EBOOK
About
This book invites readers to step into a space of reflection on your personal relationship with truth, reconciliation, and Orange Shirt Day.
Written in response to the increase of residential school denialism, Phyllis Webstad and Kristy McLeod have collaborated to create a book that encourages readers to face their own biases. This book challenges readers through a series of sensitive conversations that explore decolonization, Indigenization, healing, and every person's individual responsibility to truth and reconciliation. Centered around the Orange Shirt Day movement, and a National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, these conversations encourage readers to unpack and reckon with denialism, biases, privilege, and the journey forward, on both a personal and national level.
Within each chapter, Phyllis Webstad draws on her decade of experience (sharing her Orange Shirt Story on a global level and advocating for the rights of Indigenous Peoples) to offer insights on these topics and stories from her personal journey, which co-author and Métis scholar, Kristy McLeod, helps readers to further navigate. Each section includes real denialist comments taken from social media and Kristy's analysis and response to them. Through empathy-driven truth-telling, this book offers an opportunity to witness, reflect, heal, and be intentional about the seeds we hope to plant for the future, together.
INTRODUCTION:
What does it take to heal a nation and society that has been built on the oppression of people for the benefit of others? What does it take to overcome racism and stereotypes perpetuated by economic, political, and social systems that are based on the belief that natural and human resources are to be exploited and used for one's own or one group's gain? What does it take to move forward acknowledging and accepting the past, walking in a good way in the present, and healing for future generations when systematic oppression occurred in the past and continues in the present? Healing from the purposeful ongoing oppression of a people within a nation takes an open heart and mind with a willingness to learn and grow. It takes a commitment to listening to other perspectives and ways of knowing and being in the world. It takes a willingness to put aside what you were taught to believe and understand that there are multiple perspectives of truth. It takes dialogue and a desire to reflect on how one profits from or pays for the structures and beliefs that surround us. It requires a commitment to change. It takes you.
Many harms have been done to Indigenous Peoples in the name of colonization and "civilization" in Canada. Since the creation of this country, the belief that Indigenous Peoples are somehow lesser than non-Indigenous people has been embedded in almost every choice and system carried out by the government. This attitude was a pervasive and driving force to the creation of policies in the Indian Act.
Prime Minister John A. Macdonald stated to parliament in 1885, "I have not hesitated to tell this House, again and again, that we could not always hope to maintain peace with the Indians; that the savage was still a savage, and that until he ceased to be savage, we were always in danger of a collision, in danger of war, in danger of an outbreak." Indigenous Peoples have been marginalized and oppressed through societal prejudice and educational biases, along with many other means. One example of how the Canadian government has attempted to decimate Indigenous people and their cultures is the implementation of the Indian Residential School System (IRS) in Canada. Indigenous children were removed from their families with the purpose of forcing them to assimilate into colonial culture. The term colonial is used in this book in reference to worldviews, systems, and beliefs that are a part of a colonizing nation that controls the economics and politics of another nation(s) throug
Written in response to the increase of residential school denialism, Phyllis Webstad and Kristy McLeod have collaborated to create a book that encourages readers to face their own biases. This book challenges readers through a series of sensitive conversations that explore decolonization, Indigenization, healing, and every person's individual responsibility to truth and reconciliation. Centered around the Orange Shirt Day movement, and a National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, these conversations encourage readers to unpack and reckon with denialism, biases, privilege, and the journey forward, on both a personal and national level.
Within each chapter, Phyllis Webstad draws on her decade of experience (sharing her Orange Shirt Story on a global level and advocating for the rights of Indigenous Peoples) to offer insights on these topics and stories from her personal journey, which co-author and Métis scholar, Kristy McLeod, helps readers to further navigate. Each section includes real denialist comments taken from social media and Kristy's analysis and response to them. Through empathy-driven truth-telling, this book offers an opportunity to witness, reflect, heal, and be intentional about the seeds we hope to plant for the future, together.
INTRODUCTION:
What does it take to heal a nation and society that has been built on the oppression of people for the benefit of others? What does it take to overcome racism and stereotypes perpetuated by economic, political, and social systems that are based on the belief that natural and human resources are to be exploited and used for one's own or one group's gain? What does it take to move forward acknowledging and accepting the past, walking in a good way in the present, and healing for future generations when systematic oppression occurred in the past and continues in the present? Healing from the purposeful ongoing oppression of a people within a nation takes an open heart and mind with a willingness to learn and grow. It takes a commitment to listening to other perspectives and ways of knowing and being in the world. It takes a willingness to put aside what you were taught to believe and understand that there are multiple perspectives of truth. It takes dialogue and a desire to reflect on how one profits from or pays for the structures and beliefs that surround us. It requires a commitment to change. It takes you.
Many harms have been done to Indigenous Peoples in the name of colonization and "civilization" in Canada. Since the creation of this country, the belief that Indigenous Peoples are somehow lesser than non-Indigenous people has been embedded in almost every choice and system carried out by the government. This attitude was a pervasive and driving force to the creation of policies in the Indian Act.
Prime Minister John A. Macdonald stated to parliament in 1885, "I have not hesitated to tell this House, again and again, that we could not always hope to maintain peace with the Indians; that the savage was still a savage, and that until he ceased to be savage, we were always in danger of a collision, in danger of war, in danger of an outbreak." Indigenous Peoples have been marginalized and oppressed through societal prejudice and educational biases, along with many other means. One example of how the Canadian government has attempted to decimate Indigenous people and their cultures is the implementation of the Indian Residential School System (IRS) in Canada. Indigenous children were removed from their families with the purpose of forcing them to assimilate into colonial culture. The term colonial is used in this book in reference to worldviews, systems, and beliefs that are a part of a colonizing nation that controls the economics and politics of another nation(s) throug