Indigenous historian Cody Groat credits Laurier with shaping his path as a storyteller and scholar

 

Groat's father, Bill (left), a survivor of the Sixties Scoop, passed away in 2022. The sharing of his story, with an examination of broader themes including intergenerational trauma, Indigenous masculinities and the long-term effects of colonial policies, is Groat’s latest project. 

Groat’s time as a PhD student also led to his first university teaching role, stepping in as a sessional instructor at St. Paul’s University College (now United College) at the University of Waterloo. The course on Indigenous Studies provided Groat with an opportunity for a deeply personal teaching moment. 

“My dad, Bill, was a Sixties Scoop survivor and a transport truck driver — just an average guy,” says Groat. “I asked him to come speak to my class about his experience as an Indigenous person in the child welfare system.  About three minutes into the lecture, he just started bawling his eyes out.  He’d never talked about his life before, and it was just a release.” 

The experience resonated deeply, and Groat’s father went on to guest lecture several more times, including for Brookfield’s History of Adoption classes at Laurier Brantford.  

“He never finished high school and had some literacy issues, but he loved being a ‘university instructor,’ as he called himself,” says Groat. “He wanted to tell his story so others could learn from it.” 

Groat is Mohawk and a band member of Six Nations of the Grand River.  

READ MORE:   https://www.wlu.ca/features/2025/summer/indigenous-historian-cody-groat-credits-laurier-with-shaping-his-path-as-a-storyteller-and-scholar.html

Indian Boarding Homes Program in Canada | The Nisga’a Nation B.C.

 

Article by Jackson Pind | Published September 10, 2024

The Indian Boarding Homes Program was established by the Canadian federal government and operated from the early 1950s to the early 1990s.  Its purpose was to relocate Indigenous children into non-Indigenous homes while they attended elementary and high schools, often far from their home communities. Relocation was compulsory; refusal was not permitted.  The host families with whom they were placed were paid to provide care.   Many children in this situation faced physical, sexual, verbal and psychological abuse (see also Child Abuse).  The program was designed to assimilate Indigenous children into the mainstream Canadian society.  As a result, children were often forbidden from speaking their native language or engaging in practices of their culture.  This led, inevitably, to significant consequences that included loss of cultural identity and connection to their communities for the approximately 40,000 First Nations and Inuit children who were forced to relocate.

Reginald Percival’s Experience

One of the survivors and plaintiffs of a recent class action lawsuit, Reginald Percival, recalls being taken from his home in the Nisga’a Nation** in northern British Columbia at the age of 13.  He was placed 1,300 kilometers away with a non-Indigenous family in southern BC, where he endured significant abuse.  He remembers being taken away, with other students, by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.  His mother was crying, and he recalled it feeling “like a funeral.” Percival remembers that “I was slapped around, locked in rooms… I once spent 10 days in a closet. It is not a good memory for me.”  His story highlights the broader experiences of many Indigenous children who were part of this program.

Many children in boarding homes were subjected to starvation, forced to work as free labour and prohibited from practicing their culture.  Percival said, “We were told that to be good Indian, you have to forget about your culture.” They often had minimal or no contact with their families.  Other forms of abuse including sexual or physical occurred within these households.  When Percival returned home, he felt ostracized from his family.

Legal Actions and Settlement

In 2018, a class action lawsuit was initiated by survivors of the Boarding Homes Program, including Reginald Percival. They sought justice and compensation for the abuses they suffered.  This lawsuit culminated in a $1.9 billion settlement agreement approved by the Federal Court in 2023 for Indigenous people who were part of the program between 1951 and 1992.  The settlement covers approximately 33,000 eligible survivors, providing compensation ranging from $10,000 to $200,000 based on the level of abuse experienced.  The settlement offers a two-tier compensation system:

Category 1: A base payment of $10,000 to all class members.

Category 2: Additional compensation based on the severity of abuse, up to $200,000.

