How Did The Indian Act Affect Canada's Identity?

When European settlers came to Canada they colonized Canada by taking away land, water, rights, spiritual practice, as well as put children into residential school and put an unprecedented amount of children in the child welfare system (Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, 2015). This is a key example of how trauma can be passed down from one generation to the next until someone deals with it. Right now the youth of Attawapiskat are dealing with the intergenerational trauma as well as creating more trauma for generations to come, this creates an ongoing chain of risks that will continue to develop if not helped.

Residential Schools affected every single person that attended, with varying degrees of consequences. Numerous problems arose, however, one of the biggest impact that affected every generation to come would be the result of poverty from residential school. These institutes didn’t teach many helpful skills that would aid them down the line. Instead, they just taught the students the languages of the Caucasian man and the religion of Christianity. As a result of First Nations not receiving useful education, they were not applicable for either jobs or for higher tier jobs. Alas, an abundance of “Indians” were either unemployed or underemployed. In response to poverty, the human mind can be induced by trauma in addition to psychological damage.

“They get everything for free. Why don’t they just go home?” First Nations people enjoy the same fundamental benefits as all other Canadians, including Child Tax Benefit, Old Age Security and Employment Insurance. Where constitutionally-protected Aboriginal rights exist, First Nations people do have priority over others (for example, the right to hunt and fish for subsistence), but even these rights are subject to regulation. Furthermore, another myth says that First Nations people don’t pay taxes. All Inuit, Métis, and Non-Status Indians pay taxes, and Status Indians who live off- reserve pay taxes. The only Aboriginal people who are exempt from paying income tax are Status Indians who earn their income on a reserve for a company or organization located on the reserve. John Lagimodiere, a Métis from Saskatoon explains the basics of this troubled relationship. Lagomodiere makes the point that unlike the non- Aboriginal Frank, Lagomodiere’s ancestors had every detail of their lives prescribed by a special law. Natives were isolated group inside of a community that was put on reserves that were not legally allowed to even leave the reserve that had administrative people that administrated their banks that left them perennially poor. The Indian Act of 1876, which still governs life on reserves held fast to John A. Mcdonald's declaration to do away with

The Metis have faced difficulties because of dealing with the segregation from the other majority cultures in Canada. This is shown through the treatment they received

The history of Residential Schools is impossible, in the sense that it is incomplete and only recently recorded. Many of the 150 000 Inuit, Metis, and First Nations who were forced into these assimilatory schools have already died, meaning their experiences are lost. Only a fraction of the former students’ stories will be

The Impact of the Indian Act on Canadian Society and First Nations Identity is massive. The Indian Act had a goal of assimilating the First Nations, therefore influencing their identity and culture and also influencing Canadian Society as a whole. There are many aspects of this which will be looked into. The first step is to understand the Indian Act, which will be paragraph one. The next step is to look at the challenges left behind from the Indian Act on both the European and First Nations sides, which will be paragraph two. The third step is to understand the impacts of those challenges on Canadian society, which will be paragraph three. Let's get started.

Residential schools were first being established in the 1940s and the last one was finally closed in 1996. In these residential schools, First Nations people were very badly treated and one who went to those schools would not get a proper education. The students who went to those schools would still be affected by it and effects from them are showing still to this day. Why did the Canadian government create residential schools in the first place? Well, the most obvious reason was to educate First Nations people to educate them in modern Euro-Canadian ways. Another reason and one of the main ones was to remove their Indian status .The other reason was to Christianize aboriginal people. In this essay, you will learn the three main reasons

First Nations were one of the first people in Canada, but suffered horribly. Through the genocide from the European settlers to the residential schools for Indigenous children, many families were destroyed and in grief for their lost ones. As Canada became a country, the Indian Act was founded in 1867. This Act governs the matters relating to Indian status, reserves and bands. There are many parts to this Act. They are the “Potlatch Law” and Section 141, Bill C-31 and gender discrimination, White Paper, and the 1951 amendments. The Act was established to eliminate the cultural, social, political, and economic qualities of Aboriginals through assimilating them into the culture and lifestyle of Canadians. Some of these laws were unfair to Indigenous people. The Indian Act

