5. Decolonizing linguistics
5.2. Colonialism and decolonization
The Canadian Encyclopedia defines colonialism as “the process through which a foreign people establish control over a territory and, if applicable, its Indigenous peoples” (Hale 2023). Colonial control can be exercised in a variety of ways, and often includes control of a people’s language.
Shoemaker (2015) describes 12 different forms of colonialism, two of which are relevant to us: settler colonialism and extractive colonialism.
Settler colonialism
Settler Colonialism. Large numbers of settlers claim land and become the majority. Employing a “logic of elimination,” as Patrick Wolfe put it in the American Historical Review, they attempt to engineer the disappearance of the original inhabitants everywhere except in nostalgia.
-Shoemaker 2015
Settler colonialism was the major form of colonialism deployed in Canada and many other nations. Throughout much of Canadian history, “desirable” settlers were actively recruited, while “undesirable” settlers were discouraged and Indigenous peoples were killed, displaced, or assimilated by force in order to clear the land for settlers.
One major tool of forced assimilation used in Canada and elsewhere is the Indian Residential School System. Children were forcibly removed from their families and taken to boarding schools where they were horribly mistreated, as well as forbidden from speaking their languages and practicing their cultures. The stated aim of these residential schools was assimilation, as stated openly by Prime Minister John A. Macdonald in parliament.
When the school is on the Reserve the child lives with its parents, who are savages; he is surrounded by savages, and though he may learn to read and write his habits and training and mode of thought are Indian. He is simply a savage who can read and write … Indian children should be withdrawn as much as possible from the parental influence, and the only way to do that would be to put them in central training industrial schools where they will acquire the habits, modes and thought of white men.
-John A. Macdonald, House of Commons, 9 May 1883
as cited by Starblanket 2018: 179
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission classifies these practices as a “cultural genocide” (2015). The act of forcibly transferring children from one group to another group is also classified as an act of genocide according to the United Nations (1948).
The last residential school didn’t close until 1996 and communities are still healing and rebuilding. Many community elders and language users are residential school survivors. Other forms of forced assimilation are still in force, as well, such as the placement of Indigenous children in foster care with non-Indigenous families.
When we do linguistic research with communities that have experienced forced assimilation, we need to keep this in mind. There may be only a few language users left, whose time and energy belongs to the community first, not to outsider linguists. Because language use was punished in the residential schools, survivors may have trauma associated with the language. Others may have purposefully not taught the language to their children in order to protect them. Community members may be rightfully upset if settlers and other outsiders seem to have more access to their own language than they do.
Extractive colonialism
Extractive Colonialism. All the colonizers want is a raw material found in a particular locale: beaver fur, buffalo hides, gold, guano, sandalwood. The desire for natural history specimens and ethnographic artifacts could also be considered extractive colonialism. A slash-and-burn operation, extractive colonialism does not necessarily entail permanent occupation, but it often seems to follow. Extractive colonizers might destroy or push away indigenous inhabitants to access resources but more typically depend upon native diplomatic mediation, environmental knowledge, and labor.
-Shoemaker 2015
Although aspects of settler colonialism are still at play in Canada, we have in many cases transitioned to an extractive colonial society.
Extractive colonialism in Manitoba
Extractive colonialism doesn’t only apply to physical resources like fur and oil, though; it also applies to knowledge. When we do research on a language, we need to be careful to protect the well-being of the community the data comes from, keeping in mind that we are guests and that the language belongs to the community, not to the researchers. We also need to remember that our research depends on community members’ knowledge, labour, and expertise, and that we would not be able to do our research without them.
Decolonization
Decolonization, on the other hand, refers to the removal of colonial elements. This means that we have to first recognize the ways that our systems are colonial in nature and then restructure them to remove those colonial structures. In the next few sections, we will first learn about the colonial history of linguistics and then we will look at models for how to move forward in a good way.
Key takeaways
- Settler colonialism is when settlers attempt to become the majority population group of a land, displacing or assimilating the original population.
- The Indian Residential School System in Canada was a form of genocide used to force the assimilation of Indigenous peoples.
- In Indian Residential Schools, children were typically forbidden from speaking their languages, which still has far-reaching impact on Indigenous language use today.
- Extractive colonialism is when settlers collect resources from the settled land, often using Indigenous labour or expertise, prioritizing their desire for resources over the well-being of Indigenous communities.
- Research conducted on Indigenous peoples can be a form of extractive colonialism if it is not done in a good way.
- Decolonization is the process of identifying colonial systems and removing them from our society.
Check yourself!
References and further resources
The references in this section that have at least one Indigenous author are indicated with an ➡️.
For a general audience
Hale, Karl. 2023. Colonialism in Canada. The Canadian Encyclopedia. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/colonialism-in-canada
➡️ McLeod, Angelina. 2019. Freedom Road. National Film Board of Canada. https://www.nfb.ca/series/freedom-road-series/
Mikkelson, Dawn, and Jamie A. Lee (Directors). 2005. Green green water. Culture unplugged. https://www.cultureunplugged.com/play/6661/Green-Green-Water
Perry, Adele. 2016. Aqueduct: Colonialism, resources, and the histories we remember. Winnipeg: ARP Books.
➡️ Shoemaker, Nancy. 2015. A Typology of Colonialism. Perspectives on History.
Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada. 2015. Honouring the truth, reconciling for the future: Summary of the final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada. https://ehprnh2mwo3.exactdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/Executive_Summary_English_Web.pdf
United Nations. 1948. Convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide. https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/genocide-convention.shtml
➡️ Wa Ni Ska Tan Alliance. 2024. Augmented flow: License to destroy documentary. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZdrEwEt-V7o
Wilt, James. 19 October 2016. How green energy has hurt First Nations in the North. Vice. https://www.vice.com/en/article/4w58mq/how-green-energy-has-hurt-first-nations-in-the-north
Academic sources
Carleton, Sean. 2021. ‘I don’t need any more education’: Senator Lynn Beyak, residential school denialism, and attacks on truth and reconciliation in Canada. Settler Colonial Studies 11 (4): 466-486. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/2201473X.2021.1935574
➡️ Fontaine, Lorena. 2017. Redress for linguicide: Residential schools and assimilation in Canada. British Journal of Canadian Studies 30(2): 183–204.
MacDonald, David & Graham Hudson. 2012. The Genocide question and Indian residential schools in Canada. Canadian Journal of Political Science 45: 427–449.
➡️ Starblanket, Tamara. 2017. ‘Kill the Indian in the child’: Genocide in international law. InIndigenous peoples as subjects of international law, ed. Irene Watson. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge. 171-200.
