And this is the story at the heart of colonialism: the people whose land was taken away weren’t using it anyways. Well, they were not using it productively.
Chambers 27
When we look back at Canadian history, we usually don’t go farther than the 1800s. That’s when Canada began, we were taught implicitly, because that is how far teachers go back in the Canadian history classes. Chambers mentions something like this when she was describing her own ancestral history, which is Irish and Scottish. She says: “. . . it was as if their adopted country had no story . . . the story of their new home began with their arrival” (Chambers 25). If Indigenous peoples are mentioned, they are described as this alien other. They aren’t given the same treatment as the Western Caucasian impact on the history of Canada. In Social Studies classes, we usually have a timeline of events. First, there’s a Prime Minister. Then, there’s a railway. Then, so on and so on. One event leads into the next.
European countries, in general, are usually given more complexity and character as well when they are discussed in class. We are told that Greece was one country, but then go in depth describing how each city-state was different from the other, that Sparta and Athens were different. I can barely name some Indigenous tribes, but I think I could list out a couple of reasons archeologists and historians think that Knossos disappeared. A lot of students dislike Canadian history. They don’t want to learn about Prime Ministers. They want to learn about the Battle of Thermopylae, or how the Vikings lived. Perhaps it is just my class, but we like to learn about the distant other at times. Ancient Greece, ancient Rome, and the Medieval Era have a certain mystique that eclipses them. We are intrigued by the Gods and Goddesses that were worshipped because we read novels about them. I remember when I was in middle-school, the book Percy Jackson was popular, which was about Greek Mythology. It was trendy, and all of a sudden, everyone knew the basics of the Gods/Goddesses of Olympus. However, the main reason we didn’t want to talk about Prime Ministers wasn’t because we didn’t care about politics. In today’s social media age, young people are active advocates for social justice and change. We didn’t want to learn about John A. MacDonald because we didn’t see ourselves in him. He was seen as boring, and if that’s all that Canadian History courses could offer, then Canada was indeed a very boring country, especially compared to the U.S.A (with their Revolution and Civil Wars).
I read a book called Clearing the Plains which is about Indigenous peoples before and during colonization. I found their ways of life interesting, and I wanted to know more. I wanted to know more about inter-tribal conflicts. I didn’t know that some of the tribes had complex relationships with one another, as the Greeks did. I also wanted to know their way of life. What did they eat? How did they dress? What was fashionable? What was their education system like? I find myself stumbling onto videos that talk about the Aztec empire, or Aztec theology. Of course, we don’t learn about any of this in class, though I’m almost positive the average teenager would much rather learn about that than a railroad. I learned about the Silk Road, which operated like the railroad in Canada. However, the Silk Road has a grand title, and it is appeared to be political, powerful, fearsome, and a tactical decision between countries at odds. It’s cool. A railroad, though? What I’m saying is that a train is less likely to be romanticized that the grand Silk Road that connected the Eastern and Western worlds.
Indigenous history should be taught, because it’s Canadian history. You can’t just teach the end-tips of it; you have to go back to the start. I was once a hyperactive, anxious teenager. If you gave me a textbook on Aztec or Indigenous mythology and their ways of living before European settlers, I would have eaten it up. Inter-tribal relationships? I would’ve thought it was the coolest thing ever! And yet, I never got that because it wasn’t European. That is why I think Treaty Education is so important. I am not Grecian at all, but it doesn’t take you to be a part of that culture to appreciate it and be enthusiastic to learn about it. Treaties are vital if you want to explain how Europe colonized the Americas. Dwayne Donald goes as far as to explain colonialism is to deny relationships between other people and between yourself. This disconnect is part of the adolescent experience, so this phenomena is readily enticing to kids. They were complex as well; their ways of doing treaties at the start of their relation ship was different from how they did it in the middle of the Hudson Bay period, and the later 1800s and earlier 1900s. Inter-tribal conflict still existed during the Hudson Bay Company’s hold over Canada. How did they feel about the American Revolution? Why were some Indigenous peoples royalists? These are interesting, intriguing questions that leave kids scratching their heads.
The phrase “We are all treaty people” is tossed around, but what does that mean? Even if you yourself are not Indigenous, you agree and must abide by the promises made in a treaty of your given territory just by occupying a space in the land. I was conflicted by this. I come from a country that has negatively changed drastically by European influence. I do not fit in with the Western standards at all. Where do I fit in with all of this? Again, even though I am an immigrant Canadian, I am still a Treaty person because live on Treaty 4 territory. I am thankful I occupy a space this beautiful country. I feel terrible because this is not the country where my parents were raised. And yet, I am given better treatment compared to the Indigenous peoples. I have running water. They don’t. I don’t have to be Caucasian to be privileged. This concept is startling, but children are people who actively seeking out their identities. While educating kids on this notion, I would ask them who they as citizens. Once a teacher makes them responsible for building their selves, their more likely to take this topic seriously and understand it in greater depth.
Books, Books, Books! 