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Creative pieces of writing on abusive relationships
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Aboriginal people are struggling to improve their lives while re-discovering their traditional values after years of oppression. In the graphic novel, The Outside Circle, author Patti Laboucane-Benson grapples with the ramifications of government abuses. Laboucane-Benson craftsmanship paints the picture of racial inferiority among First Nations through the residential school trauma, causing readers to ponder the difficult questions of race. Readers observe the novel through Pete’s eyes and follow along on his journey of an identity crisis and self-discovery. The powerful and deeply moving graphic novel reflects the widespread reality regarding manifestation of urban poverty for the First Nations culture through the representation of the injustices …show more content…
The Indian Act existed as an effort to break down traditional indigenous ways and replace those ways with the European culture. The Act gave the government the domination and power to assimilate First Nations peoples through the means of residential schools. The horrific reality of the Indian Act was extended far beyond the residential school system. From social perspectives, many First Nations cultural practices and ceremonies were banned and deemed illegal. Aboriginal people were denied basic human rights and were unable to defend themselves. Sequentially, many turned to an escape route of crime to let out anger. Drug, alcohol and physical abuse were a few to name. The Indian Act is complementary to both the plotline and characters because they deal with the same struggles as many modern day First Nations people. Since Pete had an unstable childhood due to poor parental relationships he turned to activities that allowed him to experience liberation such as the unsolicited use of drugs and gang activity.The hardship Pete and his family faced lead him to his unwise choices. Laboucane Benson alludes to the historic event through portraying the modern day existential crisis caused by oppression and her take on the issue. The advantage of using modern day to reflect upon the Indian Act is that is it can show the everlasting effects of the situation and the influence it still has on many First Nations lives, 150
The Indian Act was an attempt by the Canadian government to assimilate the aboriginals into the Canadian society through means such as Enfranchisement, the creation of elective band councils, the banning of aboriginals seeking legal help, and through the process of providing the Superintendent General of the Indian Affairs extreme control over the aboriginals, such as allowing the Superintendent to decide who receives certain benefits, during the earlier stages of the Canadian-Indigenous' political interaction. The failure of the Indian Act though only led to more confusion regarding the interaction of Canada and the aboriginals, giving birth to the failed White Paper and the unconstitutional Bill C-31, and the conflict still is left unresolved until this day.
In the book Bad Indians, Miranda talks about the many issues Indigenous People go through. Miranda talks about the struggles Indigenous people go through; however, she talks about them in the perspective of Native Americans. Many people learn about Indigenous People through classrooms and textbooks, in the perspective of White people. In Bad Indians, Miranda uses different literary devices to show her perspective of the way Indigenous People were treated, the issues that arose from missionization, as well as the violence that followed through such issues. Bad Indians is an excellent example that shows how different history is told in different perspectives.
According to conservative conflict theory, society is a struggle for dominance among competing social groups defined by class, race, and gender. Conflict occurs when groups compete over power and resources. (Tepperman, Albanese & Curtis 2012. pg. 167) The dominant group will exploit the minority by creating rules for success in their society, while denying the minority opportunities for such success, thereby ensuring that they continue to monopolize power and privilege. (Crossman.n.d) This paradigm was well presented throughout the film. The European settlers in Canada viewed the natives as obstacles in their quest of expansion by conquering resources and land. They feared that the aboriginal practices and beliefs will disrupt the cohesion of their own society. The Canadian government adopted the method of residential schools for aboriginal children for in an attempt to assimilate the future generations. The children were stripped of their native culture,...
Residential schools all across Canada have left its students with the difficult task of regaining a normal life after various abuses. This legacy of residential school system is still affecting people today. In the books Kiss of the Fur Queen by Tomson Highway and Creative Escape 2013 by various inmates, tell stories of attending a residential school and then dealing with the legacy of the residential school system by finding different ways to overcome the effects of the residential school system. One effects of the legacy of the residential school system is isolation. Another effect of the legacy of the residential school system is guilt. Lastly the loss of identity is an effect of the residential school system legacy. The legacy of residential schools through the works of Kiss of the Fur Queen and Creative Escape 2013 show that the legacy of residential schools has caused the survivors to feel isolated from family and community leading to various consequences, the guilt that the characters are taught in the residential schools is carried with the characters after they leave the schools, and the loss of identity the students are left with after leaving the school and going into the cities. These texts not only show that there is a legacy of the residential school system and that the characters face it but that the characters in the texts also find strategies to overcome this legacy through the use of art, traditional teachings and religion.
