Examining ‘Indigenization’
What does it mean when schools and universities across Canada announce that they are “decolonizing” and “indigenizing” their institution?
It means they have come to recognize the role education has played in marginalizing Indigenous peoples and suppressing Indigenous knowledge systems. And they have embarked on dedicated programs to reform their institutions in ways that are based instead on truth, reconciliation, respect, and collaboration.
Through those reforms, they are ensuring that all students learn about the history of colonization, including Indigenous knowledge in the curriculum -not just as a unit in a few optional courses, but as part of their core course programming.
They are infusing Indigenous ways of learning and teaching in their teaching practices, under the leadership of Indigenous elders and advisors.
They are making spaces in their schools for Indigenous students to meet, get guidance and conduct ceremonies.
They are hiring Indigenous teachers, professors, resident elders, and Indigenous affairs coordinators.
Canada as a nation has at last acknowledged what the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples established in 2007: that nation-states have a moral obligation not to violate the basic human rights of Indigenous Peoples, and to support and not destroy cultural diversity.
Further, that “indigenous peoples have suffered from historic injustices” as a result of colonization, and nation-states have a moral obligation to “redress” these injustices – which means to set them right.
When Europeans arrived on the east coast of what is now Canada, they could not have survived the harsh winters without the support of the Indigenous peoples they met, who offered friendship, water, food, shelter, clothing, and more.
But by the mid-1800s, when help was no longer needed and Europeans wanted to lay claim to the most fertile and resourcerich lands, they began talking about “the Indian problem,” and engaged in systematic efforts to destroy Indigenous knowledge systems and train their populations into servitude and low-paid labour. This was the era of residential schools and reservations.
The obligations to redress and restore cost money, of course, and invite challenge to ownership of public lands. That is one of the reasons why four nationstates refused to support the UN Declaration. Sadly, Canada was one of them.
But the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Report of 2016 has finally set Canada on a better path.
Universities across Canada have strengthened their commitment to Indigenous knowledge, teaching, students and support services. And UPEI is among them.
Working on a term to use in place of “indigenization” and help people understand why this educational reform is needed, UPEI’s Elder-in-residence Judy Clark stated, “It’s our way of life.”
Making a proper place for these ways of life in dominant educational systems is a measure of recognition and respect for Indigenous peoples. It is also be an important element for non-Indigenous people in trying to understand their own identity and relation to the land.
To help us explore these issues at all educational levels, UPEI has invited two international leaders to give a talk this Monday evening, Oct. 2 at 6:30 p.m. in the Alex H. MacKinnon Auditorium, Room 242, Don and Marion McDougall Hall at 6:30 p.m.
Marie Battiste is a professor of education at the University of Saskatchewan who has done award-winning work in Mi’kmaw cultural revitalization and in decolonizing and Indigenizing educational institutions at all levels, elementary to post-secondary, for the past 40 years.
And Sa’ke’j Henderson is one of the legal advisers who helped develop the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Now a research fellow of the Native Law Centre of Canada at the University of Saskatchewan, he is an award-winning legal scholar who has served as constitutional adviser for the Mi’kmaw Nation and the Assembly of First Nations.
We hope to see you there.
Prof. Pamela Courtenay-Hall (non-Indigenous; chair of the Philosophy Department), Prof. John Doran (Mi’kmaq, assistant professor, Faculty of Education), and Prof. David Varis (Cree; sessional Iinstructor, Department of Sociology/ Anthropology) teach and do research in (among other fields) Indigenous studies and education at the University of Prince Edward Island