Aboriginal Identity & Terminology
…“Aboriginal” became the mutually accepted term. In the Constitution, “Aboriginal” is used to include three groups previously defined by earlier categories: “Indian,” “Inuit,” and “Métis.” Each of these three predecessor…
Indian Status
…in the government’s interest to reduce the numbers of eligible Indians and therefore ease the associated governmental responsibilities and expenditures. To “legislate out” Indian status would ultimately absolve themselves from…
The Residential School System
…administered by churches that had the nominal objective of educating Indigenous children but also the more damaging and equally explicit objectives of indoctrinating them into Euro-Canadian and Christian ways of…
Global Actions
…Eastern Europe, Western Europe, and Other States.10 Delegates of the Indigenous organizations represent U.N.-designated socio-cultural regions that seek to achieve broad representation of Indigenous peoples: Africa; Asia; Central and South…
Bill C-31
…major goals: to address gender discrimination of the Indian Act, to restore Indian status to those who had been forcibly enfranchised due to previous discriminatory provisions, and to allow bands…
UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
…can be read online. The UN Economic and Social Council (UNECOSOC) responded to these findings by creating the Working Group on Indigenous Populations (WGIP), comprised of five independent experts as…
Métis
…part because scrip had to be redeemed at Lands Title offices that were hundreds of kilometers apart, necessitating several days of travel by each grantee. Some people sent others to…
Constitution Act, 1982 Section 35
…the First Ministers’ Conference on Aboriginal Rights in March 1983.5 These clauses were added after lengthy campaigns by women’s groups, who were unrepresented in the initial discussions and experienced systemic…
Gustafsen Lake
…rancher, Lyle James, who used the land as cow pasture. James and the Sundancers had reached an agreement that the Sundancers would assemble at the Sundance arbour area every summer…
Oral Traditions
…Introduction “The Elders would serve as mnemonic pegs to each other. They will be speaking individually uninterrupted in a circle one after another. When each Elder spoke they were…
