Unlearning colonialism

In September 1874, Treaty commissioners ­representing Queen Victoria traveled to Fort Qu’Appelle to negotiate the terms of a sacred promise to live in peace and friendship with the Indigenous Peoples of the region that came to be known as Treaty 4. (These people were the Nehiyawak (Cree), Anihšināpēk (­Saulteaux), Dakota, Lakota and Nakoda.)

Prior to this meeting, the Indigenous leaders had learned that the Hudson’s Bay Company had sold their lands to the Dominion of Canada without their consultation or consent. Thus, when the Treaty commissioners sought to initiate negotiations, they were surprised when the leaders declined to discuss the Treaty. Instead, an Anihšināpēk spokesman named Otahaoman ­explained through a translator that the assembled peoples felt that there was “something in the way” of their ability to discuss the terms of the Treaty in good faith (Morris 2014, 97–98). 

It took several days of discussion for the Queen’s representatives to comprehend the concerns expressed by Otahaoman, that these side dealings undermined the integrity of the government’s Treaty intentions. Through the translator, Otahaoman clearly articulated the view that the Hudson’s Bay Company really only had Indigenous Peoples’ permission to conduct trade. The company did not have the right to claim ownership over any land. 

Despite these misunderstandings, as well as notable disagreement among the various Indigenous groups in attendance, the parties did eventually ratify the terms of Treaty 4. 

I begin with this story to draw attention to the ­persistence of Canadian colonial culture as “something in the way” of efforts to repair Indigenous–Canadian relations. The observation that Otahaoman articulated in 1874 is still a very relevant and unsettling problem today. 

In the wake of the 94 Calls to Action issued by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, educational jurisdictions and institutions across Canada have rushed to implement various policies and program initiatives. However, the rush to Reconciliation facilitates an active disregard for the truth of ­colonial ideologies that remain mostly uninterrogated in ­Canadian ­educational contexts and continue to be “in the way” of meaningful Indigenous–Canadian relational renewal. Such relational renewal is only possible if colonialism is unlearned through a broad social, ­cultural and educational reckoning.

Colonial ideologies have gotten “in the way” of schooling practices in the sense that prevailing curricular and pedagogical approaches perpetuate a colonial worldview. The founding principle of colonialism is relationship denial, and the centuries-long predominance of this principle has resulted in the creation of educational practices that perpetuate relationship denial in mostly subtle and unquestioned ways. 

Such practices are reflective of the “Western code”—the Enlightenment-based knowledge paradigm that is presented as possessing all the answers to any important questions that could be asked by anyone, anywhere in the world. It is important to state that such conceptions of knowledge and knowing have provided many ­benefits, but those understandings become a form of violence when they are prescribed as the only way to be a successful human being. 

For example, Wynter (1995), has argued that the ­arrival of Christopher Columbus to Turtle Island instigated a centuries-long process wherein a universalized model of the human being was imposed on people around the world. She asserts that this particular advancement of colonial power has served to “absolutize the behavioural norms encoded in our present culture-specific conception of being human, allowing it to be posited as if it were the universal of the human species” (Wynter 1995, 42–43). 

The assertion of this colonial power is carried out in the name of Progress.1 Formal schooling eventually became a primary means by which those with power could discipline the citizenry to conform to this model of the human being and this notion of Progress. As I see it, this has resulted in the predominance of curricular and pedagogical approaches that perpetuate these universalized behavioural norms by persistently presenting knowledge according to the rubric of relationship denial.

The complex task of unlearning colonial forms of relationship denial does require learning more about the colonial worldview and the ways in which the cultural assumptions of that worldview inform the common sense conventions of educational practices. However, it cannot only rely on learning about such things in an informational way. To do so is to assume that relationship denial is just an intellectual problem that can be ­unlearned via a three-hour lecture with accompanying PowerPoint slides. 

The difficult truth is that colonial forms of relationship denial are much more than just intellectual problems. Human beings who accept a colonial worldview as common sense come to embody colonial forms of relationship denial that teach them to divide the world. 

One prominent form of relationship denial is evident in the ways in which the mental aspect of a human being is considered more important than the emotional, spiritual and physical aspects. The possibility for holistic unity and balance is denied when the different aspects of a human being are increasingly fragmented and disassociated as they become educated. 

Relationship denial is also evident in the ways in which human beings are taught to believe that their needs are always more important than the needs of other forms of life. It is also evident in the ways in which students are taught to deny relationships that they have with people who do not look like them, speak like them or pray like them. When someone is educated to accept relationship denial as a way of being in the world, it becomes part of how they are as a human being—how they live—and this acceptance has a very distinctive bearing on how they understand knowledge and knowing. 

The field of education has become so fully informed by the assumed correctness of colonial worldview that it has become difficult to take seriously other knowledge systems or ways of being human. However, this struggle to honour other knowledge systems or ways of being is contributing to some of the most significant difficulties that society faces in trying to live in less damaging, divisive and ecologically destructive ways. It is clear to me that the acceptance of relationship denial as the natural cognitive habit of successful human beings undermines our ability to respond to these complex challenges in ­dynamic ways. Thus, an urgent challenge facing educators today involves decentering, denaturalizing and unlearning colonial logics of relationship denial as curricular and pedagogical common sense, and then honouring other ways to know and be.

