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June 21 is National Indigenous Peoples Day. On this day, we celebrate those nations that have populated territories that have been unceded for thousands of years. Following the death of George Floyd under the knee of a police officer in Minneapolis last month, the world took to the streets to protest against racism and police brutality, as well as against the racist and colonialist foundations of our societies and what represents them publicly: certain statues and monuments. Last Tuesday in Montreal, the statue of Christopher Columbus was vandalized in Turin Park. It was covered in red paint and “BLM” graffiti (for Black Lives Matter).
The previous Sunday, on René-Lévesque Boulevard in Montreal, the John A. Macdonald statue had once again been splashed with mauve paint and vandalized. It included the following sentence: “The RCMP rapes Aboriginal women and kills Aboriginal men.”
A petition is currently being circulated asking the City of Montreal to unbolt this statue. It has already been signed by 16,000 people. A similar petition targets the statue of James McGill, who owned slaves, in Montreal. Craig Commanda, an Indigenous student and artist from the Kitigan Zibi community, explains that John A. Macdonald, who was the very first prime minister of Canada, is “the architect of the RCMP, residential schools, and the racist legislature that imposed the railroad in Western Canada.”
He believes that a statue of this character is a glorification of white supremacy. “Debunking it would destroy his ideas and make room for a better world,” he said. According to the historian Aly Ndiaye, also known as Webster, the history of Quebec is marked by the slavery of 4,185 people, three-quarters of whom were Aboriginal people. According to him, most streets in Quebec are named after people who advanced the colonial project. Last week, Robert Jago, a Montreal-based columnist and member of the Kwantlen Nation, for his part, said he was “worried” about the “well-being” of the Columbus statue in Montreal. “With all these people demolishing Columbus statues, I hope the one in Turin Park is OK. It's just there if you want to make sure it's safe,” he wrote ironically. on her social networks. “People who want to leave these statues on their pedestals say that the accomplishments of the characters they represent outweigh their crimes and that these are essential to human history. I am sure that future generations will only associate the name Columbus with crimes related to his heritage,” he said in an interview.
When asked what he thought the statues of Macdonald and Columbus should be replaced with, Mr. Jago said that Canada was built by three nations — the English, the French and the Aboriginal peoples — and that he would like this reality to be reflected in the public square. However, he believes that we are living in a time where bronze statues no longer carry the weight of history, as they once did, and that it is time to move on. According to Ellen Gabriel, a Kanienkehaka from the Kanesatake community, we should look at the importance given to human statues. “It is time to think beyond human existence and to really consider the importance of the natural world,” she notes as she reflects on the representation of Kanienkehaka history. And if we leave these statues on their pedestals, is it enough to add a plate with explanatory text underneath? That's what the executive director of the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society of Canada, Cindy Blackstock, did. The Mcgill social work professor worked with Beechwood Cemetery in Ottawa in 2017 on the Nicholas Flood Davin monument in order to add a plaque evoking his role in implementing the residential school system, which was responsible for the suffering of several generations of Indigenous people and the deaths of 4,200 children.
Jaime Morse, Nehiyaw/Michif, and founder of Indigenous Walks in Ottawa, spends a lot of time analyzing statues and monuments and telling their stories as part of her cultural work. At first she thought that the statues should be left in place and a plaque should be added to them, but now she feels that these characters are already part of the story.
“The statues are on pedestals, they are symbols of who runs the city. We don't need it. They can represent oppression and are an imposition of existing power. A young person does not really recognize himself in them and may even integrate a feeling of inferiority into their contact. There are no real signs that we are in unceded Anishinabe territory. We need to have more opportunities to tell other stories in particular places,” she notes. According to Guy Sioui Durand, a sociologist and Wendat art critic from the community of Wendake, Quebec, colonial statues are reminders of the deep memory of society. “We are touching on history. You can't rewrite it; you pursue it, you stick to it and you change it.”
He believes that, if the Macdonald statue were to be brought down, it should be placed in a museum of unbolted statues. Leena Minifie, Gitxaala and a documentary series producer and researcher, explains that Indigenous history is simply not currently recognized. “They are tiny representations that are chosen to glorify white people. We must recognize those who have contributed to the enormous changes that this country has gone through, those who have sacrificed themselves and who have been ignored by Britain.
It's time to make things right.” In Ottawa, the capital of Canada, a few statues honour the place of Aboriginal people in Canadian history. In particular, they represent figures who played an important role in ensuring trade or peace — including Joseph Brant, Tessouat, the unnamed Anishinabe scout — not to mention the National Aboriginal Veterans Monument.
In Canada, there are over 690 statues of historic figures, but according to the site heroines.ca, only 20 represent women, and of these, only 4 are dedicated to Aboriginal women: the Spirit of the Beothuks in Newfoundland, Kateri Tekakwitha at the Basilica of Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré, near Quebec City, Shannen Koostachin in New Liskeard, Ontario, and the statue dedicated to missing and murdered women and girls, near the police station in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, and inspired by the story of Amber Redman, who died in 2005.