Indigenous Policies in Canada Quiz

Stereotype

• Unfair and untrue generalizations about groups of people.

Peace and Friendship Treaties

• Agreements signed between settlers and Indigenous peoples to secure alliances or guarantee neutrality.
• British formalized these agreements in writing.
• Jean Baptiste Cope, a Mi'kmaq grand chief, signed an agreement with the governor of Nova Scotia in 1752.
• Premier John Savage and Grand Chief Ben Sylliboy announced October as Mi'kmaq History Month in 1993 to honour the peace and friendship treaties.

Potlatch

• Ceremonies used to confirm titles, celebrate changes in rank or status (using dancing, feasting, and gifts).
• Celebrated marriages and the adoption of children.
• Demonstrated wealth and power through the distribution of gifts.
• Used to reaffirm social status and community connections.
• Part of naming ceremonies, transferring rights and privileges, mourning the dead, and demonstrating family, clan, and international connections as well as demonstrating a relationship with the supernatural world.
• A crucial way of sharing riches, establishing social ties, and re-affirming community bonds.
• Shows the importance of generosity and reciprocity in Mi'kmaq culture.

Enfranchisement

• Process of Indigenous peoples becoming Canadian citizens, often requiring the abandonment of Indigenous status and culture.
• Incentive to decrease government costs and responsibilities.
• Status Indians who joined the military were allowed to vote, but lost status and a home to return to.
• Indigenous peoples were forced to align themselves with settler norms.
• Gained ability to own land and vote, but lost treaty rights, identity, and hunting and fishing rights.

Vision Quest

• Spiritual journey to seek guidance and visions from a guardian spirit.
• Typically involves fasting and isolation in a sacred location.
• Takes place during illness, periods of doubt, or puberty.
• Helpers prepare the sacred place, seeker prays for visions, visions come in animal forms or dreams, seekers are taken to sweat lodge.

Smudging

• Burning sacred herbs (sage, sweetgrass, or cedar) to purify a space, person, or object.
• Removes negative energy or negative spirits.
• Facilitates communication with the spiritual world,ancestors, and higher powers
• Part of ceremonies and important events.
• Considered a mode of healing and promoting overall well-being.

Systemic Racism

• Racism embedded in systems, laws, or policies resulting in unfair treatment.

White Paper

• Canadian government's policy to assimilate First Nations people into mainstream society.
• Proposed to repeal the Indian Act, ending federal responsibilities to First Nations, ending Indian status, eliminating reserve lands and transferring Aboriginal responsibilities to the provinces.
• Met strong opposition from Indigenous peoples.
• Withdrawn in 1970.

Oral History

• Passed down traditional stories and knowledge through spoken words about culture and history.
• Legends that help people understand their roots and past.

Residential Schools

• Forced Indigenous children to leave their cultures and traditions behind.
• Indigenous children were taken from their families and forced to attend schools that aimed to erase their identities.
• Catholic run residential schools.
• Had a goal to assimilate Indigenous children into Canadian society and erase Indigenous cultures, languages, and traditions therefore preparing children for life in white settler society.

Wigwam

• Homes built by Mi'kmaq women using spruce poles, tied together at the top using split spruce root.
• Covered with birch bark sheets placed starting at the bottom.
• Waterproof and portable for optimal use and flexibility of location.

Elders

• Important members of the community, who played vital roles in preserving culture and traditions.
• Served as keepers of traditional knowledge, historical stories, and spiritual guides.
• Offered practical advice and acted as advisors for community members.
• Played crucial roles in passing on cultural knowledge.
• Played a vital role in decision-making processes for many Indigenous communities.

Indian Act

• Canadian statute that governs Aboriginal peoples.
• Contains laws concerning reserves, governance, and status.
• Federal governing authority over Aboriginal peoples.
• Aimed to assimilate Indigenous peoples by taking away their rights and controlling reserve lands.
• Contains policies created to govern and assimilate first nations.
• Indigenous communities have fought to have the Indian Act repealed citing it as a paternalistic act.

Doctrine of Discovery

• Assumed Christian Europeans had a superior right to land.
• Justified European land acquisition from indigenous peoples.
• Ignored existing indigenous laws and governance.
• Claim to land, despite indigenous peoples already having rights.

60s Scoop

• Forced removal of Indigenous children from their families and placed them in non-Indigenous homes.
• Mass removal of Indigenous children from their families for adoption or foster care.
• Canadian government was responsible for the children's placement.
• Placed children outside of their families to assimilate them into mainstream society.
• Resulted from policies meant to address concerns of child welfare.

Colonialism

• Control of a dependent country, territory, or people by a colonising power, often exploitative and culturally suppressive.

Restorative Justice

• Focuses on repairing harm by providing opportunities for communication and addressing needs of all involved in a crime or wrongful act.

The Columbian Exchange

• Exchange of plants, animals, and diseases between the old (Europe) and new worlds (Americas).
• Transfer of plants, animals and diseases influenced by the rapid spread of European populations and their agricultural dominance.

Centralization

• Policy to relocate Mi'kmaq in Nova Scotia to two reserves ( Eskasoni and Sipekne'katik) for the sale of land.

Rita Joe

• Mi'kmaq poet who celebrated language, culture, and their way of life.
• Argued for assimilation and cultural destruction in residential schools.
• Recognized for activism and resistance against negative societal practices.

Indian Agent

• Representative of the Canadian federal government on Aboriginal reserves.
• Enforced policies and managed band councils
• Had significant power over Indigenous communities.