The claims process was designed to be non-adversarial, conducted entirely on paper to avoid re-traumatizing survivors.  There was no cap on the total compensation amount, ensuring that all eligible survivors could receive their compensation.  The designated timeframe for survivors to submit claims was set for 21 August 2024 to 22 February 2027.  The class counsel, Douglas Lennox, noted the importance of this process compared to other settlements.  He said, “We found with some other settlements, like day schools, people felt pressure to get a claim in quickly — financial pressure, emotional pressure — and they put in a lower-level claim. And later on, many claimants seem to have regretted that decision.”

The settlement included the voices of 12 different survivors from across the country. The judge agreed they had similar stories of abuse and mistreatment while being part of the program.  Justice Peter Pamel stated, “I must say that the trembling of their voices as they recounted their stories was palpable, and the trauma reflected in their eyes as they relived their experiences was truly overwhelming; these are stories that all Canadians should hear.” In particular, the settlement also found:

A vast number of boarding home survivors did not complete high school because of the extensive abuse they suffered, leaving them with permanent emotional scars. When many finally did try to return to their communities, they found that they simply could not fit in; they spoke of having become outsiders in their own homes, of turning inward and feeling that their rights had been taken away from them, and of losing trust in others, especially individuals in authority. Most turned to alcohol and drugs to cope with the pain and suffering, constantly feeling forgotten, abused and abandoned; they felt shame and viewed themselves as a burden on society rather than a contributor. When the time came to raise their own families, their marriages were consumed by alcoholism, drug use and domestic abuse, all coping mechanisms to forget their suffering and the pain they have had to endure.

The program had a devastating impact on the lives of thousands of survivors and their families through intergenerational trauma (see also Intergenerational Trauma and Residential Schools).

Calls for Official Apology

Despite the financial compensation, survivors continue to advocate for an official apology from the federal government. They argue that previous apologies for residential schools did not adequately address the specific harms inflicted by the Boarding Homes Program. Justice Pamel, in his decision, acknowledged the severe abuse and cultural disconnection suffered by the children in the program. However, as Reginal Percival noted: “The prime minister of Canada has an obligation, I think, to say … I'm sorry for what happened. Because some of us never made it home.”

Legacy

The settlement emphasizes the need for ongoing mental health and emotional support services throughout the claims process.  A $50 million foundation was created by the settlement, which aims to provide continuous support for the survivors and their families, ensuring that they receive the necessary resources for healing, language and cultural revitalization, and commemoration. The Indian Boarding Homes Program remains an understudied part of Canadian history compared to other instances of historical government programs of education and care for Indigenous children, such as residential schools, day schools and the Sixties Scoop, which are well-documented in the impacts they have had on Indigenous children, families and communities. 

**

Every Nisga’a person belongs to a wilp (family group or house). Wilps own territory and are governed by one or more chiefs, depending on their size.

Nisga’a also belong to one of four clans, known as pdeek: Gisk’aast (Killer Whale/ Owl), Ganada (Raven/Frog), Laxgibuu (Wolf/ Bear) and Laxsgiik (Eagle/Beaver). Membership in a pdeek is determined by a matrilineal system, meaning that it is passed down through the mother’s line.  This maternal clan inheritance also includes the rights to traditional names, songs, crests and dances. 

READ: https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/nisgaa

Pind, Jackson. "Indian Boarding Homes Program in Canada". The Canadian Encyclopedia, 10 September 2024, Historica Canada. www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/indian-boarding-homes-program-in-canada. Accessed 13 September 2024.

Kamloops Indian Residential School: So why is it so hard to determine how many children died there?

With any genocide, the oppressor seeks to minimize their damage and atrocity... TLH

Lost children

newsinteractives.cbc.ca/longform/kamloops-residential-school-children-dead

 

The threat of death was part of life at the Kamloops Indian Residential School. So why is it so hard to determine how many children died there?

