Liberalism, Surveillance, and Resistance: Indigenous Communities in Western Canada, 1877-1927

Abstract

"Canada is regularly presented as a country where liberalism has ensured freedom and equality for all. Yet with the expansion of settlers into the First Nations territories that became southern Alberta and BC, liberalism proved to be an exclusionary rather than inclusionary force. Between 1877 and 1927, government officials, police officers, church representatives, ordinary settlers, and many others operated to exclude and reform Indigenous people. Presenting Anglo-Canadian liberal capitalist values and structures and interests as normal, natural, and beyond reproach devalued virtually every aspect of Indigenous cultures. This book explores the means used to facilitate and justify colonization, their effects on Indigenous economic, political, social, and spiritual lives, and how they were resisted."--Publisher's description. 1. The Liberal Surveillance Complex -- Imperialism and Colonial Expansion in Western Canada -- Liberalism -- Liberalism and Surveillance -- Knowing Indians -- The Homogenizing Impact of "National" History -- The Agency/Coercion Binary -- Investigating Colonialism as Cultural Formation and Concrete Experience -- 2. The Transformation of Indigenous Territory -- The Peoples of Treaty 7 -- The Peoples of the Kamloops and Okanagan Regions -- European Disruptions -- Reserves as Reformatory Spaces -- 3. Churches, Police Forces, and the Department of Indian Affairs -- Missionary Surveillance and the Surveillance of Missionaries -- Police Surveillance -- The Pass System -- Restriction of Movement in British Columbia -- Mounted Police and the DIA -- The Visual Impact of the Mounted Police -- Relations Between the NWMP and the BCPP -- Force Strength and External Assistance -- Police Forces and Indigenous Employees -- Surveillance of Police -- 4. Disciplinary Surveillance and the Department of Indian Affairs -- The Department of Indian Affairs' Hierarchy -- The Permit System -- DIA Employees and the Expense of Surveillance -- Surveillance by and of Indian Agents -- DIA Surveillance, Indigenous Employment, and Cooperation -- 5. The British Columbia Interior and the Treaty 7 Region to 1877 -- Indian Policy in Canada and the United States -- Indigenous Lands and Settler Interests -- Application of Scientific Geography in Western Canada -- British Columbia Before 1877 -- Indigenous Resistance to 1877 in the British Columbia Interior -- Establishment of the Joint Reserve Commission -- The Treaty 7 Region Before 1877 -- Comparing Treaty 7 and the British Columbia Interior Before 1877 -- British Columbia in 1877 -- The Treaty 7 Region in 1877 -- Land Retained in the Text of Treaty 7 -- 6. The British Columbia Interior, 1877 to 1927 -- Churches and Indigenous Lands in British Columbia -- Indigenous Resistance in British Columbia Before World War I -- Long Lake Surrender -- The McKenna-McBride Commission -- Indigenous Resistance and the Issue of Consent in British Columbia -- The Special Joint Committee of 1927 -- 7. The Treaty 7 Region After 1877 -- Nakoda -- Tsuu T'ina -- Kainai -- Piikani -- Siksika -- Reserve Reductions and the Nature of Consent -- CHAPTER EIGHT: Exclusionary Liberalism in World War I and Beyond -- Conclusion.