SOCI 2070 The Imaginary Indian

1
SOCI 2070The Imaginary Indian
2
Who Was Dudley George?

• September, 1995
• First term of new provincial government
• Mike Harris, Premier
• Occupation of Ipperwash Provincial Park by
  members of the Stony Point Band
• Park is part of a larger land claim and holds an
  Aboriginal burial ground

3
Todays Class

• Colonialism, Indians, Land and Politics
• The Rest in the West Images of the Imaginary
  Indian
• Are discourses of the Imaginary Indian
  innocent?
• Who Was Dudley George?

4
Todays Readings

• Required
• Daniel Francis, The Imaginary Indian The Image
  of the Indian in Canadian Culture, 1-9, 219-224.
• Valda Blundell Aboriginal Cultural Tourism in
  Canada Joan Nicks and Jeannette Sloniowski (eds)
  Slippery Pastimes Reading the Popular in
  Canadian Culture Waterloo Wilfrid Laurier
  University Press, 2002, 37-60.
• Don Kelly And Now, Ladies and Gentlemen, Get
  Ready for some (Ab)Original Stand-up Comedy Drew
  Hayden Taylor (ed.) Me Funny Vancouver Douglas
  McIntyre, 2005, 51-65.

5
The Imaginary Indian

• my attention shifted from the display cases to
  the people who were tending them. I became aware
  that the facility was staffed entirely by
  Indians. But I found myself thinking that they
  didnt look like Indians to me, the Indians I
  knew from my school books and from the movies,
  the Indians, in fact, who were depicted inside
  the museum displays I was looking at.
• The Indian is the invention of the European.
• Daniel Francis

6
Discourse

• a group of statements which provide a language
  for talking about (representing) a particular
  kind of knowledge about a topic
• it also limits the other ways in which the topic
  can be constructed
• Stuart Hall

• Produces meaningful knowledge
• Influences social practices
• Has effects produces social relationships
• Connected to power not innocent
• May originate from many sites

7
Colonialism Land and Politics in British North
America

• Royal Proclamation of 1763
• Guaranteed Aboriginal title to land
• Land treaties negotiated to expand European
  settlement
• British North America Act, 1867
• Indians and their lands are a federal
  responsibility

• Indian Act, 1876
• Defined Indians
• Reserve system
• Land set aside for Indians
• Government policy of assimilation
• Socialize Indians for integration into European
  culture

8
Land and Politics at Ipperwash

• Land that became Ipperwash Park was covered by
  the Royal Proclamation
• Stony Point reserve was created through treaty
  negotiations in 1827
• Ipperwash Provincial Park (part of the reserve)
  was created in 1932
• During WWII, the Stoney Point reserve was
  appropriated and turned into a military base
• A land claim was launched to restore Aboriginal
  control over the reserve and Ipperwash Park

9
The Imaginary Indian

• Europeans have tended to imagine the Indian
  rather than know Native people, thereby to
  project onto Native people all the fears and
  hopes they have for the New World. If America
  was a Garden of Eden, then Indians must be seen
  as blessed innocents. If America was an alien
  place, then Indians must be seen to be frightful
  and bloodthirsty.
• Daniel Francis

10
Cowboys and Indians

• Cowboys are good guys
• Settlers are innocents
• Indians are
• Bad guys
• Wild and savage warriors
• Uncivilized
• Not trustworthy
• Childlike
• Simple minded speak in broken english

• The Violent Warrior
• The Drunken Indian

11
Beyond the Wild West?

• Real Indians
• Stoic (dont show emotions)
• Noble
• Victims
• Spiritual
• Connected to the environment
• Still warriors

• The Noble Savage
• The Spiritual Indian
• Freedom Fighters

12
The Imaginary Indian

• Cultural symbols and practices thrown together to
  create the image of the Indian
• Ideas, assumptions, and forms of representation
  that may intersect with, justify/explain, and
  produce practices of economic, political, social,
  and cultural marginalization

• Includes
• The violent warrior
• The drunken Indian
• The noble savage
• The spiritual Indian
• The freedom fighter (the new warrior)

13
Returning to Ipperwash

• The Occupation
• Actually began in 1993 in the larger territory
  around Ipperwash Park
• Escalating Tensions
• September 4, 1995 protestors move into the Park
• Increased confrontations with police

14
No Discourses Are Innocent

• Violent Warriors
• the OPP issued news releases saying the first
  shots were fired at officers from the school
  busthe OPP have maintained that its officers
  feared for their safety
• Globe Mail, March 3, 1997

15
No Discourses Are Innocent

• Drunken Indian
• one officer says we had this plan, you know?
  We thought if we could get five or six cases of
  Labatts 50 we could bait them and wed have this
  big net and a pit.
• Creative thinking, says another.
• Toronto Star, Feb. 12, 2004

16
No Discourses Are Innocent

• Spiritual Indian
• The protesters were mostly white property owners
  in the region, who had been affected by last
  years dispute at nearby Ipperwash Provincial
  Parksome yelled racist comments such as Wheres
  your teepee?
• Toronto Star, April 21, 1996

17
Who Was Dudley George?

• A member of the Stony Point band
• Parents lived on the Stony Point reserve
• Participated in the occupation of Ipperwash
  Provincial Park
• Shot to death - while unarmed - by the OPP on
  Sept. 6, 1995
• The circumstances surrounding his death are the
  subject of an ongoing public inquiry
• http//www.ipperwashinquiry.ca/