Last February, after having been inundated with media coverage of the Idle No More movement, I came upon a cultural exchange program jointly offered by Canadian Roots Exchange and the Health Studies Student Union. The partnership sought to open dialogue about the realities of indigenous life in Canada and foster reconciliation between native and non-native Canadians. With a group of fellow youths from various backgrounds, I travelled to the Six Nations of the Grand River territory, a reserve of the Haudenosaunee people.
Six Nations is fittingly named, with six different Haudenosaunee nations residing there. Under the Haldimand Proclamation of 1784, Six Nations was deeded a tract of land six miles on either side of the banks of the Grand River, from Lake Erie to its source. The approximately 950,000 acres of land was granted to Six Nations for its alliance with the British Crown during the American Revolutionary War. Now, Six Nations comprises of only 46,000 acres of land.
We spoke one morning with two activists on the topic of indigenous peoples’ sovereignty and land rights. They explained to us the mandate of their advocacy group, the Two Row Society, named after the Two Row wampum. John Borrows, a scholar in indigenous law, captures the symbolism of the Two Row wampum: “One row symbolizes the Haudenosaunee people with their law and customs, while the other row symbolizes European laws and customs. As nations move together side-by-side on the River of Life, they are to avoid overlapping or interfering with one another.”
Some believe that the Two Row could serve as a functional framework for decolonization and reconciliation. Driven by the value of non-interference, adherence to the Two Row would entail defending the rights of indigenous Canadians to have autonomy in indigenous matters, especially with regard to upholding land bases under their own systems of self-governance. The undercutting of this autonomy was a main instigator of the Idle No More movement.
At Six Nations, our group’s visit came full circle when we visited the Mohawk Institute, a former residential school preserved for educational purposes. The Mohawk Institute’s past students had been given Christian names arbitrarily, in an attempt to erase all traces of their Onkwehonweh roots. The conditions inherent to residential school life were abhorrent. Pharmaceutical companies would administer unspecified drugs to students and sexual abuse was rampant. It was haunting to have stood within the wooden cavities of a residential school, mired in our nation’s dark history. More haunting still was the realization that we, the Canadian public, have been inadequately exposed to the extent and severity of these historic crimes.
In this way, our group was confronted with the weight of Canada’s colonial history. The residential school era initiated a cycle of violence that continues today: the abused become the abuser, the caned justify the cane, and the oppressed in turn oppress. The effects of colonization are undeniably intergenerational; after all, institutions built on the removal of indigenous culture have a tremendous capacity to impinge on parenting and social skills. One of our group leaders introduced the idea that indigenous Canadians are undergoing a process of decolonization together, as a people. Some are in denial, others are angry, some are ready to reconcile. Given that the last residential school was closed only in 1996, this is sensible. The trauma of colonization is a recent one, and it begs more attention than we have given it.
How can we hope to address high rates of substance abuse in indigenous Canadians without understanding that health was used as a tool for manipulation in the days of residential schools? How can we promise economic productivity when modern legislation mimics the tactics of paternalistic land-grabbing? Why do we constantly tout such economic productivity when, in reality, it is of little concern to traditional Onkwehonweh societies? I am frustrated that too many imbue mistrust and stereotypes in their perception of native Canadians, without regard for the lasting effects of colonial institutions. There is a systemic injustice, manifested in policy and legislation, aimed at indigenous Canadians. The solution to this structural violence, which still encroaches on indigenous agency to this day, is not ignorance, but reconciliation. Our country’s dark colonial past was and is real. Now I know better; it’s time for all of us to share this burden, and be idle no more.
Benedict Darren is a fourth-year student studying pathobiology and global health.
