Fiction: Nation-Building Project and Fiction Section

fiction: Many should be, according to Rabble. The artificial divide between works of fiction and nonfiction is well illustrated by the false narratives about Indigenous people found in Canadian school books. Published by Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade COAT . View as PDFby Richard Sanders History textbooks are not found in the fiction section of the library. These texts have been key to promoting patriotism and faith in the nation-building project called Canada.' Achieving this goal has usually been far more important than conveying disturbing truths about the unjust treatment of First Nations by Europeans.A good example of what anthropologist Bruce Trigger called the nationalistic history-writing of the post-Confederation era can be found in the disturbingly infantile, but still-quoted textbooks of Henry H. Miles. Describing Jacques Cartier as a noble specimen of a mariner, Miles began his 1872 history text with this sycophantic drivel Canada was discovered in the year 1534, by Jacques Cartier a man in whom were combined the qualities of prudence, industry, skill, perseverance, courage, and a deep sense of religion.1Miles' naive, hero-worshipping view of Cartier reflected his efforts to reconcile English and French Canadian histories.2 In contrast to this conciliatory approach, Miles exhibited the virulent, officially sanctioned racism towards First Nations shared by most French- and English-speaking Canadians. He penned such widely read tomes as The Child's History of Canada 1870 A School History of Canada 1870 and The History of Canada under French R gime, 1535 1763 1872 . These texts for elementary and middle schools venerated the supposed European heroes who discovered Canada. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.