Happening Now – Webcast from “Sharing Truth”
March 1, 2011
UPDATE: Some of the presentations are available online. Click here to watch.
For those people (like me) who couldn’t make it to the “Sharing Truth – Creating a National Research Centre on Residential Schools” Forum in Vancouver, you can watch the proceedings online here.
Catherine Kennedy at the Sharing Truth event in Vancouver
At the moment, Catherine Kennedy, the Executive Director of the South Africa History Archives is discussing some of the challenges regarding the compilation, interpretation and accessibility of the TRC archives in South Africa. Tom Adami, Chief of the Archives and Records Management United Nations Mission in Sudan is scheduled to speak next.
The program for the rest of Day One of the Forum is available here.
e-misférica: After Truth
February 22, 2011
A special edition of e-misférica, focusing on truth commissions, has just been published. The articles and reviews cover a diverse range of issues related to truth commissions around the world. I have two short pieces on the IRS TRC in this issue: Contexualizing Truth: Recent Contributions to Discourses of Reconciliation in Canada, and The Nation Gathers. Looking forward to reading more of this special edition.
Louder than Words
January 24, 2011
There is an article in the New York Times today about Zimbabwean artist, Owen Maseko, whose recent exhibit at the National Gallery has been censored. Maseko’s work focuses on the Gukuranhundi, a massacre of thousands of Ndebele people that occurred between 1983 – 1987 in Zimbabwe. The exhibit remains standing but access has been barred. Instead, patrons can catch glimpses of the work from a balcony above. The windows of the gallery have been covered with newspapers.
The windows of the National Gallery, covered in newspaper. Source: NY Times
The New York Times article touches on the troubled past (and present) of Zimbabwe under President Mugabe’s rule, and discusses the fear of a public who cannot criticize its rulers or play a hand in shaping their country’s future. It also highlights the complicated relationship between art, politics and reconciliation. The article notes that Owen Maseko “created the Gukurahundi exhibit to contribute to reconciliation.” I wonder what reconciliation means in this context, especially given that Mugabe is still in power.
As my research on the Indian Residential School Truth and Reconciliation Commission (IRS TRC) moves forward, the role of artwork in the negotiation of a troubled past and particularly within the context of reconciliation continues to arise as an area of interest. The IRS TRC has put out a call for artwork, recognizing that images/artwork/film etc. can play a powerful role in processes of reconciliation. It is the first TRC that has prioritized artist engagements with the past in this way.
I recently came across this image on one of my favorite blogs, No Caption Needed. The blog post is entitled “Seeing the Past in the Present,” and showcases the work of artist Sergey Larenkov. Larenkov uses archival images of Europe during World War II and current photographs to make the past legible in the present. Because I find these images so striking, and because sometimes images do speak louder than words, I end this post with one of Larenkov’s images.
By Sergey Larenkov. Source: No Caption Needed
Back to the matter at hand
December 1, 2010
Postcard for The Children Remembered
I’ve been looking through the archival documents and images I brought with me to Paris and am still trying to process the many stories they tell. Because in most cases I did not bring the originals with me, I am either looking at pictures of pictures (photographs I’ve taken of the images), photocopies or reproductions of the originals that are now circulating in different ways.
The image that has my attention now is a postcard printed by the United Church of Canada. It is a piece of promotional material for their Residential Schools Archival Project: “The Children Remembered.” There is a lot going on in the photo. The children are drawing “zeros” or perhaps circles on the blackboard, their backs facing away from us. Three girls, five boys. The banner “Looking unto Jesus” is perched above them in bold block letters. The image conveys both a sense of movement and a sense of stillness. The second girl is caught with her head looking slightly to her left; the boy second from the right seems to be reaching upwards to write higher. The angle from the picture is taken positions the photographer (and the viewer of the photograph) within the first rows of the classroom.
On the back of the postcard is a short excerpt from the United Church of Canada Apology made in 1986: “We tried to make you be like us and in so doing we helped to destroy the vision that made you what you were.”
Happening Now: Webcast of Public Education Initiative
October 26, 2010
To watch the live webcast of Public Education Initiative, presented by the Indian Residential School Survivors Society, connect to the IRSSS site and click on the webcast link. The event is scheduled to run from 8:30am – 4:30pm PST and is hosted by Squamish Nation at the Chief Joe Mathias Centre in North Vancouver.
The audience listens to Grand Chief Stewart Phillip the Public Education Initiative.
Grand Chief Edward John addresses the audience via video link
New York and Toronto: Two Upcoming Events
October 12, 2010
I wish I could attend this event in New York:
October 18 2010, 6 – 8pm: The University Seminars on Cultural Memory and on Redress invite you to join in a discussion of the new publication, MEMORY: HISTORIES, THEORIES, DEBATES (Fordham), which explores the future of memory studies. Its editors, Susannah Radstone and Bill Schwarz, will present their project. Respondents Daniel Levy, Jenny James and Marita Sturken will join them in a discussion of the state of the field and its future.
Location: Room 1 on the 2nd Floor of Faculty House
(http://www.columbia.edu/about_columbia/map/faculty_house.html)
But at least I’ll be able to attend this event in Toronto:
imagineNATIVE is a media festival in Toronto running from October 20th until October 24th. See the program here. I’m particularly interested in seeing A Windego Tale, the closing night film.
