Image Source: United Church of Canada Archives
For 150 years the Canadian government forcefully removed Indigenous children from their homes, families and everything they knew in order to get rid of “the Indian problem” through forced assimilation. The goal of assimilation was based on racist ideology which suppressed Indigenous culture by christianizing “Indians” and civilizing “savages”. More than 150,000 children were placed in 139 residential schools across Canada where they endured substandard living conditions, physical and sexual abuse, and trauma. Survivors persevered, eventually coming forward with the truth about what occurred at these schools and following up with the largest class action lawsuit in Canadian history. Out of this The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada was born in June 2008.
Here are nine must know facts connected to the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC):
1. Unique to Canada
Once the lawsuit was settled out of court, survivors realised they would never have their day in court and that there would be no public record of their stories. Survivors fought hard to make the TRC in Canada to be a part of the legal settlement agreement. This makes it unique amongst all of the TRC’s throughout the world.
2. Over 7,000 Former Students Testified
The TRC visited over 300 communities across the nation gathering witness testimonies at private and public statement gathering events. “It will take more than two years to play back the more than 6,500 statements – they range in length from 10 minutes to five hours.”
3. Electrical Chairs Used As Torture
Former students reported being electrocuted in a homemade electric chair as means of punishment by missionaries. One witness states, “The sight of a child being electrocuted and their legs waving in front of them was a funny sight for the missionaries and they’d all be laughing.” The government tried to not acknowledge these claims, but an Ontario Judge has recently ruled the federal government must turn over documented evidence.
4. Malnutrition Experiments
Beginning in 1942 the government started to perform several experiments to test the effects of malnutrition on approximately 1000 children spanning six residential schools. Students from Port Alberni, B.C., Kenora, Ont., Shubenacadie, N.S., and Lethbridge, Alta. suffered as ‘guinea pigs’ on research that went nowhere.
5. Seven National TRC Events
TRC events held throughout the country allowed survivors to come forward in a safe, supportive environment with their stories to educate the public, promote awareness about the Indian residential schools and their impact. It will take generations for the healing process to be completed and to rid society of persistent negative racial stereotypes about the First Peoples of Canada used to justify the schools.
6. Former Students Advise TRC
The Indian Residential Schools (IRS) Survivor Committee is made up of ten residential school survivors from across Canada that serve as an advisory committee to the TRC on: community characteristics to participate in Commission processes; the criteria for the community and national processes; the evaluation of Commemoration Policy Directive proposals and other issues as are required by the Commissioners.
You can read their bios here:
7. The Bentwood Box
The Bentwood box will be used to gather offerings, representing the personal journeys of the survivors. It was steamed, bent and carved from a single piece of red cedar by Coast Salish artist Luke Marston as a tribute to the victims of the IRS system. Each panel represents an Indigenous culture – the First Nations, Inuit and Metis – who suffered in residential schools.
Marston said that while he was creating the box “he asked his mother to tell him stories about his grandmother’s time at residential school… his mother told him that when his grandmother was a young child, she was grabbed by a nun and thrown down the stairs, breaking her fingers. Her hand was never cared for and her fingers healed in a cramped position.”
8. The Missing Children’s Project
“They didn’t bring their bodies home. They don’t know where they are buried” says a survivor of two Saskatchewan residential schools. The Missing Children Project was created by the TRC with the mandate to accurately account for the identity of the children who died, their cause of death and where were they buried while attending a residential school. So far the count is up to 4,100 and expected to rise.
9. The National Research Centre
The surviving student’s audio and video statements will be housed at The National Research Centre hosted by the University of Manitoba. With survivors consent, their statements, documents, audio/video material or photographs can be used for TRC research, be displayed at the NRC or be used in any educational material developed by the TRC. Third parties will also get to use this material if approved by the TRC for respectful educational purposes.