By Jorge Barrera

June 13, 2021

WARNING: This story contains details some readers may find distressing.

During a 1937 outbreak of measles at the Kamloops residential school, a nurse gave student Mary Francois some Aspirin, mustard plasters and brandy after the girl fell ill on May 3.

On May 10, Mary was taken by car to the nearby Royal Inland Hospital. She had been sick with pneumonia, two bacterial ear infections and inflamed kidneys. That day, the school principal sent a letter to her parents — but they never received it.

The local Indian agent phoned them on the morning of May 13. But when the parents arrived at the hospital that evening, it was too late.

Mary was dead from a blood clot in her brain.

Afterward, Mary's father, the chief of the Adams Lake Band, which sits about 60 kilometres to the east, wrote a letter to the Indian agent.

"In connection with the death of my daughter Mary, while attending Kamloops Indian Residential School," read the letter from Chief Francois, "I would request, as Chief of the Adams Lake Band, that in future, when a child of the school is taken sick and requires hospital attention, that the parents or guardian be notified at once."

The typewritten letter is signed with an "X."

The information about Mary Francois's case is found in a death memorandum from the Indian Affairs department (which does not, in fact, note her age). Mary's record now lies in the holdings of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation alongside 10 other death memorandums from 1935 to 1945, in a folder titled "Kamloops Residential School, Pupil Deaths." The folder is twice stamped with the word "dormant."

An image of Mary Francois's death record, kept by the Indian Affairs department. (National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation)

 

These memorandums are a reminder that the threat of death was part of life at the Kamloops Indian Residential School.

The institution has become a household word since Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation announced the discovery of what are believed to be the unmarked burial sites of children's remains adjacent to the former school's grounds.

The death of students at Kamloops residential school was no secret among the First Nations whose children were forced to go there. Finding out how they died is a challenge, but the evidence that does exist reveals a record characterized by the indifference of authorities, who saw the children as a means to an end that had little to do with their well-being.

CBC News obtained historical records as well as an out-of-print book that, along with the oral history of survivors, sheds light on the lives and suffering of the students who attended the school.

 

An undated photo of the Kamloops residential school. (National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation)

Many causes of death

Survivor testimony and historical records reveal how children died at the institution throughout the years. Many fell to diseases like tuberculosis and measles. Others drowned in the Thompson River, which flowed nearby. Some, fleeing school, tried to hop trains and died. Others died of suicide.

The National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, the repository of residential school records gathered by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, found evidence for 51 fatalities at the institution. There are likely more.

The federal government purged three volumes of funeral records from Kamloops residential school, according to listings of destroyed files held by the National Archives of Canada. The Indian Affairs department also destroyed three volumes of Indian agent reports, along with quarterly "returns" for 1956 to 1961 — student lists that would include deaths.

The memories of survivors fill in some of the gaps left by the reports.

Barbara McNab-Larson, who attended the school from 1948 to 1950, often goes down to a creek near her house in Skeetchestn First Nation. It's a place teeming with life and scents that bring her back to the place before her childhood was shattered.

"That was probably the safest time in my life," said McNab-Larson. 

When she was five, a cattle truck came to take her to Kamloops residential school. "The first thing they did was take us down to the cleansing room, where they cut off our hair," she said. "Then, they deloused us. Then, they scrubbed us down with disinfectant like we were diseased animals."

McNab-Larson returned home for the summer, but the next year, she said the school came to get her in an army truck.

WATCH | Barbara McNab-Larson talks about her time at the Kamloops residential school:

Remembering life in the Kamloops residential school

Not all were so lucky — to live and remember.

Seven years before McNab entered the doors of Kamloops residential school, a student named Florence Morgan became sick there. Her death memo notes that it was at 6:30 a.m. on June 26, 1941; by 6:50 a.m., she was taken to the Royal Inland Hospital. Florence died on June 28 from the viral infection encephalitis, the memo says.

