EF56 First Nations lecture 1

·      First Nations – original people in a land

Aboriginal peoples are under threat, in trouble, around the world, experience violence: Cuba, Australia, Finland, Canada, US, Japan

Canada – First Nations 12,000-20,000 yrs

Australia- Aboriginals 60,000-80,000yrs

Their land and way of life is being taken away

Brazil – Amazon jungle – fires- some of the tribes have never been contacted

Archeology – studying ancient human structure, buildings, town, villages

United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples

·      Focus of BC new curriculum- First Nations

Curriculum – what we study in school

First Nations ways of knowing, culture, history in Canada

My school experiences- none of the history, social studies, literature,

BC curriculum

-English 12

-First People’s English 12

·      science focused on First Nations

The focus was on Europeans, settlers, White men in Canada

·      male-centred, Euro-centred

·      Government controls education and what kids learn

·      What history did you study in school?

Words that people use – Native,

-Aboriginal

(etymology- word history, ab – original   word origin Latin ‘ab’ – beginning)

-First Nations – many groups, the ‘s’ is important

-Indian – not used now, older term

·      Talk about origin of the word ‘Indian’ due to geographical misunderstanding

Cuba, - West Indies

Christopher Columbus 1492

“Red Indian” – don’t use that name anymore

“East Indian” – don’t use that name anymore

·      racism towards First Nations people “Indians”

·      dismissive, belittling, negative

·      when I was young, people talked badly about FN people

·      lots of First Nations kids in my school, segregated

At the time, it seemed normal.

·      Tell this story

·      policy at my university – have to finish your degree in seven years

student/ professor –led initiative to change it to 10 yrs

·      racism against First Nations – BCTF AGM story

700 teachers

“equity-seeking groups” wanted representation

·      First Contact Canada

* http://aptn.ca/firstcontact/

First Contact of Europeans with First Nations

·      First Nations -Who they are?

·      Small groups

“What do you know about First Nations people in Canada?”

Generate ideas on LCD

·      First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples constitute Indigenous peoples in Canada, also called First Peoples. First Nations came into common usage in the 1980s to replace the term Indians

·      Aboriginal, Indigenous

·      First Nations- Indigenous people in the South (below Arctic Circle). Half of all First Nations bands are in Ontario and BC.

·      Inuit are the Indigenous people who live in the North. Used to be called ‘Eskimo’- disparaging term from French Esquimaux, from Montagnais ayas̆kimew ‘person who laces a snowshoe’. Montagnais, or Innu, are the Indigenous inhabitants of an area they refer to as Nitassinan, which comprises most of the northeastern portion of the present-day province of Quebec and some eastern portions of Labrador.

Discredited etymology ‘raw fish eater’

Website: https://www.itk.ca/about-canadian-inuit/#nunangat

Show map: “Inuit Map”

·      Metis a person of mixed Indigenous and European-American ancestry, in particular one of a group of such people who in the 19th century constituted the so-called Metis nation in the areas around the Red and Saskatchewan rivers. Metis comes from the French word ‘métis’, which means ‘mixed’.

·      1600s Thousands of French men hunting, trapping beaver