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Founded in the 19th century, the Canadian Indian residential school system was intended to assimilate the children of the Aboriginal peoples in Canada into European-Canadian society.[1] The purpose of the schools, which separated children from their families, has also been described as cultural genocide or "killing the Indian in the child."[2][3]
Although Education in Canada had been allocated to the provincial governments by the British North America BNA act, aboriginal peoples and their treaties were under the jurisdiction of the federal government.[4] Funded under the Indian Act by the then Department of the Interior, a branch of the federal government, the schools were run by churches of various denominations — about 60 per cent by Roman Catholics, and 30 per cent by the Anglican Church of Canada and the United Church of Canada, along with its pre-1925 predecessors, Presbyterian, Congregationalist and Methodist churches. This system of using the established school facilities set up by missionaries was employed by the federal government for economical expedience. The federal government provided facilities and maintenance, and the churches provided teachers and education.[4]
The foundations of the system were the pre-confederation Gradual Civilization Act (1857) and the Gradual Enfranchisement Act (1869). These assumed the inherent superiority of British ways, and the need for Indians to become English-speakers, Christians, and farmers. At the time, Aboriginal leaders wanted these acts overturned.[5]
The system was designed as an immersion program: children were prohibited (and sometimes punished) for speaking their own languages or practicing their own faiths. In the 20th century, survivors of the schools claimed that officials and teachers had practiced cultural genocide and ethnocide. Because of the relatively isolated nature of the schools, there was an elevated rate of physical and sexual abuse. Overcrowding, poor sanitation, and a lack of medical care led to high rates of tuberculosis, and death rates of up to 69 percent.[6] Details of the mistreatment of students had been published numerous times throughout the 20th century. Following the government's closure of the schools in the 1960s, the work of indigenous activists and historians led to greater awareness by the public of the damage which the schools had caused, as well as to official government and church apologies, and a legal settlement. This has been controversial both within indigenous and non-indigenous communities.[7]
The first residential schools were established in the 1840s and the last residential school closed in 1996.[8] Their primary roles were to convert Indigenous children to Christianity and to "civilize them".[9] In the early 19th century, Protestant missionaries opened residential schools in the current Ontario region. The Protestant churches not only spread Christianity, but also tried to encourage the Indigenous peoples to adopt subsistence agriculture as a way to ensure they would not return to their original lifestyles after graduation.[10] For graduates to receive individual allotments of farmland, however, would require changes in the communal reserve system, something fiercely opposed by First Nations governments.
In 1857, the Gradual Civilization Act was passed by the Legislature of the Province of Canada with the aim of assimilating First Nations people. This Act awarded 50 acres (200,000 m2) of land to any indigenous male deemed "sufficiently advanced in the elementary branches of education" and would automatically "enfranchise" him, removing any tribal affiliation or treaty rights.[10] With this legislation, and through the creation of residential schools, the government believed indigenous people could eventually become assimilated into the population. It ignored the matrilineal systems of many tribes, in which property was controlled and passed through the maternal line, as well as the major roles that Aboriginal women typically had in cultivating their crops after men had cleared the fields. After confederation (1867), Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald commissioned Nicholas Flood Davin to write a "Report on Industrial Schools for Indians and Half-Breeds"[11] (now known as the "Davin Report"), which was submitted to Ottawa in March 1879 and led to public funding for the residential school system in Canada.[12]
In 1884,[13] attendance became compulsory by law for status Indians under 16 years of age. Children were often forcibly removed from their families, or their families were threatened with prison if they failed to send their children willingly.[14] Students were required to live on school premises. Most had no contact with their families for up to 10 months at a time because of the distance between their home communities and schools, and sometimes had no contact for years. They were prohibited from speaking Aboriginal languages, even among themselves and outside the classroom, so that English or French would be learned and their own languages forgotten. They were subject to corporal punishment for speaking their own languages or for practicing non-Christian faiths, policies that have given rise to allegations of cultural genocide.[15][16][17]
After the Second World War, the Canadian Family Allowance Act began to grant "baby bonuses" to families with children, but ensured this money was cut off if parents refused to send their children to school. This act added more coercion to have indigenous parents to accept the residential school system.[18]
Compulsory attendance at the residential schools had ended by 1948, following the 1947 report of a Special Joint Committee and subsequent amendment of the Indian Act; although this did little to improve conditions for those attending.[19] Until the late 1950s, residential schools were severely underfunded, and relied on the forced labour of their students to maintain their facilities, although it was presented as training for artisan skills. The work was arduous, and severely compromised the academic and social development of the students. Literary education, or any serious efforts to inspire literacy in English or French, were almost non-existent. School books and textbooks, if they were supplied, were drawn mainly from the curricula of the provincially funded public schools for non-Aboriginal students; and teachers at the residential schools were considered to be under-trained.