The Indian agent reported that her body was returned by truck to her parents on the Bonaparte First Nation, which sits 90 kilometres to the east of the school.

The viral infection that killed Florence was a common after-effect of contracting measles. Outbreaks of measles coursed through the school during this era.

One of these outbreaks sickened nine-year-old Leslie Lewis. On Sept. 22, 1935, while Leslie was recovering, he suffered an epileptic attack. The nurse at the school gave him three grams of luminal, an anti-seizure medication. Leslie was put in a car and sent to the hospital at 9 a.m. the next day.

The doctor reported that Leslie seemed fine that morning, but the next day he was dead, his memo says. The doctor reported that the measles infection likely triggered the seizure.

An image of  Leslie Lewis's death memo. (National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation)

 

The Indian agent concluded the memo by commenting on the overcrowded conditions at Kamloops residential school, where five dormitories accommodated 285 students.

"During an epidemic it is impossible to properly isolate the patients and contacts," typed the Indian agent. "The need for separate quarters to house sick children is evident."

'They still get nightmares about it'

It wasn't just disease. Some students were also driven to suicide.

"This … young boy hung himself in the bathroom. You know, my brother's age group," said Gerry Oleman, who attended Kamloops residential school from about 1960 to 1968, in a recent interview with CBC. Oleman, who is from St'át'imc First Nation in B.C.'s Interior but now lives in Brandon, Man., said the students who witnessed it still can't shake the moment.

"Still today they remember that. They still get nightmares about it," he said. Oleman also mentioned other distraught students: "the runaways and people jumping trains, getting killed jumping a train, you know, freezing to death."

Suicide also haunts the stories of survivors gathered in the book Behind Closed Doors: Stories from the Kamloops Indian Residential School, which was published by the Secwepemc Cultural Society in 2001.

James Charles, who attended from 1964 to 1978 and is featured in the book, knew of three boys who died of suicide. "One suicide was over on the swings beside the brown building," Charles says in Behind Closed Doors. "No one could figure out how that really took place, because it happened in broad daylight, blue sky out, sun was shining."

Charles said there was another child who died on the bell rope and a third found in the orchard. "I think remembering these suicides played a big role in a lot of my anger that I had bottled up inside," Charles says.

According to the book, some of the children who died attempting to escape on a nearby train came from the Lillooet district, about 170 km west of the school.

One anecdote in the book, told by a survivor who signed their story "Anonymous," said their older sister Nellie died at the school. She was sick for months with hepatitis and yellow jaundice. No doctor came to treat her and no one told her parents of her illness until after her death.

"When my father came to the school after hearing of the sad news, he beat the principal and punched him down the stairs," says the survivor in the book. "As much as I want the memories of my education years to be positive, it just can't be."

 

A photo from April 4, 1937, of students, administration and teaching staff at Kamloops residential school. The photo is from the Quebec archives of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate. (National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation)

Another survivor in the book, Eddy Jules, spoke of abortions and a furnace.

"All of us that were going to school would hear the clang, and we would say, 'Oh, that's so and so's friend, and they gave her an abortion,'" said Jules, noting the strangeness of "fire in September or October or November when it's not cold."

Retired senator Murray Sinclair, who chaired the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, said in a recent video statement that he also heard testimony from survivors about this use for a furnace in residential schools.

"Some survivors talked about infants who were born to young girls at the residential schools, infants who had been fathered by priests, were taken away from them and deliberately killed — sometimes thrown into furnaces, we were told," said Sinclair.

'We mourned these children'

Despite all this evidence of death at the school, no record has yet surfaced of a graveyard at the institution — no shred of paper, cross or stone marks conveying who might lie beneath the earth.

Sister Marie Zarowny, chair of the board for the Order of St. Anne's, which provided teachers and nurses to the school, told CBC News a fire destroyed the first 30 years of records from the institution. She said that to her knowledge, no students were ever buried on the school grounds.

