Atlantic Canada: Terra Nullius & Terraforming

Atlantic Canada

• Week 2 focuses on "How Does It Work? Atlantic Canada as Terra Nullius, Terre-Neuve, and Terraforming”.

Show-Share-Tell

• Starting the session in a collaborative way to share thoughts and reports.

Key Concepts for Week 2

• terra nullius
• Terre-Neuve
• terraforming

Making Sense of Atlantic Canada

• This involves understanding and figuring out multiple materials, matters, and meanings of Atlantic Canada.
• Aims to unpack and interrogate normative mythologies to share a common operating picture or "common sense."

Terra Nullius as Terraforming

• This is used to justify claims, jurisdiction, violence, dispossession, and expulsion/expropriation.
• It requires a fantasy of a raw, empty wilderness that is depopulated/uninhabited.
• Requires clear land to remake it.

Papal Bulls and Church Doctrine

• The Vatican issued two papal bulls to justify Christian-Catholic domination, which became the basis of international law.
• Pope Nicholas V issued Dum Diversas(1452) and Romanus Pontifex (1455) to root out, vanquish, and destroy non-Christian people, also known as the "enemies of Christ."
• These granted the Portuguese a monopoly of trade with Africa and authorized the enslavement of local people.
• Pope Alexander VI issued Inter Caetera (1493), justifying European commercial and territorial claims for any land/water/resource "discoveries" under the sign of Spain and Portugal "spreading Christianity."
• It also asserted European sovereignty through terra nullius and the doctrine of discovery.

The Newfoundland Acts

• In 1699, An Act to Encourage the Trade to Newfoundland, also known as King William's Act or Newfoundland Act, established "garrison government”.
• This included admirals and naval convoy commodores also relates to fishing.
• 1710-1815 saw 105 years of war
• A Reform Bill received royal assent on 1832 in the British Parliament and contained representative government
• Newfoundland Act in 1847 established the houses of assembly in 1855
• Newfoundland Act of 1933 saw Britain suspend the dominion's constitution to avoid bankruptcy.
• Newfoundland joined Confederation as the 10th province of Canada in 1949.

Dialect Atlas of Newfoundland and Labrador

• Registers the relational isolation and integrity of Newfoundland and Labrador.
• Language is an archive, a time-capsule, a vehicle and an institutional practice that is wildly arbitrary.
• Professor Harold Paddock of Memorial University worked on "Newfoundland dialects of English" (1982) and "Mapping lexical variants in Newfoundland English" (1982).
• Field work was done in 1980 by Kathleen Manuel.

Newfoundland and Labrador Place Names

• Blow Me Down
• Come By Chance [Passage Harbour]
• Dildo
• Joe Batt's Arm
• Notably lives on a coastal interface.
• Contains upper and lower economies: Upper Economy, Middle Economy, Economy, Lower Economy (LeHave, Chezzetcook).

Doctrine of Discovery

• The Assembly of First Nations suggested dismantling a legal fiction that is used to de facto seizure of lands/resources.
• Dismantling it will mean addressing what the Government of Canada has claimed is racist, historically false, and legally invalid, morally condemnable, and socially unjust.
• Dismantling a legal fiction has been denounced in the UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous People.
• Canada ratified it but is slowing eroding the process through CANDRIP legislation

Legal Cases

• Delgamuukw v British Columbia (1997) and Tsilhqot'in Nation v British Columbia (2014) address the related doctrine of terra nullius.
• The Supreme Court has ruled the doctrine of terra nullius never applied in Canada, confirmed by the Royal Proclamation (1763).
• Indigenous People in sovereign nations occupied the land before contact
• Everyone must recognize Indigenous People in sovereign nations occupied the land before contact and all people must live together.

Making Sense of Atlantic Canada

• Historical, geological, governmental, and political economic connections exist between legacy, precedent, and discovery.
• There are terraformed climate disasters people are all living in differential ways.

Canadian Economics

• Refers to its as petrocapitalism + climate change
• Federal carbon tax comes into effect
• Expenses, costs of carbon economy, and home (oil) heating carve-out serve to be a political lever for premiers
• NS Power rate increased on 1 January 2024 to 6%
• $8.9B 2024-2026 capital plan is forecasted to drive ~7% annualized rate base growth
• 95% of adjusted net income comes from regulated investments.
• Sustainable Dividend Growth has 17 consecutive years of dividend increases, also has a 4% to 5% dividend growth target through 2026.

Factors to Consider

• Symbolic: associations, meanings, representations, and values that unify + divide
• Epistemological: knowledge, discourse, and allocation of what counts ("normal")
• Social: order, organization, relations, structures, systems, distribution of resources
• Cultural: language, narratives, stories, and ideas of belonging that structure everyday life
• Historical: "events" + heritage, genealogy, traditions, and generational development over time
• Economic: resources, commercel, money, and finance; wealth accumulation + capitalism
• Political: the 'state'; local, regional, national, international; legislative, legal, governmental
• Institutional: different systems and structures that produce reliable and predictable effects
• Geographical: physical, social, human, and cultural; working class, critical race, feminist, etc.
• Territorial: urban/rural, borders, jurisdiction, and the administration of sovereignty
• Infrastructural: access to built environmental resources + essential critical systems (e.g., energy)
• Geological: considerations of the deeper development of earth systems +climate change
• Environmental: related to wider interaction of organic and non-organic systems
• Ecological: foregrounding the interconnection of human- and non-human living systems
• Climatological: earth vital systems and more specific emphasis on rapid
• Marine/nautical: oceanic and coastal contexts that shape other concerns

Week 2 explores the concept of Atlantic Canada as terra nullius, terre-neuve, and terraforming. It challenges normative mythologies to understand the multiple materials and meanings of the region. The session examines how terra nullius was used to justify claims and dispossession.