Literary text sheds light on different erasures through which a dominant Canadian national narrative of benevolence and tolerance emerges. In What We All Long For by Dionne Brand., this tolerance becomes more specific as readers are able to see a struggle in race, generational difference and identity. However, these concepts lead to the creation space negotiation in order to establish Toronto as a home. Through this negotiation there are two kinds of erasures that emerge: fictional and historical. The fictional erasures work to create an unconscious space for the characters. This means that the characters navigate spaces in an intangible manner where they face issues that are not directly impacting to them. It is brought on or is created by the issues they ‘actually’ face. The ‘actual’ issues that these characters face are then transposed into a greater erasure that presents itself as a historical erasure. The fictional erasure becomes a mirror of the historical erasure as it sheds light on how the text manoeuvre through space and time in the text. Though Brand addresses the issues of tolerance while enabling a dominant national Canadian narrative, the novel reveals the generational differences as the vehicle to the negotiation of space. The negotiation of space draws attention to the fictional and historical erasures that show white hegemony as Brand illuminate the issues of immigration, blackness and generational gaps.
“To kill the Indian in the child,” was the prime objective of residential schools (“About the Commission”). With the establishment of residential schools in the 1880s, attending these educational facilities used to be an option (Miller, “Residential Schools”). However, it was not until the government’s time consuming attempts of annihilating the Aboriginal Canadians that, in 1920, residential schools became the new solution to the “Indian problem.” (PMC) From 1920 to 1996, around one hundred fifty thousand Aboriginal Canadians were forcibly removed from their homes to attend residential schools (CBC News). Aboriginal children were isolated from their parents and their communities to rid them of any cultural influence (Miller, “Residential Schools”). Parents who refrained from sending their children to these educational facilities faced the consequence of being arrested (Miller, “Residential Schools”). Upon the Aboriginal children’s arrival into the residential schools, they were stripped of their culture in the government’s attempt to assimilate these children into the predominately white religion, Christianity, and to transition them into the moderating society (Miller, “Residential Schools”). With the closing of residential schools in 1996, these educational facilities left Aboriginal Canadians with lasting negative intergenerational impacts (Miller, “Residential Schools”). The Aboriginals lost their identity, are affected economically, and suffer socially from their experiences.
By telling the story from the Manitous’ omniscient point of view, Boyden (2016) allows the reader to share Chanie’s perception while explaining factually significant events beyond his personal tragedy. This omniscient view by the Manitous is essential for the reader to understand things about the residential school system that Chanie cannot. Chanie’s escape with two other orphaned boys is a tragic one, and it evokes empathy for him by experiencing fear and pain through his eyes. When he is afraid that the authorities, who he calls “Fishbelly”, catch him and beat “a lot of red marks” (Boyden, 2016, p.1-3) into him or when he tries to desperately catch up with his friends and “his chest burns and [he] spit some red-and white spit on the ground...” (Boyden, 2016, p.12), the reader is instantly emotionally involved with Chanie’s struggle. While the reader is invited to share Chanie’s perceptions and emotions, the reader learns through the Manitous that Chanie is not the only one dealing with his situation rather that he is one of many indigenous students who attempted to escape the residential school (Boyden, 2016, p. 6) which is the same institution that also subjected many students to tuberculosis (Boyden, 2016, p.7). This dual perspective allows the reader to learn about how Chanie’s problems are
Despite the decreasing inequalities between men and women in both private and public spheres, aboriginal women continue to be oppressed and discriminated against in both. Aboriginal people in Canada are the indigenous group of people that were residing in Canada prior to the European colonization. The term First Nations, Indian and indigenous are used interchangeably when referring to aboriginal people. Prior to the colonization, aboriginal communities used to be matrilineal and the power between men and women were equally balanced. When the European came in contact with the aboriginal, there came a shift in gender role and power control leading towards discrimination against the women. As a consequence of the colonization, the aboriginal women are a dominant group that are constantly subordinated and ignored by the government system of Canada. Thus today, aboriginal women experiences double jeopardy as they belong to more than one disadvantaged group i.e. being women and belonging to aboriginal group. In contemporary world, there are not much of a difference between Aboriginal people and the other minority groups as they face the similar challenges such as gender discrimination, victimization, and experiences injustice towards them. Although aboriginal people are not considered as visible minorities, this population continues to struggle for their existence like any other visible minorities group. Although both aboriginal men and women are being discriminated in our society, the women tends to experience more discrimination in public and private sphere and are constantly the targeted for violence, abuse and are victimized. In addition, many of the problems and violence faced by aborigin...
