Along with many other progressive forces in the settler community, CD stands in solidarity with the Wet’suwet’en and their struggle to exercise their sovereignty and protect their land. Image by Canadian Dimension. On the first National Day of Truth and Reconciliation last September, Denis Coderre, former Liberal MP and cabinet
Continue readingTag: Indigenous Politics
Canadian Dimension: Ellen Gabriel on the 30th anniversary of the 1990 ‘Oka Crisis’
Kanien’kehá:ka human rights and environmental rights activist Ellen Gabriel during the police and military siege of Kanehsatake, commonly know as the “Oka Crisis”, summer 1990. Today marks the 30th anniversary of the 1990 Kanehsatà:ke and Kahnawake Siege where the Kanien’kehá:ka Nation were denied their fundamental human rights without any just
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Decolonizing the Zombie Apocalypse: An Interview With Jeff Barnaby About His New Film Blood Quantum
Promotional artwork for writer-director Jeff Barnaby’s Blood Quantum. Illustration by Chippewar. With people sheltering in place as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, many are turning to their TVs for comfort and binging disaster movies. Teaser poster by Chippewar If you’ve already watched popular choices like Contagion and Outbreak and
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Canada Is Ignoring the Gendered Impacts of COVID-19 on Indigenous Women
Supporters and mourners walk together in the streets of downtown Saskatoon, SK during the Sisters in Spirit Vigil & March, October 6, 2019. Canada is in a crisis of epic proportions. Both Canadian and Indigenous governments are currently responding to the coronavirus pandemic in an effort to prevent the spread
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: All Eyes on Wet’suwet’en: International Call for Week of Solidarity
Marching down Main Street in Smithers. B.C. chiefs gather in Smithers to support Wet’suwet’en hereditary chiefs’ position on Unist’ot’en camp and opposition to Coastal GasLink natural gas pipeline. Photo by Chris Gareau. We call for solidarity actions from Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities who uphold Indigenous sovereignty and recognize the urgency
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Is reconciliation a peaceful process?
The Mohawk warrior flag flutters over an overpass on Highway 401 after the Mohawks successfully shut the road down as part of a protest near Deseronto, Ontario, on June 29, 2007. Photo by Tom Hanson/CP. On the international stage, Canada portrays itself as peaceful state; however, the reality is quite
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: ‘This is Our Land’: An Interview with Ellen Gabriel about Ongoing Land Fraud at Kanesatake
Land back is land back. For the Kanien’kéha:ka (Mohawk) of Kanehsatà:ke, the return of stolen land – fraudulently sold first by a religious order and then by the municipality of Oka, Quebec and the Government of Canada – has been at the heart of their demands for 300 years. Mohawk
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: The legacy of ‘Oka’ and the future of Indigenous resistance
Photo by Ellen Gabriel In the summer of 1990, Ellen Gabriel (Katsi’tsakwas) was chosen by the People of the Longhouse and her community of Kanehsatà:ke to be their spokesperson during the infamous “Oka Crisis,” a 78-day standoff to protect ancestral Kanien’kéha:ka (Mohawk) land in Québec. Mohawks had erected a small
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Thrashing Colonialism: Skateboarding, History, and the Power of Education
Micheal Langan, owner of Colonialism Skateboards • Photo by Troy Fleece Most skateboarders have a least one good story about a security guard. Micheal Langan, who is of Cree and Saulteaux ancestry, a member of the Cote First Nation in Saskatchewan, and the founder of Colonialism Skateboards, is no exception.
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: True test of reconciliation: respect the Indigenous right to say No
Photo by Mychaylo Prystupa. Conflict is coming. There is no getting around that fact. Anyone who believes that reconciliation will be about blanket exercises, cultural awareness training, visiting a native exhibit at a museum or hanging native artwork in public office buildings doesn’t understand how we got here. Reconciliation between
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: In Victory for Standing Rock Sioux, Court Finds That Approval of Dakota Access Pipeline Violated Law
Photo by Becker1999 The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe won a significant victory today in its fight to protect the Tribe’s drinking water and ancestral lands from the Dakota Access pipeline. A federal judge ruled that the federal permits authorizing the pipeline to cross the Missouri River just upstream of the
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Social conflict is inevitable in decolonization battle
Members of Unis’tot’en camp, November 2012. All the controversy over Canada 150 and its morbid celebration of the gains Canada has made at the expense of Indigenous lives has many people asking: What do we do now? What will the next 150 years look like? We all know that Indigenous
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Red Skin, White Masks: Glen Coulthard
Glen Coulthard Glen Coulthard spoke on issues arising from his celebrated recent work and from subsequent developments in academe, activism and the links between the two. Glen Coulthard is Yellowknives Dene and an associate professor in First Nations and Indigenous Studies and Political Science at the University of British Columbia.