A Windego Tale:
Against an idyllic autumn backdrop, Harold (Gary Farmer) embarks on a road trip north with his troubled grandson and recounts a story of their family’s harrowing past that began a generation earlier. In a remote northern community, Lily (Andrea Menard) returns home after a 15-year absence and reunites with her estranged mother, Doris (Jani Lauzon). When she begins to uncover the terrifying legacy of the community’s residential school and its ties to her own family, the weight of the past threatens to awaken the sinister spirit of the Windigo. With an all-star cast that includes the screen debut of acclaimed writer Lee Maracle, this gripping and potent psychological drama depicts the intergenerational scars left by residential schools in this dark chapter of Canada’s history, and the power of reconciliation and hope for the future.
TRC Commission and Canadian Senate Hearing
September 27, 2010
On Tuesday morning (September 28, 2010), the IRS TRC commissioners will give an update on the commission’s progress to the Senate Committee on Aboriginal Peoples. Their presentation will be webcast live at 9:30am Eastern. For details, click here, and to watch the webcast, click here.
UPDATE: FULL TEXT OF THE PRESENTATION CAN BE READ HERE: INDIGENOUS PEOPLES ISSUES AND RESOURCES.
Photo of Justice Murray Sinclair, Chair of the IRS TRC, courtesy of CBC.ca
Blog Link: Media Indigena
August 30, 2010
Check out Media Indigena, a collaborative blog by 7 indigenous contributors. The blog focuses on indigenous issues from around the world and topics range from politics, culture and the environment. A couple of their recent posts focus on the election of Australia’s first Aboriginal MP and Stephen Harper’s visit to the Canadian Arctic. They’ve also posted about the Indian Residential School system and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. For example, check out Sorry is Right and Reflections of a Residential School Survivor.
Looking at the archives
August 13, 2010
St. Paul's Indian Residential School - North Vancouver, 1890s-1950s
After my trip to Winnipeg to attend the TRC’s first national gathering, I traveled to Vancouver to continue my research and visit family. I had the pleasure of spending some time at the North Vancouver Archives where I tried to find more information about St.Paul’s Indian Residential School. Although some of the school’s records are held by the Catholic church, which ran the school, the municipal archives did have a few photographs and documents from the school.
For me, there is something really powerful about looking through these images. They are so personal, yet so removed from their personal histories. The images of school students posed for class photos have a somewhat universal feel; so many of us can recall these sorts of pictures from our own pasts. At the same time, the images from the Indian Residential Schools, particularly during the era that I was looking at on this trip (the 1950s), are tinged with a sort of sadness. I understand that perhaps this is only my personal reading of these images, and that others may look at them and find other emotions. Still, these images prompted me to imagine the difficulties these students may have faced.
After my trip, I wondered whether I should post some of the images I saw to my blog. I do think the photographs are moving and meaningful, but ultimately, I decided to wait. Even though the images are in a public archive, they are of individuals who may or may not want them circulated without their knowledge or consent. Particularly in the case of Native peoples in Canada (and elsewhere), photographic images have been circulated in problematic ways, often with little input from the “photographic subjects” themselves. So, instead, I’ve posted a few images of the St. Paul’s Indian Residential School from the past, and of what now stands in its place.
To some extent, my research focuses on how these archival images are circulated in the climate of the IRS TRC, and I understand that my own research will play a role in this process. I’ve seen these types of images used in the media without much context. In some cases, there are lists of names that accompany the images. In others, the students in the pictures are unidentified. Often, these pictures of individuals stand in for a general history, and I find this troubling. For this reason, I am hesitant to contribute to the circulation of these images without processing further what this circulation means/produces/activates.
The floor plan for the Indian Day school, which was built to replace St. Paul's Indian residential school. In the upper left hand corner, an image of the school after its completion.
The building today - now St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic high school.
Above: an image of the closing event at the Canadian TRC’s first national gathering.
Below: a list of some of the coverage of the Canadian Truth Commission’s first national gathering in Winnipeg. (Thanks to Viola, Leonard and Harmony for some these links!)
Truth and Reconciliation Walkers Headed for Winnipeg (Wawatay News Online)
Strahl Breaks Down at Hearings Into Residential Schools (Global Winnipeg)
Ottawa Makes Own Gesture of Healing at Truth and Reconciliation Event (Edmonton Journal)
Minister Strahl Delivers A Speech on the Truth and Reconciliation National Event (IsumaTV)
Residential Schools Will Be Nixed from Indian Act (The Vancouver Province)
Residential School Stories Move From Shadows (CBC.ca)
Ottawa Intends to Amend Indian Act (Financial Post)
Commission Will Hear Residential School Truths that Will ‘Heal Us All’ (Metro)
Residential Schools: Stories to Tell and Re-tell (The Globe and Mail)
Truth and Reconciliation (video clips covering the first national gathering – The National)
Harbinger of Truth Sees Hope for Future (Edmonton Journal)
Declaration Adoption is ‘a step on the journey of reconciliation’ (Indian Country Today)
Pupils to Study Residential Schools (Winnipeg Free Press)
Some Former Residential School Students Struggle with Church Presence at Reconciliation Event (The Globe and Mail)