8th Fire: Indigenous in the City, is part of a documentary series that describes the challenges that aboriginal people face when moving to the large cities from reservations. The documentary begins by describing the stereotypes that English Canadians as well as other visible minority groups perceive aboriginal people to be. They show how damaging the stereotypes are to the First Nations, especially in the area of education. The documentary concludes by offering a few some solutions of how to change and improve the relationship between the aboriginal community and the rest of Canada. The two main aspects of the film that I will focus my analysis on is the education system from past to present and the negative impacts it has had on the First Nation’s people as well as aboriginal stereotyping. These two themes were the most prominent topics brought up throughout the film, and while one topic was well argued and framed, the other I will argue was more damaging than educational. I should mention that due to my ethnicity being of aboriginal decent, Métis in particular, I was extremely critical of the film because though these issues need to be addressed publicly, if they are presented in the wrong light, it can cause more negative implications than positives.
The school system was than defined as a wide spread system, set up by the Canadian government and directed by churches for fulfilling their delusional responsibility of “educating and caring for Aboriginal people in Canada” (A History of Residential Schools in Canada, 2014). The nominal objective of these two organizations was to “kill the Indian in the child” and to assimilate them into the mainstream Canadian society, so their native traditions would completely abolish in the next few generations.
When created, it was under policies of the federal government calling for assimilation and “civilization”. The act was made so that Natives would become “civilized” and lose their status coming apart of Canadian society. The fact that a native becoming a part of the military, becoming a doctor or lawyer or receiving a university degree would take away their Indian status shows that the goal of the Indian Status of was to keep natives improvised and only given status based on social class rather than compensation for their race. Next, not all Native people have special status under the Indian Act in Canada. The Act applies only to status natives, despite Métis and Inuit both being indigenous to Canada. Also many other Natives who are not registered status due to conditions under the act. The act not being able to apply to all indigenous people of Canada shows the issues with the act since it was created to compensate for the taking of aboriginal
The Indian act, since being passed by Parliament in 1876, has been quite the validity test for Aboriginal affairs occurring in Canada. Only a minority of documents in Canadian history have bred as much dismay, anger and debate compared to the Indian Act—but the legislation continues as a central element in the management of Aboriginal affairs in Canada. Aboriginal hatred against current and historic terms of the Indian Act is powerful, but Indigenous governments and politicians stand on different sides of the fence pertaining to value and/or purpose of the legislation. This is not shocking, considering the political cultures and structures of Aboriginal communities have been distorted and created by the imposition of the Indian Act.
The world continually changes and yet Canada refuses to change its views on the Indigenous Peoples. In the novel, Motorcycles and Sweetgrass by Drew Hayden Taylor, a community is suffering under the thumb of society. The theme of acceptance in history regardless of the pain and suffering is explored to bring more peace. Assimilation has harmed many Indigenous Peoples and their way of life in the story. Their society needs to change to preserve the history of Indigenous Peoples. Everyone who lives in the community must know the truth of the land they stand on. The truth is vague because the trickster hid the truth to prevent the citizens from knowing who he truly is. In order to achieve peace and order, the social norm should be replaced with
When a native author Greg Sams said that the reservations are just “red ghettos”, the author David disagree with that. He thinks there must be something else beyond that point. After his grandfather died, he somehow changed his mind. Because he could not think anything e...
The Indian Act is a legal document that spells out the laws and gives a legal identity to the Aboriginal Peoples of Canada with the exception of the Métis and Inuit. It is more than a body of law, but rather a formal government document that controls every aspect of The Aboriginal Peoples way of life. Our textbook, Ways of Knowing – An Introduction to Native Studies in Canada by Yale D. Belanger states, “…Indigenous people had legally been turned into wards that must be protected and civilized, the British Parliament was responsible for legislating on behalf of them, instead of negotiating with them.” (Belanger, 2014, p. 112)