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Arthur Manuel’s battle against the 0.2 per cent Indigenous economy
Photo by Tupac Enrique Acosta As the pageantry around Canada 150 begins, Ricochet and our Indigenous Reporting Fund present “Resistance 150: Unsettling Canada’s Hidden Economic Apartheid,” a series honouring and continuing the pathbreaking work of the late Arthur Manuel. The Secwepemc chief, long-time member of the United Nations Permanent Forum
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Indigenous nations lead opposition to pipeline development
With the plans for an Enbridge pipeline linking
the tar sands in Alberta to the West Coast temporarily
blocked, activists are mobilizing against TransCanada’s
proposed 4,600-kilometre Energy East
pipeline. If built, the pipeline would be the largest in
North America and would see 1.1. million barrels of
tar sands oil shipped each day from Western Canada
to New Brunswick.
The pipeline is disingenuously being promoted as
a job creator and a way of reducing Canada’s dependency
on imported oil, but make no mistake about it:
Energy East is simply another “rip it and ship it”
resource development scheme designed to make
fast money for Big Oil by getting tar sands oil onto
the international market.
Although many Canadians and Quebecers have
voiced concerns about the environmental impacts of
the proposed pipeline, Indigenous Nations are leading
the opposition to Energy East. In New Brunswick,
Grand Chief Ron Tremblay recently declared: “As
members of the Wolastoq Grand Council we unanimously
oppose the Energy East Pipeline project in
order to protect our non-ceded homeland and waterways,
our traditional and cultural connection to our
lands, waterways, and air. The Wolastoq Grand
Council has serious concerns for the safety and protection
of the animals, fish, birds, insects, plants
and tree life that sustains our Wolastoq Nation.”
Other Indigenous Nations feel similarly. In January
2015, Anishinaabe Grand Chief Warren White stated,
“I do not want to be the grand chief who consented
to a pipeline that’s going to destroy 30 per cent of
the fresh water in Ontario, in Treaty 3 territory … We
will be the ones to stop this. Our communities, our
youth, our leadership are being called on by other
nations.”
Haudenosaunee peoples are also taking a stand
against Energy East. Grand Chief of the Kanesatake
Mohawk community, Serge Simon, said that “The
Mohawks of Kanesatake were inspired by the efforts
of First Nations out West like the Yinka Dene Alliance
who successfully built a wall of Indigenous opposition
to halt the threat posed by the Enbridge Northern
Gateway pipeline. We are now working to extend
that wall of opposition out East to stop the TransCanada
Energy East tar sands pipeline.”
On March 8, 2016, Grand Chief Simon sent an
email to Québec Premier Philippe Couillard (which
was posted on cbc.ca) in which he explained that the
pipeline “threatens Kanesatake’s lands, waters and
our people’s very survival as a result of setback the
project represents in the fight against climate
change,” of which Indigenous peoples are the first
victims. He also pointed out that there are “few longterm
jobs associated with the project, but many
more associated with clean energy, healthy communities,
energy conservation and efficiency.” Simon’s
declaration won support from other Indigenous
groups, including the Iroquois Council and the
Assembly of First Nations Quebec and Labrador.
Canadian Dimension stands in solidarity with
Indigenous peoples opposing Energy East and fighting
for environmental justice. From the fight against
fracking waged by the Elsipogtog First Nation in
New Brunswick to the struggles of recently murdered
activists Berta Cáceres and Nelson Garcia in
Honduras, Indigenous peoples are championing the
defence of their land and the protection of the entire
planet from environmental destruction. But this burden
should not fall on Indigenous peoples alone. It
is a heavy responsibility that must be more equally
shouldered by Canadians and Quebecers. Labour
and activist groups from coast to coast should rally
to support Indigenous land defenders. Because we
share the Earth, we must also share in the struggles
to defend it against the depredations of colonialism
and capitalism.
This article appeared in the Spring 2016 issue of Canadian Dimension (Childhood).
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Continue readingCanadian Dimension: How do we heal trauma suffered by Native communities?
Photo by Renegade98
It is not enough that the Attawapiskat First Nation has declared a state of emergency over the epidemic of suicides and suicide attempts among its youth. Our entire country should declare a s…
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Nunavut is still a colony.
In January 2014, The Globe and Mail published an op-ed by James Bell, editor of Nunatsiaq News and winner of the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Medal for his journalistic contribution to Northern politics. The piece was entitled “Nunavut is no longer Canada’s colony. It needs to end its own deprivation.” In
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: On the 12th Anniversary of the Grassy Narrows Blockade
Photo from FreeGrassy.net We, the women of Grassy Narrows, make a statement on behalf of our children, grandchildren and great grandchildren on resource extraction on our traditional harvesting lands since time immemorial. We will continue to stand strong for our children grandchildren and great grandchildren as we celebrate the 12thanniversary
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Harper v. First Nations: The assimilation agenda
Photo from Public Domain Last week, in response to this summer’s Supreme Court decision in Tsilhqot’in Nation v. British Columbia, the Harper government quietly put forward an aggressive revision of Canada’s Indian policy. It is the first major revision of Canada’s comprehensive land claims and Aboriginal self-government policies since 1986.
Continue readingCanadian Dimension | Articles: Canada is Not the Arbiter of What is Genocide
Any policy or law that denies people their culture is genocide. No adjective of “cultural” is required; genocide is genocide. In the Anishinaabeg tradition, the place where rivers intersect is an important location of truth. It is where rivers intersected that nations renewed relationships with one another as well as
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