and
specific. Comprehensive
claims are based on the
recognition that there are
continuing aboriginal rights
to lands and natural
resources and have a wide
scope including such things
as land title, fishing and
trapping rights, financial
compensation and other
social and economic
benefits. Specific claims
deal with specific
grievances that aborigines
may have regarding the
fulfilment of treaties.
In 1982, the government's
recognition of land claims
was renewed by a
constitutional change, which
touched off further
favourable court decisions
leading to new treaties with
the Inuit of the Northwest
Territories (1984 and 1993),
the Yukon First Nations
(1993) and the Nisga'a in BC
(1996).
From the early 1970s
until March 1996, the
government provided
aboriginal groups with
approximately $380 million
to prepare their claims.
This money enabled
aboriginal peoples to
conduct research into treaties
and rights and to
research, develop and
negotiate their claims. But
the negotiations have been
notoriously long and
painstaking, and until 1990
there was a limit of no more
than six comprehensive
claims at one time.
Enterprise
The ownership of land and
control over funding have
brought opportunities for
economic self-sufficiency
and expansion previously
unavailable to aboriginal
groups. This last decade has
seen the rapid growth of a free-enterprise
economy among Canada's
aboriginals, especially in
the cities. In 1995 there
were an estimated 18,000
aboriginal-owned businesses
across Canada. About 66
percent of aboriginal
businesses were in the
service sector; 13 percent
were in construction and
related sectors. Another 12
percent were in the primary
industries such as mining
and forestry, and 9 percent
were businesses related to
food processing, clothing,
furniture, publishing and
other manufacturing. One
fast-growing area is
aboriginal tourism, where an
insight is given into
culture and environment.
However, employment and
subsequent social problems
(particularly among the
growing young population)
are still rampant.
Each year the oil-rich
aborigines get $32 million
in petroleum revenues. This
upsurge in revenue would
seem to bode well, but
migration from the still
impoverished reserves to the
city (which began three
decades ago) is on the
increase, resulting in an
unskilled and impoverished
underclass of aborigines in
Canadian cities and a
subsequent increase in
social fragmentation,
greater unrest and increased
crime. Most of the aborigine
newcomers to the cities are
young, and they are
increasingly angry with the
federal government and their
own leaders. With 60 percent
of aboriginal populations
now city-based, there has
also been the formation of
young street gangs .
Such gangs have made a mark
in Winnipeg, which has the
nation's biggest aboriginal
urban population.
The anger that the
street gangs epitomize has
risen across native
communities. Gang members
complain about financial and
political corruption by
their leaders; young people,
who make up more than half
of the native population,
say they are being ignored
by an uncaring federal
government and ineffectual
elders. As a young native
activist said recently,
"Most of us have
nothing to lose, so we will
do what we have to to have
our voices heard." Violence
is inevitable, and flared up
most notoriously with an
armed standoff between
Mohawk militants and the
Canadian military at Oka in
1990
. Five years later there was
trouble again at Gustafsne
Lake in the British Columbia
interior and Ipperwash
Provincial Park on the
shores of Lake Huron.
Meanwhile, the white
attitude to militancy has
hardened. Tough prison
sentences are passed out to
native protesters who break
the law, yet there is little
punishment for police
officers who overstep the
mark - in 1997, an Ontario
Provincial policeman was
given two years of community
service after he was found
guilty of criminal
negligence in the fatal
shooting of an aborigine
demonstrator at Ipperwash
Provincial Park.
Change
The showdowns attracted much
media attention and after
Oka the government funded a
$60 million exhaustive Royal
Commission on Aboriginal
Peoples , which was
finally published six years
later in November 1996 and
called for fundamental
change and self-government
for aboriginals. The
document presented a
devastating account of the
everyday struggle facing
Canada's aboriginal peoples,
including a catalogue of
deprivation, mistreatment
and official neglect
suffered by native children
in the residential schools.
The report went on to
recommend the creation of an
aboriginal parliament to
decide on land claims,
establish a native
university and steer an
ambitious twenty-year
multimillion dollar
programme of economic aid to
counter native unemployment
and poor housing and health
conditions. The majority of
the recommendations seem to
have been totally ignored by
the present Liberal
government - they've made it
clear that broad structural
change, particularly
anything connected with the
Constitution, is simply not
on its agenda.
In 1998, the government
did, however, formally
apologise to the aboriginal
peoples for the way they had
been mistreated and offered
compensation to those abused
in the school system.
On April 1, 1999, after
decades of negotiations and
planning, the creation of a
new province, Nunavut
, redrew Canada's borders
and gave one-fifth of its
landmass to Canada's
smallest native population,
the Inuit. Known as
"our land" in
Inuktitut, the two million
square kilometres of Nunavut
is home to a self-governed
population of 27,000, 85
percent of which is Inuit.
More recently, in July
2000, the Supreme Court of
British Columbia upheld the
Nisga'a land treaty as
constitutionally valid. This
came after Liberals in
British Columbia tried to
quash the $487 million deal,
which gives 2000 square
kilometres of land, $170
million fishing and logging
rights and a significant
degree of self-government to
the Nisga'a.
For their part the
formerly fractured Assembly
of First Nations , which
represents "status
Indians", enjoyed three
years of relative calm under
its national chief, Phil
Fontaine, who lifted the AFN
out of its debt, inherited
from his predecessor, Ovide
Mercredi, who had taken a
much more hardline approach
to aboriginal sovereignty.
Fontaine also signed a
co-operation agreement, in
July 1999, with the
Washington-based National
Congress of American
Indians, America's largest
Indian organization, to
expand trade and cultural
exchanges.
For all his achievements,
Fontaine was seen as being
too cosy with the government
in Ottawa and in September
2000, Mathew Coon Come, a
tough-talking Cree leader
from northern Quebec, was
elected the new national
chief, perhaps signalling a
return to more
confrontational politics
between Canada's natives and
the federal government.
Cultural Revival
Beyond this volatile
scenario there have been
dramatic improvements
secured since World War II
that have led to a revival
of interest in their own
culture for many aboriginal
people. Ceremonies, like the
summer powwow celebrations,
and art forms that have been
almost forgotten, are being
revived through research and
reconstruction. There are
aboriginal theatre groups
that reinterpret the legends
for modern audiences,
aboriginal authors and poets
who are publishing works
that present unique and
indigenous viewpoints; and
aboriginal painters and
sculptors who are using a
mix of traditional and
modern techniques to produce
vivid and exciting works of
art. A public television
channel for indigenous
people - the Aboriginal
Peoples Television Network
(APTN) - has been on the air
since 1999. However, the
resultant optimism has been
tempered by the threat of
possible violence as
Canada's First Nations seek
redress from cultural
oppression - as Coon Come
declared, "Behaving
like good little Indians
never got us anywhere. There
is a social time bomb that
is ticking away in the many
Indian communities
throughout Canada."
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