She said that if a child died at the Royal Inland Hospital, the body would not be returned to the school. If a student did die at the school, the body would be sent back to their home community for burial.

"We mourned these children at the school. We had a ceremony for them, but they were ... returned to their parents," said Zarowny.

She said that students from Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc who died at the school were buried in the community's cemetery. There are hints of another, now-forgotten graveyard in the records, she said, but couldn't confirm any aspect of this.

"I actually don't know if that reference comes from that school or from another school," she said.

As a result of destroyed records, the true number of students who died at residential school may never be known. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission, which was created to delve into the long history of the schools, concluded that at least 4,100 children died in these institutions.

The Catholic Church has faced widespread calls to release all records related to residentials schools.

The same uncertainty shadows the location of graveyards. Many children were buried in unmarked graves, some of which are now lost to time.

One institution that holds large pieces of this history in its archives is the Catholic Church. Catholic entities ran roughly 75 per cent of residential schools.

The church has faced widespread calls, from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on down, to release all records related to residential schools, to augment the incomplete government record.

Zarowny said her order is sharing any relevant records with Tk'emlúps te Secwépemc that could help aid in the quest to identify the suspected remains on the Kamloops residential school grounds.

She said the Sisters of St. Anne's turned over what they viewed as records related to residential schools to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC).

 

A photo from 1931, taken at the Kamloops residential school. (National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation)

But the order has yet to sign off on the transfer of its records to the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, said Stephanie Scott, executive director of the institute.

"The [Sisters of St. Anne's] remain unwilling to authorize disclosure of [its] records currently in the possession of the government of Canada," said Scott, in a statement to CBC News.

Several Catholic entities never turned over any records to the TRC. According to an internal TRC document obtained by CBC News, 17 Catholic entities failed to hand over any archival material to the commission.

"There are a lot of records in church archives that we never got to go through," Tom McMahon, the former general counsel for the TRC, told CBC.

McMahon said the Catholic entities that did provide files made their own determinations about what was deemed to be a "relevant" document to hand over.

The Oblates of Mary Immaculata, which ran Kamloops residential school, turned over what it deemed to be relevant records to the TRC, according to the internal TRC document.

McMahon said the Catholic entities that did provide files made their own determinations about what was deemed to be a "relevant" document. He said the Catholic entities held onto records connected to church functions and personnel files.

"When you start talking about personnel records, they did not see that as relevant to the children and education of the children," said McMahon.

"When we talk about deaths of children, you want to think about the church records, the baptism records, death records held by the church. The church told us those records pertain to church activities and were not relevant."

McMahon said one of the potentially richest sources of survivor testimony is held by the federal Justice Department in documents relating to roughly 4,000 civil actions filed by survivors against Canada and the various churches that ran residential schools. He said most of those files were never turned over to the TRC.

Survivors and descendants have long spoken about unmarked graves and children who never came home. Their calls made it to the House of Commons in 2007 and then-Indian Affairs minister Jim Prentice, who asked the interim executive director of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to begin working on the issue.

According to a 2008 memo obtained by CBC News, the TRC asked the research branch of Indian Residential Schools Resolutions Canada, a federal agency created to deal with a multitude of civil claims filed by survivors, to conduct an internal records search for cemeteries.

Numerous schools came back with no records of cemeteries, including Kamloops residential school, according to a preliminary report.

John Milloy, one of the country's leading historians and author of A National Crime, perhaps the seminal book on residential schools, said that may be because Indian Affairs never prioritized residential school files.

When government edicts forced the department to destroy records through recycling — for example, as a result of a paper shortage during the Second World War — such files were seen as expendable.

"An awful lot of information which one could have had, to describe the nature of the system, the treatment of the children… a lot of that information was simply lost," said Milloy, who was involved with the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

Milloy said the Indian Affairs department, which is now known as Indigenous and Northern Affairs, is really a large real estate company, holding in trust reserve lands across the country. It also determines who has the right to live on this property, holding registries with status records and band membership lists.