Canada is considered a relatively peaceful country that has little conflict with foreign countries world wide. Although Canada has peaceful foreign relations, its biggest conflicts come internally with the Aboriginal population. The Aboriginal people of Canada were the first people to reside in Canada, but as European settlers arrived they were quickly pushed off of their lands. Aboriginal people have had constant conflict with the colonizing population ever since white European settlers colonized Canada. Many Canadian citizens are unaware of the atrocities that were committed against Aboriginal people by these European settlers. There have been constant disputes over land privileges and the discrimination that Aboriginal people have faced

government started to civilize them and moved to control all aspects of their lives through passing the Indian Act and residential schools. According to Carole Blackburn “although assimilation was the stated goal, in actuality, the Indian Act facilitated the ongoing supervision of aboriginal people as a racially segregated population, marking their externality from the nation and separation from the rights and duties of Canadian citizenship” ( ). Therefore, biology has been used as an ideology to maintain capitalism and used to determine society behavior. In the other words, prejudice, discrimination and racism become the reason that they occupied the subordinate position in the political, economical and ideological relations of Canadian’s society.

Residential schools were government sponsored Religious schools for the Aboriginal community. Assimilation is the process by which a person or a group's language and/or culture come to resemble those of another group. The residential schools were made to assimilate the Natives to live within Canada in peace with society. The residential Schools were closed in 1996 with the last school in Saskatchewan. This was due because the schools were close due to expense and teachers preferred working at public schools. The Aboriginals today show us that Residential Schools were ineffective. This can be shown by examining the components of Harper's Apology, Maclean Magazine Issues and the FN Test Show far below average.

Residential schools stripped children from their culture and traditions. Firstly, the students were not permitted to speak their mother tongue or practice their language (6.11), If they did, they were smacked on their hands or severely punished

In 1996, the last of a number of schools in Canada created for the purposes of assimilating indigenous youth into Canadian society was shut down. The residential school phenomenon can be traced back to the late 1800’s, when the government authorized the taking of indigenous children from their families to be placed in church-run schools. While the schools did provide some education, many students suffered physical, mental, and sexual abuse while being stripped of their language and culture in favour or European language, culture, and values (Legacy of Hope Foundation, n.d.). Here, I will look at the residential school phenomenon through a picture of a young indigenous boy getting his hair cut in a classroom of a residential school, approached

Linda in her study elaborates that it could simply separate Canadians in three kinds: native Canadians, migrants from former suzerain and migrants from other countries. As a native Canadian, Linda thinks that they could not ignore the experience of colonization that made Canada becomes marginalization through post-colonialism. Here she pointed out Quebec, which is colonized by France, is a good example about first imperial force of pre-colonial history. In 1608, French explorers arrived Quebec and made it became French colony. After the Seven Years War between Britain and France, they signed the Treaty of Paris and ceded Quebec to Britain in 1763. Under the colonized of Britain, Quebec could keep speaking French and keep French culture, which

The residential school was a government-sponsored religious school founded to assimilate aboriginal children into the Euro-Canadian culture. Originally, Christian schools and Canadian governments have attempted to educate and convert indigenous adolescents into Euro-Canadian society, which has confused life and community and caused long-term problems among the indigenous peoples. With the passage of the British North America Act in 1867 and the implementation of the Indian Act (1876), the government was required to provide Indigenous youth with an education and to integrate them into Canadian society. Large numbers of aboriginal children in Canada were required to attend go to the residential schools. In the article "Impact of residential schooling and of child abuse on substance use problem in Indigenous Peoples" by Amélie Ross states,"According to the First Nations Regional Longitudinal