When the government revised the Indian Act in the 1940s and 50s, a slim majority of Indian bands, along with regional and national native organizations, wanted residential schools to stay open. Those who supported the schools wanted to keep the religious component as well. Motivations for support of the schools included their role as a social service in communities suffering extensive family breakdown; the significance of the schools as employers; and the seeming lack of other opportunities for children to receive an education. In the 1960s, when the government decided to close certain schools, some Indian bands pleaded to have them to remain open.[20] In 1969, after years of sharing power with churches, the Department of Indian Affairs took sole control of the residential school system.[10]
In Northern Alberta, parents protested the DIA decision to close the Blue Quills Indian School. In the summer of 1970, they occupied the building and demanded the right to run it themselves. Their protests were successful and Blue Quills became the first Native-administered school in the country.[21] It continues to operate today as the Blue Quills First Nations College, a tribal college.
In the 1990s, investigations and memoirs by former students revealed that many students at residential schools were subjected to severe physical, psychological, and sexual abuse by teachers and school officials. Several prominent court cases led to large monetary payments from the federal government and churches to former students of residential schools.
The last residential school, White Calf Collegiate, was closed in 1996. A settlement offered to former students was announced on September 19, 2007.[22]
In 1909, Dr. Peter Bryce, general medical superintendent for the Department of Indian Affairs (DIA), reported to the department that between 1894 and 1908, mortality rates at residential schools in Western Canada ranged from 30% to 60% over five years (that is, five years after entry, 30% to 60% of students had died, or 6–12% per annum). These statistics did not become public until 1922, when Bryce, who was no longer working for the government, published The Story of a National Crime: Being a Record of the Health Conditions of the Indians of Canada from 1904 to 1921. In particular, he alleged that the high mortality rates were frequently deliberate, with healthy children being exposed to children with tuberculosis. At the time, no antibiotic had been identified to treat the disease.
In 1920 and 1922, Dr. F. A. Corbett was commissioned to visit the schools in the west of the country, and found similar results to Bryce. At the Ermineskin school in Hobbema, Alberta, he found 50% of the children had tuberculosis.[10] At Sarcee Boarding School near Calgary, all 33 students were "much below even a passable standard of health" and "[a]ll but four were infected with tuberculosis." In one classroom, he found sixteen ill children, many near death, who were being made to sit through lessons.[10]
In March 1998, the government made a Statement of Reconciliation – including an apology to those people who were sexually or physically abused while attending residential schools – and established the Aboriginal Healing Foundation. The Foundation was provided $350 million to fund community-based healing projects focusing on addressing the legacy of physical and sexual abuse at Indian residential schools. In its 2005 budget, the Canadian government committed an additional $40 million to continue to support the work of the Aboriginal Healing Foundation.
In the fall of 2003, after some pilot projects launched since 1999, the Alternative Dispute Resolution process or "ADR" was launched. The ADR was a process outside of court providing compensation and psychological support for former students of residential schools who were physically or sexually abused or were in situations of wrongful confinement.
On November 23, 2005, the Canadian government announced a $1.9 billion compensation package to benefit tens of thousands of survivors of abuse at native residential schools. National Chief Phil Fontaine of the Assembly of First Nations said the package covers, "decades in time, innumerable events and countless injuries to First Nations individuals and communities." Justice Minister Irwin Cotler called the decision to house young Canadians in church-run residential schools "the single most harmful, disgraceful and racist act in our history." At a news conference in Ottawa, Deputy Prime Minister Anne McLellan said: "We have made good on our shared resolve to deliver what I firmly believe will be a fair and lasting resolution of the Indian school legacy."[23]
This compensation package became a Settlement Agreement in May 2006. It proposed, among other things, some funding for the Aboriginal Healing Foundation, for commemoration and for a "Truth and Reconciliation" program in aboriginal communities, as well as an individual Common Experience Payment (CEP). Any person that could be verified as residing at a federally run Indian residential school in Canada, as well as other criteria, was entitled to this CEP. The amount of compensation was based on the number of years a particular former student resided at the residential schools: $10,000 for the first year attended (one night residing there to a full school year) plus $3,000 for every year resided thereafter.