"So those are the records which are most critical to the department," said Milloy.

He also said that the Canadian public has not properly understood the rationale for the evolution of a residential school system under the country's first prime minister, John A. Macdonald. The schools were a means of nation-building and achieving state-security ends, he said.

"It becomes pretty obvious that, as far as Macdonald and other senior members of the Indian Affairs department [were concerned]… one of the purposes of the schools was to hold the children hostage against the good behaviour of their parents," said Milloy.

He said the officials used children as bargaining chips to counter any attempts by Indigenous nations from raising arms against the still-fledgling state.

John Milloy, one of the country's leading historians and author of A National Crime, considered one of the seminal books on residential schools. (CBC News)

Milloy provided CBC News with a pre-print academic paper he wrote that details the strategy. The draft title is "Sir John A.'s Hostages." It states that government and North-West Mounted Police officials were increasingly concerned about a breakout in hostilities between the state and armed Indigenous nations such as the Blackfoot in the Prairies, just as Canada was building a railway to deliver goods and people — as well as establish control over territory.

The use of the schools to neutralize Indigenous resistance was put bluntly by school inspector J. A. Mcrea in a 1886 letter to the Indian commissioner: "It is unlikely that any Tribe or tribes would give trouble of a serious nature to the Government whose members had children completely under Government control."

At the time, Canada wanted to avoid a repeat of the wars in the U.S. and feared any new conflicts would eclipse the violence from the rebellion led by Louis Riel in 1885, Milloy's research showed.

A 1879 report by Nicolas Flood Davin, which recommended the creation of residential schools, followed a fact-finding mission to explore how the Americans used similar institutions, the paper said.

"Davin would have discovered this covert purpose for residential schools in his conversations with Carl Schurtz, the U.S. Secretary of the Interior, and Ezra Hayt, the Commissioner of Indian Affairs," said the paper. "Certainly, for the Department, the resolution of the 'Indian problem,' characterized so often as carrying the white man's burden of Christian duty was, in fact, countering the perceived threat to state security and social purity."

Milloy said that "this is one of the reasons why the Kamloops school is developed in the 1890s, because the situation in the area is tenuous for the government … The schools are also very much part of the colonial process … for the sake of the development of Canada."

The schools used fear and violence — and fear of violence — to bend generations of children under the cross and flag. Much remains hidden from the record about the fate of thousands of children who attended these institutions, but this history is carried by those who came home.

"'You better behave. Don't get out of line, because there's a graveyard and there's also the river.' Those were warnings that were given to us as little, tiny children — five, six years old," said Barbara McNab-Larson of her time at the Kamloops school.

"I don't think you really grasp it at the time, but when your friends disappear and they don't come back, even as a child, you know something's wrong."

Support is available for anyone affected by their experience at residential schools and those who are triggered by the latest reports.

A national Indian Residential School Crisis Line has been set up to provide support for former students and those affected. People can access emotional and crisis referral services by calling the 24-hour national crisis line: 1-866-925-4419.

How differently the Canadian government engages with Tribal Nations

Government Bill (House of Commons) C-92 (42-1) - Royal Assent - An Act respecting First Nations, Inuit and Métis children, youth and families - Parliament of Canada

Somehow the final passage ("royal assent") of this bill in Canada slipped our attention back in June. Initially, we saw it referred to as a "Canadian ICWA", but it seems fair to say that it doesn't quite achieve that level of protection for Native children and families. If nothing else, it illustrates just how differently the Canadian government engages with the tribal nations within its borders compared to the U.S.. We want to add a large caveat, which is that none of us are experts on Canadian law or child welfare.

