Righting Canada S Wrongs Inuit Relocations

A ground-breaking account of multiple forced relocations by the Canadian government of Inuit communities and individuals. All have been the subject of apologies, but are little known beyond the Arctic. The Inuit community has proven resilient to many attempts at assimilation, relocation and evacuation to the south. In a highly visual and appealing format for young readers, this book explores the many forced relocation of Inuit families and communities in the Canadian Arctic from the 1950s to the 1990s. Governments promoted and forced relocation based on misinformation and racist attitudes. These actions changed Inuit lives forever. This book documents the Inuit experience and the resilience and strength they displayed in the face of these measures. Years afterwards, there have been multiple apologies by the Canadian government for its actions, and some measure of restitution for the harms caused. Included in the book are accounts of a community forced to move to the High Arctic where they found themselves with little food and almost no shelter, of children suddenly taken away from their families and communities to be transported to hospitals for treatment for tuberculosis, and of the notorious slaughter by RCMP officers of hundreds of sled dogs in Arctic settlements. Though apologies have been made, Inuit in northern Canada still face conditions of inadequate housing, schools that fail to teach their language, and epidemics of infectious diseases like TB. Yet still, the Inuit have achieved a measure of self-government, control over resource development, while they enrich cultural life through music, film, art and literature. This book enables readers to understand the colonialism and racism that remain embedded in Canadian society today, and the successful resistance of Inuit to assimilation and loss of cultural identity. Like other volumes in the Righting Canada’s Wrongs series, this book uses a variety of visuals, first-person accounts, short texts and extracts from documents to appeal to a wide range of young readers.

Canada's residential school system for aboriginal young people is now recognized as a grievous historic wrong committed against First Nations, Metis, and Inuit peoples. This book documents this subject in a format that will give all young people access to this painful part of Canadian history. In 1857, the Gradual Civilization Act was passed by the Legislature of the Province of Canada with the aim of assimilating First Nations people. In 1879, Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald commissioned the "Report on Industrial Schools for Indians and Half-Breeds." This report led to native residential schools across Canada. First Nations and Inuit children aged seven to fifteen years old were taken from their families, sometimes by force, and sent to residential schools where they were made to abandon their culture. They were dressed in uniforms, their hair was cut, they were forbidden to speak their native language, and they were often subjected to physical and psychological abuse. The schools were run by the churches and funded by the federal government. About 150,000 aboriginal children went to 130 residential schools across Canada. The last federally funded residential school closed in 1996 in Saskatchewan. The horrors that many children endured at residential schools did not go away. It took decades for people to speak out, but with the support of the Assembly of First Nations and Inuit organizations, former residential school students took the federal government and the churches to court. Their cases led to the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, the largest class-action settlement in Canadian history. In 2008, Prime Minister Harper formally apologized to former native residential school students for the atrocities they suffered and the role the government played in setting up the school system. The agreement included the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which has since worked to document this experience and toward reconciliation. Through historical photographs, documents, and first-person narratives from First Nations, Inuit, and Metis people who survived residential schools, this book offers an account of the injustice of this period in Canadian history. It documents how this official racism was confronted and finally acknowledged.

Over more than 100 years, the Canadian government took 150,000 First Nations, Métis, and Inuit children from their families and placed them in residential schools. In these schools, young people were assigned a number, forced to wear European-style clothes, forbidden to speak their native language, required to work, and often subjected to physical and psychological abuse. If they tried to leave the schools to return to their families, they were captured by the RCMP and forced back. Run by churches, the schools were paid for by the federal government. The last residential school closed in 1996. It took decades for people to speak out in public about the devastating impact of residential schools. School Survivors eventually came together and launched court actions against the federal government and the churches. In 2008 the Canadian government apologized for the historic wrongs committed by the residential school system. The survivors’ lawsuits led to the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, the largest class-action settlement in Canadian history, and the establishment of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The Commission spent six years gathering testimony and discovering the facts about residential schools. This book includes the text of the government’s apology and summarizes the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s 94 Calls to Action, which offer the basis for a new relationship between the Canadian government, Aboriginal people, and non-Aboriginal people.

Through an examination of the roles of relief and relocation in response to welfare and other perceived problems and the federal government's overall goal of assimilating the Inuit into the dominant Canadian culture, this book questions the seeming benevolence of the post-Second World War Canadian welfare state. The authors have made extensive use of archival documents, many of which have not been available to researchers before. The early chapters cover the first wave of government expansion in the north, the policy debate that resulted in the decision to relocate Inuit, and the actual movement of people and materials. The second half of the book focuses on conditions following relocation and addresses the second wave of state expansion in the late fifties and the emergence of a new dynamic of intervention.

The RIGHTING CANADA'S WRONGS series is devoted to the exploration of the mostly unknown, and often shocking, stories of Canadian government's racist actions against various ethnic groups through our history, the fight for acknowledgement and justice, and the eventual apologies and restitution of subsequent governments. In this Resource Guide you will find seven lessons that will engage your students while they learn about some of the important events in Canada's history that helped shape our current multicultural society. You will find support for teaching about Canada's past treatment of ethnic minorities and how to approach the topic of racism. As well, your students will learn about the important roles that these minorities have played in Canadian society. SPECIAL FEATURES: A different historical thinking concept is introduced in each lesson Each lesson is directly linked to books in the series. As more books in the series are published, the Resource Guide will be updated. Student Blackline Masters are provided for copying. Evaluation rubrics for your assessment of student achievement on each lesson are included. Video links throughout the guide will supplement your lesson and add another dimension to student learning. Special guide to teaching about racism.

During the Second World War, over 20,000 Japanese Canadians had their civil rights, homes, possessions, and freedom taken away. This visual-packed book tells the story.

Addresses lingering questions about government resettlement of Native Canadians and its impact on their lives.

In 1914, Canada was a very British society with anti-Asian attitudes. Although Great Britain had declared that all people from India were officially British citizens and could live anywhere in the British Commonwealth, Canada refused to accept them. This racist policy was challenged by Gurdit Singh, a Sikh businessman, who chartered a ship, the Komagata Maru, and sailed to Vancouver with over 300 fellow Indians wishing to immigrate to Canada. They were turned back, tragically. Over the years, the Canadian government gradually changed its immigration policies, first allowing entry to wives and children of Indian immigrants and later to many more immigrants from India. The Indo-Canadian community has grown throughout Canada, especially in British Columbia. Many in the community continue to celebrate their Indian heritage which enriches Canadian culture.