Statement on Residential School Apologism/Denialism

Department of English Statement on Residential School Apologism/Denialism

The Department of English condemns any stance that Indian Residential Schools might be rationalized or justified in any way, and condemns the denial of the multiply recounted experiences of child-focused violence and murder at Residential schools across Canada. We are clear that Indian Residential School denialism is part of the ongoing structure of settler colonialism that continues to harm Indigenous people as we outline in our Land Acknowledgement Statement.

Indeed, these experiences form a core part of our Department of English curriculum which recognizes the community we teach within, and the many Indigenous students we teach. As English scholars, we feel particularly compelled by the prose of Indigenous writers such as Anishnaabe writer and journalist Tanya Talaga, who writes in The Knowing about Indian Residential Schools: “The effect was devastating. Destroying and separating generations, the newcomers’ polices and actions left tens of thousands of children, youth, women, and men in unmarked graves, buried out of sight and out of conscience. Buried in school grounds with graveyards dug by the students themselves. Buried in hospital grounds, sometimes in mass graves. Buried unceremoniously, anonymously, on forgotten plots of land in fields or city centres, or in church graveyards—not good enough for headstones and, sometimes buried on the other side of the cemetery fence because, apparently, Jesus Christ did not want to save these particular souls.”

Nisga’a academic and poet Jordan Abel, in Nishga, states, “Residential schools severed the most important bond, that  bond between Indigenous children and their mothers and their families. This system exposed our children to a cycle of violence that continues today.”

In As We Have Always Done, Mississauga Nishnaabeg academic, musician, and writer Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, notes the ongoing fatal effects on survivors of the Residential School system many of whom “committed suicide as a result of the residential school experience, or were forced to live an invisible life because of residential school homophobia and shaming.” The violences of forcibly destroying the lives of Indigenous families and children are part of the settler project that continues today. Yet, as Simpson’s title insists, Indigenous resurgence is ongoing and unstoppable.

This is not an issue of academic freedom or simple scholarly disagreement. Just as Residential School is violence, so too is IRS apologism and denialism. Coded speech against Black Lives Matter and/or 2SLGBTQIAA+ movements is also violence. Regardless of rhetorical tricks and “scholarly” manipulations, anti-Indigenous speech is always violence.

The Department of English unequivocally denounces any form of white or ethno-nationalism, including but not limited to IRS apologism/denialism, anti-Black, xenophobic, racist, and/or anti-2SLGBTQIAA+ rhetoric. We honour and support Residential School Survivors, their families, and communities, as well as the thousands of children lost by way of this genocidal system. Information about Indigenous-led and centred University events in honour of National Truth and Reconciliation Day can be found here.  The Indigenous Students Services Centre at UW is open M-F, 8:30-16:30.