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These are difficult stories. We bear witness in this chapter to the role of sport in furthering the settler colonial projects throughout Turtle Island. Here are some supports to access in the community and from a distance:
First Peoples House of Learning Cultural Support & Counselling
Niijkiwendidaa Anishnaabekwag Services Circle (Counselling & Healing Services for Indigenous Women & their Families) – 1-800-663-2696
Nogojiwanong Friendship Centre (705) 775-0387
Peterborough Community Counselling Resource Centre: (705) 742-4258
Hope for Wellness – Indigenous help line (online chat also available) – 1-855-242-3310
LGBT Youthline: askus@youthline.ca or text (647)694-4275
National Indian Residential School Crisis Line – 1-866-925-4419
Talk4Healing (a culturally-grounded helpline for Indigenous women):1-855-5544-HEAL
Section One: History
A) The Residential School System
Exercise 1: Notebook Prompt
We are asked to honour these stories with open hearts and open minds.
Which part of the chapter stood out to you? What were your feelings as you read it? (50 words)
| What stood out for me was how sports was used as a tool incultural genocide for indigenous people rather than a form of healing as I was not aware of this in our history which I found disturbing as it was yet another form of erasure in indigenous games and had been replaced with Euro Canadian sports in order to “civilize” residential students. It was another form of colonial control and powerrather than fostering healing and a relationship of recognition and repsecting indigenous culture on sports.
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B) Keywords
Exercise 2: Notebook Prompt
Briefly define (point form is fine) one of the keywords in the padlet (may be one that you added yourself).
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Residential schools were forms of cultural genocide that erased Indigenous children’s identities to assimilate to Euro Canadian colonial idealisms. Where it reinforced control through colonial powers to discipline and reshape children into molded constructs that were based on the beliefs that it was paternalistic in determining what was best for Indigenous children.
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C) Settler Colonialism
Exercise 3: Complete the Activities
Exercise 4: Notebook Prompt
Although we have discussed in this module how the colonial project sought to suppress Indigenous cultures, it is essential to note that it also appropriates and adapts Indigenous cultures and “body movement practices” (75) as part of a larger endeavour to “make settlers Indigenous” (75).
What does this look like? (write 2 or 3 sentences)
| A reflection on colonialism acknowledges the deeper strategic appropriation and adaptations of Indigenous culture and their practices. Where, for example, the attempt in “making settlers Indigenous” (Forsyth & O’Bonsawin, 2023) is the process of settlers taking on Indigenous identities, expressions and the physical practices, but not honoring them as it was just a means of transactions in justifying the claim to lands and “belonging” as a means of appropriation. To further elaborate, where it was implemented within Euro-Canadian sports by taking traditional Indigenous games and practices, and rebranding them. In taking certain aspects from Indigenous physical culture, settlers took games like lacrosse and erased the spiritual, cultural and community way of celebrating the game. Lacrosse was a sacred game that many indigenous nations often played for spiritual purposes or to settle disputes among clans. Yet, settlers took the game and redefined it as a competitive, rule-bound sport that aligned with colonial values of masculinity and discipline. As a result, removing the Indigenous origins and meanings of the sport, which as a result disrespected the cultural foundations and acknowledgement of Indigenous erasure, was skewed through a colonial narrative (TRC, 2015).
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D) The Colonial Archive
Exercise 5: Complete the Activities
Section Two: Reconciliation
A) Reconciliation?
Exercise 6: Activity and Notebook Prompt
Visit the story called “The Skate” for an in-depth exploration of sport in the residential school system. At the bottom of the page you will see four questions to which you may respond by tweet, facebook message, or email:
How much freedom did you have to play as a child?
What values do we learn from different sports and games?
When residential staff took photos, what impression did they try to create?
Answer one of these questions (drawing on what you have learned in section one of this module or prior reading) and record it in your Notebook.
| I noticed the photos throughout the website from the individuals who told their stories portrayed a false sense of happiness and success of Indigenous children participating in sports that were inforced and taught in the residential schools and churches. It gave a false sense of representation that these places were supportive and nurturing in guiding children throughout childhood. However it hid the harsh realities that Indigenous children faces by being forced into assimilation, and cultural suppresion with varying forms of abuse and oppression. It concealed many atrocities that these systematic frameworks enforced upon Indigenous children and the suffering they incured from the residential school system.
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B) Redefining Sport
B) Sport as Medicine
Exercise 7: Notebook Prompt
Make note of the many ways sport is considered medicine by the people interviewed in this video.
| I found from several individuals who discussed their form of medicine in participating in sports within Indigenous communities. A main sport that was discussed throughout was how lacrosse as a traditional game was considered a gift from the Creator, not just a physical activity but also playing an important part within the Indigenous community as spiritual and cultural practices that helped with endorsing a sense of healing for their well being.
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C) Sport For development
Exercise 7: Notebook Prompt
What does Waneek Horn-Miller mean when she says that the government is “trying but still approaching Indigenous sport development in a very colonial way”?
| I believe Waneek Horn-Miller’s statement is a critique of how institutions are still managing and framing Indigenous sports through a colonial European system that is failing to recognize and also prioritize Indigenous knowledge, autonomy and culture. Furthermore, funding that’s in place is often under the control of non Indigenous decision makers which is still perpetuating the issues of colonial powers. |
Exercise 8: Padlet Prompt
Add an image or brief comment reflecting some of “binding cultural symbols that constitute Canadian hockey discourse in Canada.” Record your responses in your Notebook as well.
This image displays the myth of innocence and unity in hockey as a sport. It shows Indigenous children playing hockey on a frozen pond with handmade sticks, which can be interpreted as a binding of cultural symbols on Canadian Hockey discourse. At first glance, it reflects a classic Canadian scene of winter, playing on a frozen lake and bringing together a sense of community. However from a historical view it reveals deeper truths from the image, Indigenous children were introduced to hockey in residential schools where traditional games were banned enforcing assimiliation into the sport and schools. It had become a tool in implimenting colonial control over Indigenous children. Upon further reflection the image can be interpreated as a romanticized portrayl that is masking deep traums from forced assimilation throgh the sport. |
Section Three: Decolonization
Please see the major assignment for this half of the term in the final section of this chapter.
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