However, those that are put together a really helpful publication which is available here, and is well worth your read (it made us think about if ICWA would get passing grades):

does-bill-c-92-make-the-grade_-full-report

From the Jurisdiction section of the report:

Why We Give the Bill a ‘D’ on this:

IN A HISTORIC FIRST FOR CANADA, the Bill purports to recognize Indigenous peoples’ inherent jurisdiction. For example, section 8(a) of the Bill affirms “the rights and jurisdiction of Indigenous peoples in relation to child and family services”. This positively worded language is also noted in the Bill’s introduction and summary. Similarly, section 18(1) states that the “inherent right of self-government recognized and affirmed by section 35 of the Constitution Act, 1982 includes jurisdiction in relation to child and family services, including legislative authority in relation to those services and authority to administer and enforce laws made under that legislative authority.” Section 18(2) affirms that this right includes the right to “provide for dispute resolution mechanisms.”

As there are no section 35 cases that recognize an inherent right of self-government for Indigenous Peoples or that have recognized an Aboriginal or Treaty right over child and family services law-making, this is a significant step forward.

This is not, however, a recognition of jurisdiction that removes all federal or provincial oversight, power or intervention. By recognizing jurisdiction over child and family services as a section 35 right, the federal government immediately re-asserts its power to unilaterally infringe or limit that right, a power upheld by court cases such as Sparrow. The legislation sets legal limits in terms of Indigenous laws being subject to Charter and Canadian Human Rights Act and the BIOC. It also sets practical limits in terms of the virtual necessity of negotiating coordination agreements with the federal and provincial governments, and in the glaring absence of any provisions for funding. At best, this could be interpreted as an acknowledgment of concurrent (or shared) jurisdiction, a matter on which Bill C-92 should be more clear.

***

Further, section 23 states Indigenous laws only authoritative if they can be applied in a way that “is not contrary to the best interests of the child.” As previously stated, Indigenous laws have upheld the best interests of Indigenous children for thousands of years. The concern about this limit is how the BIOC doctrine has been interpreted and applied by courts, non-Indigenous governments and decisions makers to apprehend Indigenous children and separate them from their families, communities and territories for the past 50 plus years.

Bill C-92, An Act Respecting First Nations, Inuit and Métis Children, Youth and Families by Kate Fort

The Adoption of Frances T #CANADA #60sScoop

An Interview with Allyson Stevenson, the recipient of the 2016 Arrell M. Gibson Award

by Lauren Naus for AMERIND

Allyson

An interview with Allyson Stevenson, author of “The Adoption of Frances T: Blood, Belonging, and Aboriginal Transracial Adoption in Twentieth-Century Canada” is now available on the UTP Journals Blog!

Learn about the inspiration behind her article and about her research as a Historian of Canadian Indigenous History.

For excellence in Native American History, this article was given the 2016 Arrell M. Gibson Award from the Western Historical Association. Stevenson’s article appeared in the Canadian Journal of History/Annales canadiennes d’histoire, and to celebrate this award-winning research, this article is Open Access until November 4. Read her article here - http://bit.ly/CJH503d. 

This article offers a case study of a transracial adoption involving a mixed-heritage child and a legally Indian adoptive couple. The legal adoption of “Frances T” in 1937, considered to be “in the best interests of the child” by social welfare professionals, took on gendered and racialized meaning in the discourse of the Indian Affairs bureaucrats who subsequently attempted to overturn it. The article uses the case to examine Canadian settler-colonial beliefs about blood and belonging. It also explores the complications that emerged as legally defined Indian people came into contact with provincial child welfare legislation. With the goal of eliminating Indigenous legal and kinship forms, the Indian Act colonized adoption so it could be used as a method of assimilation rather than as a traditional form of Indigenous alliance creation and childcare. The case highlights the themes of Indigenous kinship and sovereignty, legislated Indian identity, and the growing involvement of social workers in the lives of Aboriginal people in the mid- to late-twentieth century.

[I have the pdf and can email it if you don't make the download deadline... Trace]