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
Reconciling Several Pasts
December 20, 2010
The Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission has recently announced a conference to take place in Vancouver (March 2 – 4, 2011) to discuss the proposed National Research Centre on Residential Schools. I recently visited the Nikkei Place / Japanese Canadian National Museum (JCNM) in Burnaby whose funds partially came from the reparations awarded for the internment of Japanese Canadians during World War II. I wonder if the Research Centre on Residential Schools will take their cue from the JCNM, which aims to be a site for both the sharing of information as well as the creation and fostering of a strong Japanese Canadian community.
Raymond Nakamura gave me a tour of the exhibit on the internment and we discussed some of the similarities between the Japanese Canadian experience and the Indian Residential Schools. A few months ago, I posted a short excerpt from Thomas King’s short story, “Coyote and the Enemy Aliens,” which draws connections between these two histories. It seems fitting to post it again here:
“I know the story of the Japanese internment in Canada. I know it as most Canadians know it.
In pieces.
From a distance.
But whenever I hear the story, I think about Indians, for the treatment the Canadian government afforded Japanese people during the Second World War is strikingly similar to the treatment that the Canadian government has always afforded Native people, and whenever I hear either of these stories, a strange thing happens.
I think of the other.
I’m not suggesting that Native people have suffered the way the Japanese suffered or that the Japanese suffered the way Native people have. I’m simply suggesting that hatred and greed produce much the same sort of results, no matter who we practice on.”
Model of Japanese Canadian Internment Camp in Lemon Creek, BC
Image at Internment Exhibit
AFN Event
December 12, 2010
The Assembly of First Nations is holding an event tomorrow, December 13, 2010, in Ottawa focusing on the Indian Residential School Settlement Agreement. The event will be webcast live from 8:30am – 4:30pm. Click here for more information and a link to the webcast.
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
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
Recently Read – Along the Archival Grain
September 23, 2010
My last few months have been spent reading and searching through archival documents and images. As I have posted in the past, I am constantly in awe of the materials that can be found there, documents that are both revealing and limited. I’ve also had some wonderful conversations with the archivists I have met (in Vancouver, Toronto and Ottawa) and it’s been a pleasure to discuss some of the complexities involved in doing this research. Over the last few months, I have also been reading (and re-reading) sections of Ann Stoler’s book, Along the Archival Grain: Epistemic Anxieties and Colonial Common Sense, which has provided an additional perspective on reading not only the documents contained within the archive, but on the archive itself.
I’ve found that my approach to archival research follows what Stoler identifies as “archiving-as-process rather than archives-as-things” (20). She stresses the need to read both along and against the grain of the archive, that is, to understand the conditions in which these archives were created and cultivated, and the conditions in which they are read now. Archives are not simply produced; they are productive. Because archives are charged sites of both knowledge and anxiety, they must be read as sites of contestation and resignification.[1]
These reflections have also led me to recognize that truth commissions themselves are often about the production of an archive. For example, Verne Harris, Deputy-Director of the National Archive of South Africa during the South African TRC saw the reconciliation process as “profoundly, an archival intervention.”[2] As the South African TRC gathered testimonies, “it was engaging archive, rescuing archive, creating archive, refiguring archive.”[3] I am curious to see how the archive (as both process and thing) plays a role as the Canadian TRC moves forward.
[1] See the collected essays in Lucy R Lippard’s Partial Recall: Photographs of Native North Americans for one example where indigenous people have done re-readings and resignfied archival images.)
[2] Krog, Antjie. There Was This Goat: Investigating the Truth Commission Testimony of Notrose Nobomvu Konile. University of Kwazulu Natal Press, 2009, p. 65
[3] ibid, p. 65.
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.
Recently, I’ve been reading about the role that indigenous literature can play in the process of
reconciliation in Canada. I’m currently finishing Jo-Ann Episkenew’s Taking Back Our Spirits: Indigenous Literature, Public Policy, and Healing where she explores the work of Aboriginal authors including Basil Johnston, Maria Campbell and Beatrice Culleton Mosionier. But this post will focus on a short story from the collection, Our Story: Aboriginal Voices on Canada’s Past (published in 2005).
Although the book is filled with excellent writing, the narrative that I found most striking was Thomas King’s piece entitled “Coyote and the Enemy Aliens.” Here, King tells a tale of a coyote who becomes involved in rounding up “enemy aliens.” The story is set during the internment of Japanese Canadians during World War II. As the definition of enemy alien changes in the story, King illustrates the fickle nature of dividing people into categories of “us” and “them.”
I have been curious for some time about how the process of redress for historical injustices in Canada has taken shape. In particular, the demand for an apology and reparation for Japanese Canadians interned during the second world war is one that I have followed closely. And I have often wondered how to relate these two experiences (of Japanese Canadians and Aboriginal peoples) to each other without erasing the important differences. Thomas King’s work in his short story is impressive in this regard. He uses the familiar character of the trickster coyote to tie the two historical narratives together. In his foreword to the story, he explains his intentions:
“I know the story of the Japanese internment in Canada. I know it as most Canadians know it.
