What Will Native Kids Learn?

July 5, 2006 Vancouver: Premier Gordon Campbell, Federal Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development Jim Prentice, Chief Negotiator Nathan Matthew, and Deborah Jeffrey, President of the First Nations Education Steering Committee (FNESC), signed a historic agreement that will lead to recognition of First Nations' jurisdiction over First Nations' education in British Columbia. (from a Government of British Columbia news release)

New strategies, therefore, must provide for support systems which recognize, strengthen, and incorporate Aboriginal culture and tradition in the delivery of post-secondary education programs. The unique history, culture, values, and traditions of Aboriginal peoples and their learning needs must be reflected in strategies which allow the adult learner to incorporate individual experience into the process of learning. (from the Government of British Columbia Aboriginal Post-Secondary Education and Training Policy Framework)

Aboriginal peoples the world over face an enormous dilemma: how do they live and work in the larger society without losing their culture, their connection with their community roots? This has, for one thing, brought about huge land claim problems.

What belongs to natives? If some land does belong to them, have they exclusive rights? If they are entitled to claim land subject to further disposition or treaty, what right do other have to the use of that land? Perhaps the most vexing question is this: assume that land claims are settled and the integrity of the band's traditions thus preserved; what about members of that band who live away from the land? And what about their descendants? At the root of the struggle by aboriginals to retain their ancient culture and the desire of governments to accommodate them is education, especially as it relates to what we might broadly call "social studies."

A Maori's view

Here is an excerpt from The Globe and Mail report of July 6:

In new native school curriculum, John Cabot and Samuel Champlain will be minor footnotes in Canadian history, and Shakespeare a bit player in English classes. Chief Negotiator Nathan Matthew said, "This agreement secures federal and provincial recognition of First Nations jurisdiction over education and strengthens the voice of First Nations in a significant way."

A few years ago I interviewed New Zealand author Alan Duff. (I suggest strongly that you Google Mr. Duff and read the New Zealand Book Council bio sketch of this remarkable man who certainly "suffered" for his art.) Duff, a Maori, faced with considerable anguish and no shortage of trouble with the law his desire to be a Kiwi. He wanted to be a man of the world and a Maori all at the same time. I'll never forget him saying to me that the average Maori kid starts school without his parents ever reading to him, a huge disadvantage because of the lack of basic understanding of European and other cultures which make up the world around the child. Duff was not saying that native kids should not be taught their language and culture -- not at all. What he was saying is that understanding the cultures of the world did not come by simply learning to speak English.

Toward a 'world culture'

What, then, should a native youngster be taught?

It certainly cannot be simply how to grow up to be a "white kid." Nor can it simply be an education so that he can only do manual labour -- the method used by the residential schools. What I'm saying is this: if an aboriginal youngster is not allowed to learn those things based on other cultures because that gap has been filled by teachings of his own culture, he will be a sadly deprived person.

Let me zero in on Shakespeare for a moment. Last Saturday we were at the Bard on the Beach for A Midsummer Night's Dream. I was delighted to note a substantial number of kids from all backgrounds, including a great number of Asians. The non-European youngsters were not replacing their culture with an English variety. They were taking advantage of the fact that they not only knew English but understood, because of their parents and schooling no doubt, that Shakespeare is part of the "world culture."

I think what's being missed here, and what Alan Duff was saying, is that cultures are a living, growing phenomenon and the secret to self-fulfilment is the ability to grasp the cultural gifts of others. And the appetite for that must come early in a child's life.

I would not want to be seen as opposing native children learning about their culture's past and present, or their speculating about the future of their culture. Nor do I challenge the right, indeed the obligation, of the school system to make that possible. Nor would I for a moment deny that the schools have hitherto made it appear that native culture, while nice and interesting, was inferior to other cultures.

Open doors

What I do say is that in order to fulfil yourself as a human being of whatever culture or background, you must be given the opportunity to know and indeed love the culture of others. Because Arabs gave us arithmetic, the English Dickens, the Irish Wilde, the Germans Goethe, the Italians Michelangelo, the French Descartes, the Chinese Confucius and the Greeks the tools of philosophy and so on, we inherited and developed a culture than belongs to all of us wherever we live.

Is it the new policy that not only Shakespeare but Tolstoy, Da Vinci, Victor Hugo and Beethoven will not be accessible to native school kids?

Will the child go into the world without the educational spyglass to read Canadian authors like Robertson Davies, Margaret Atwood or W.O. Mitchell? Or the ability to understand and enjoy the paintings and writings of Emily Carr? Will there be no aboriginal ear wanting to listen to Beethoven, Mozart or Bach? Or James Galway from Ireland playing Japanese melodies? No Celine Dion?

I cannot believe that native leaders want their education system to graduate young adults who, because of government sins of the past (not to mention those of the churches), are to have a screen put before them that blots out cultures other than their own.

I don't argue against opening a new door for native kids. I simply plead that this must not, at the same time, shut others.

Rafe Mair's column for The Tyee appears every Monday.