{"id":71375,"date":"2021-03-29T09:56:57","date_gmt":"2021-03-29T13:56:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/?p=71375"},"modified":"2024-09-01T09:54:57","modified_gmt":"2024-09-01T13:54:57","slug":"midzain-gobin-and-smith-not-in-the-past-colonialism-is-rooted-in-the-present","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/2021\/03\/midzain-gobin-and-smith-not-in-the-past-colonialism-is-rooted-in-the-present\/","title":{"rendered":"MIDZAIN-GOBIN and SMITH: Not in the past: Colonialism is rooted in the present"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Liam Midzain-Gobin, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Brock University, and Heather Smith, Professor of Global and International Studies at University of Northern British Columbia, had a piece recently published in <em><a href=\"https:\/\/theconversation.com\/not-in-the-past-colonialism-is-rooted-in-the-present-157395?utm_medium=email&amp;utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20Canada%20for%20March%2029%202021&amp;utm_content=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20Canada%20for%20March%2029%202021+CID_8b55ae315c6d33a50f334f4c6d7a8274&amp;utm_source=campaign_monitor_ca&amp;utm_term=Not%20in%20the%20past%20Colonialism%20is%20rooted%20in%20the%20present\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The Conversation<\/a> <\/em>about what they believe is an unwillingness by the Canadian government to move past a colonial relationship with Indigenous nations.<\/p>\n<p>They write:<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cAt a press conference on March 9 after\u00a0Oprah Winfrey\u2019s interview\u00a0with Prince Harry and Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was\u00a0asked about his commitment to the monarchy\u00a0and, in particular, whether it sat uncomfortably beside his stated desire to \u201cdismantle colonialism in this country.\u201d\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>\u00a0<\/em><em>In response, Trudeau acknowledged:<\/em><\/p>\n<p><i>\u201cThere are many institutions that we have in this country, including that big building right across the street from us, Parliament, that has, and is, built around a system of colonialism, of discrimination, of systemic racism.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n<p><em>\u00a0<\/em><em>During that same press conference however, when identifying solutions, Trudeau\u2019s words changed. He began using the type of language we identify in a\u00a0<\/em><em>recent paper as \u201creconciliation lite.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>\u00a0<\/em><em>In analyzing statements made by past Canadian leaders to the world, we found that their language promotes a myth of Canada as a non-colonial power. We use reconciliation lite to describe a narrative that recognizes the need to correct past harms, but sees this as a problem solved by multiculturalism or legal rights. This narrative continues to centre settlers and their interests, and is not a move to return land or authority, or rebuild meaningful relationships between the Crown, Canadians and Indigenous peoples.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Continue reading the full article <a href=\"https:\/\/theconversation.com\/not-in-the-past-colonialism-is-rooted-in-the-present-157395?utm_medium=email&amp;utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20Canada%20for%20March%2029%202021&amp;utm_content=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20Canada%20for%20March%2029%202021+CID_8b55ae315c6d33a50f334f4c6d7a8274&amp;utm_source=campaign_monitor_ca&amp;utm_term=Not%20in%20the%20past%20Colonialism%20is%20rooted%20in%20the%20present\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Liam Midzain-Gobin, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Brock University, and Heather Smith, Professor of Global and International Studies at University of Northern British Columbia, had a piece recently published in The Conversation about what they believe is an unwillingness by the Canadian government to move past a colonial relationship with Indigenous nations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":45641,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7,6,38],"tags":[522,9486,42,5512],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71375"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71375"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71375\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71376,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71375\/revisions\/71376"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}