In pieces.
From a distance.
But whenever I hear the story, I think about Indians, for the treatment the Canadian government afforded Japanese people during the Second World War is strikingly similar to the treatment that the Canadian government has always afforded Native people, and whenever I hear either of these stories, a strange thing happens.
I think of the other.
I’m not suggesting that Native people have suffered the way the Japanese suffered or that the Japanese suffered the way Native people have. I’m simply suggesting that hatred and greed produce much the same sort of results, no matter who we practice on” (158).
King’s story captured my imagination. Not only because it is a well-told tale, but because it opens up a way of creating a particular type of Canadian narrative, one that incorporates many voices while maintaining ties to an indigenous mode of story-telling. It also works to close a gap between seemingly disparate histories, drawing attention to similarities rather than differences. I recommend the book in general, and this story in particular.
Toronto Star: “No Truth, No Reconciliation”
July 24, 2010
The title of the front-page Toronto Star article today, “No Truth, No Reconciliation” refers explicitly to those former students who have passed on since the creation of the Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 2006. For those students, the article states, there can be no truth, and no reconciliation. The article also implies that the quest for truth and reconciliation may be stalled in general, painting a picture of a commission facing extreme difficulties: “The saga of truth and reconciliation is fraught with scandal, power struggles, firings, lost friendships and soul-destroying delays,” writes author Linda Diebel.
I agree that the commission has faced struggles, and also that time is of the essence for aging survivors. I also believe, however, that the road to reconciliation is always fraught with challenges. Having attended the first national event in June in Winnipeg, I witnessed the complicated journey towards reconciliation. The event was filled with contradictions and conflicting voices. And having lived in South Africa almost a decade after the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission was established (I was there from 2004-2005), I know that these challenges are not easily resolved. Indeed, people still debate the strengths and weaknesses of the South African TRC in dealing with the injustices of apartheid.
Linda Diebel’s article discusses the challenges of the commission, including the heavy hand of government involvement, the setbacks caused by resignations and staff shuffles, and budget concerns. It’s important that we are made aware of these challenges, and that dialogue about the commission occurs in the public sphere. I think too that it is important to remember that reconciliation must occur both through the commission’s work and outside of it. Otherwise, Canadians (both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal) won’t feel engaged or implicated by the reconciliation process.
To read more from Linda Diebel’s article, click here.
A few reflections on the TRC’s first national gathering
July 15, 2010
Stephen Harper's larger-than-life apology at the Winnipeg Art Gallery
It’s been one month since the Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission held its first national gathering, and I feel as though I am still processing the event. Over the course of four days, I heard stories of both devastation and strength, of both anger and hope.
Several moments stand out in my memory:
Patrick Etherington Sr., his son Patrick Etherington Jr., Frances Whiskeychan, Christopher Paulmartin and Jorge Hookimaw’llillerre all walked for 31 days to reach the event. Beginning in Cochrane, Ontario, they walked to promote awareness for the reconciliation process. When they arrived at the national gathering in Winnipeg, Patrick Jr. spoke of the lines of communication opened between his father and himself during the walk.
In many ways, they did what I believe the commission hopes people will do: take the process of reconciliation beyond the confines of the commission, and make it personally meaningful. Because, for the most part, the IRS TRC can only be part of this process.
We also heard from those who worked at the schools. In the sharing circle held on the first day, I heard the experiences of a pilot who had taken children from up north to bring them to schools. He told of separating one young girl in particular who was crying because he had just taken her from her Inuit family. He had thought he was doing what was right. A teacher told of her experiences and the difficult conditions at the Indian Residential School where she taught. She read the names of her students in their honor.
One issue that I continue to wonder about since (and during) the event is the place of religion during this process. The churches played an instrumental role in running the Indian Residential School system, and they will play an important role in reconciliation. I noticed some visible discomfort from some people when church representatives addressed the crowds. At the same time, I also heard former students express their connections to Christian faiths. Before the event, I read a short article in the Globe and Mail where Peter Yellowquill, a survivor of the schools said: “The churches committed spiritual genocide. But I am still a Christian man. It’s complicated.”
At the event, the role that religious leaders played was indeed complicated. At times, they offered apologies, at others, I heard denials. At the opening ceremony, the crowd heard native blessings and ceremonies. At the end of his closing remarks during that first ceremony on that first day, I was surprised to hear the Chair of the Commission, Justice Sinclair, offer the Lords Prayer.
After the event, I visited the the Winnipeg Art Gallery. In the foyer of the gallery, they had erected two large art pieces that contained portions of the official apologies given by Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Prime Minister Kevin Rudd for the histories involving the taking of Aboriginal children. In some ways, the larger-than-life signs conveyed a sense of power. At the same time, they drew attention to the fact that apologies were simply words. Important words, yes, but they remain meaningless without action.
Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's official apology in 2008