The Settlement Agreement also proposed an advance payment for former students alive and who were 65 years old and over as of May 30, 2005. The deadline for reception of the advance payment form by IRSRC was December 31, 2006.
Following a legal process including an examination of the Settlement Agreement by the courts of the provinces and territories of Canada, an "opt-out" period occurred. During this time, the former students of residential schools could reject the agreement if they did not agree with its dispositions. This opt-out period ended on August 20, 2007.
The CEP became available to all the former students of residential schools on September 19, 2007. All former students (who met certain criteria) had to apply to receive their full compensation. The deadline to apply for the CEP was September 19, 2011. This gave former students of Indian Residential Schools four years from the implementation date of the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement to apply for the CEP.
Similar forced residential boarding schools for indigenous communities were operated in Australia (where the students are referred to as the Stolen Generation). The Native American boarding schools operated in the United States through the 1970s were far less harsh and not comparable, although its former students have similar complaints, especially about prohibitions against using their own languages and traditions.
On June 11, 2008, Prime Minister Stephen Harper apologized, on behalf of the sitting Cabinet, in front of an audience of Aboriginal delegates, and in an address that was broadcast nationally on the CBC, for the past governments' policies of assimilation.[24] The Prime Minister apologized not only for the known excesses of the residential school system, but for the creation of the system itself.
On October 27, 2011 University of Manitoba president David Barnard apologized to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission for the institution's role in educating people who operated the residential school system. This is believed to be the first time a Canadian university has apologized for playing a role in residential schools.[25]
In 2009, Chief Fontaine had a meeting with Pope Benedict XVI to try to obtain an apology for abuses that occurred in the residential school system.[26] The audience was funded by Indian and Northern Affairs Canada. Following the meeting, the Vatican released an official statement on the church's role in residential schools:
His Holiness recalled that since the earliest days of her presence in Canada, the Church, particularly through her missionary personnel, has closely accompanied the indigenous peoples. Given the sufferings that some indigenous children experienced in the Canadian Residential School system, the Holy Father expressed his sorrow at the anguish caused by the deplorable conduct of some members of the Church and he offered his sympathy and prayerful solidarity. His Holiness emphasized that acts of abuse cannot be tolerated in society. He prayed that all those affected would experience healing, and he encouraged First Nations Peoples to continue to move forward with renewed hope.[27]
Fontaine later stated at a news conference that at the meeting, he sensed the Pope's "pain and anguish" and that the acknowledgement was "important to me and that was what I was looking for."[28]
The Mission School Syndrome (Northern Native Broadcasting, 1985) is a documentary feature that investigates the effect of residential schools in the Yukon, focusing on former residents of the Lower Post Residential School, the Baptist Indian Mission School (Whitehorse), and the Chaoutla Indian Residential School (Carcross), as well as the Yukon Hall Residence in Whitehorse.
"Unrepentant: Kevin Annett and Canada's genocide" is a documentary describing the crimes committed in church-run residential schools.
Older Than America (2008) is a dramatic portrayal of residential schools and conflict with the church.
Where the Spirit Lives (1989) is a CBC dramatic portrayal of a child who is abducted to a residential school.
Residential schools have had lasting effects on aboriginal communities. The schools had a negative impact on aboriginal culture and have led to the partial loss of aboriginal languages as a result of systemic cultural genocide.[29] As a fallout of the residential schools, post-traumatic stress disorder, drug abuse and alcoholism, violence and domestic abuse, and incarceration are much more prevalent in Aboriginals than in other cultures within Canada.[30][31] Further, the children of those who attended residential schools are also more likely to abuse drugs and alcohol than children in other cultures.[32]
Since October 1, 2011, Archaeological surveys and test digs authorized by the elders of the Kanien'keha:ka Nation, have been conducted at the former Mohawk Institute Indian residential school. A test dig in a twenty square foot area on grounds adjoining the former Mohawk Institute have revealed a considerable number of bones, as well as buttons which have been confirmed to be part of the children's school uniforms. Large deposits of coal were also found associated with these remains, all at a depth of barely two feet. Several of the bones have also been cut up, suggesting that the bodies may have been deliberately dismembered, while other bones were broken.[33]
Indigenous populations: Potential solution or impossible dream?. Addiction Research & Theory, 15(5), 439-448. doi:10.1080/16066350701219210
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