As a teacher educator struggling to address this challenge, I draw significant guidance and inspiration from Indigenous wisdom teachings of kinship relationality. These wisdom teachings emphasize how human beings are at their best when they recognize themselves as enmeshed in networks of human and more-than-human relationships that enable life and living. 

For example, in nêhiyawêwin (the Cree language), a foundational wisdom concept that is central to ­nêhiyaw (Cree) worldview is wâhkôhtowin. Translated into English, wâhkôhtowin is generally understood to refer to kinship. In a practical way, wâhkôhtowin describes ethical guidelines regarding how you are related to your kin and how to conduct yourself as a good relative. 

Following those guidelines teaches one how to relate to human relatives and interact with them in accordance with traditional kinship teachings. Importantly, ­however, the nêhiyaw worldview also emphasizes ­honouring the ancient kinship relationships that ­humans have with all other forms of life that inhabit their traditional territories. This emphasis teaches ­human beings to understand themselves as fully ­enmeshed in networks of relationships that support and enable their life and living. 

Thus, following the relational kinship wisdom of wâhkôhtowin, human beings are called to repeatedly acknowledge and honour the sun, the moon, the sky, the land, the wind, the water, the animals and the trees (just to name a few), as quite literally our kinship relations. Humans are fully reliant on these entities for survival and so the wise person works to ensure that those more-than-human relatives are healthy and consistently honoured. Cradled within this kinship teaching is an understanding that healthy human-to-human relations depend upon and flow from healthy relations with the more-than-human. They cannot be separated out.

These wisdom teachings of wâhkôhtowin enmeshment and kinship relationality are also central to the spirit and intent of the so-called Numbered Treaties negotiated between Indigenous Peoples and the ­British Crown between 1871 and 1921. Although I cannot claim expertise in the details of each individual Treaty, I can state that Indigenous Peoples understand those Treaties as sacred adoption ceremonies through which they agreed to live in peaceful coexistence with their newcomer relatives. This means that Indigenous Peoples understand those Treaties as a formal commitment to welcome newcomers into their kinship networks, share land and resources with them, and work together with them as relatives for mutual benefit. In this sense, the Numbered Treaties can be understood as expressions of the wâhkôhtowin imagination—human and more-than-human kinship interconnectivities. 

However, such kinship interconnectivities are not a central part of how most Canadians understand the Numbered Treaties. In accordance with the colonial emphasis on relationship denial, Treaties have been a massive curricular omission in Canadian education systems. If Canadians have learned anything of Treaties in their formal schooling experiences, it usually comes in the form of historical background information that characterizes Treaties as business deals through which Indigenous Peoples surrendered their lands and received gifts and certain rights in return. So, tragically, the possibility that the Numbered Treaties could actually honour the layered complexities of kinship relationality and its constant renewal is undermined by ongoing institutional and societal dedication to relationship denial.

An urgent challenge facing educators today involves decentering, denaturalizing and unlearning colonial logics of relationship denial as curricular and pedagogical common sense, and then honouring other ways to know and be.

It is my view that Treaties can be a significant source of inspiration in addressing the two educational challenges mentioned previously: unlearning colonialism and honouring other ways to know and be. The handshake depicted on the Treaty medal guides me to work together with others in ways that bring benefits to all people who live on the land together. Specific to Treaty 6, the shaking of hands is understood to signify ka-miyo-­wîcêhtoyahk (for us to get along well), ka-wîtaskîhtoyahk (for us to live as Nations), ­ka-wîtaskêhtoyahk (for us to share the land and live as good neighbours) and ka-miyo-ohpikihitoyahk (raise each other’s children well). 

What expressions of knowledge and knowing flow from an education that emphasizes kinship ­connectivities and relational renewal? What kind of ­human being emerges from such educational ­experiences? These are questions without clear answers. However, there are also questions that educators must begin to carefully consider as part of the much larger struggle to unlearn colonialism. It is clear to me that the human ability to honour other ways to know and be depends on the willingness to return to the ancient wisdom teachings of kinship relationality that are clearly emphasized in Treaty teachings.

1 I choose to capitalize this term to denote its mythological prominence within settler colonial societies like Canada. This notion of Progress has grown out of the colonial experience and is predicated on the pursuit of unfettered economic growth and material prosperity stemming from faith in market capitalism. For more on this see Donald (2019) and Nisbet (1980).

References

Campbell, M. 2007. “We Need to Return to the Principles of Wahkotowin.” Eagle Feather News, November, 10(11), 5.
https://www.eaglefeathernews.com/quadrant/media//pastIssues/November_2007.pdf

Donald, D. 2019. “Homo economicus and forgetful curriculum.” In Indigenous Education: New Directions in Theory and Practice, ed. H. Tomlinson-Jahnke, S. Styres, S. Lilley and D. Zinga, 103–125. Edmonton, AB: University of Alberta Press.

Morris, A. 2014. The Treaties of Canada with the Indians of Manitoba and the North-West Territories: Including the Negotiations on which they are Based, and Other Information Relating Thereto. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Nisbet, R. A. 1980. History of the Idea of Progress. Piscataway, 
NJ: Transaction. 

Wynter, S. 1995. “1492: A New World View.” In Race, Discourse, and the Origin of the Americas: A New World View, ed. V. Lawrence Hyatt and R. Nettleford, 5–57. Washington DC: Smithsonian Libraries and Archives.