Welcome to the Interactive Experience: Indigenous Peoples Atlas of Canada at Pickering Public Library. This audio is to help guide you around the map, as you learn about Indigenous communities, Indigenous language groups, residential schools, treaties, and reserves across Canada. Please see a transcript of the audio tour below.
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Impacts of Colonization
Cultural Genocide is a process of destroying Indigenous culture. This means:Indigenous children were forcefully removed from their family, Indigenous children were removed from their community, Indigenous Children were refused participation in speaking their Indigenous languages, Indigenous children were refused from accessing their traditional foods and medicines, Indigenous children were denied from upholding their traditional teachings, Indigenous children were refused from practicing their Ceremonies, Indigenous children suffered abuse (physical, mental, sexual, emotional, spiritual), Introduction to Intergenerational Traumas which resulted in long term impacts to Indigenous peoples’ culture and struggles identity, health, and mental health.
From the Canadian Museum of Human Rights:
“The colonial experience in Canada, from first contact to the present, constitutes genocide against Indigenous peoples . The Indian residential school system was one key component of this genocide.
Methods of perpetuating genocide include physical, biological, and cultural means – all of which can be used to destroy a group of people. Canada’s policies aimed at assimilating Indigenous people included outlawing languages, cultural practices and political traditions and forcibly removing children from families. These were deliberate attempts to erase a distinct group of people by destroying the essential foundations of their way of life.”
Truth and Reconciliation
Apology from Prime Minister Stephen Harper
June 11, 2008, the Prime Minister of Canada, the Right Honourable Stephen Harper, made a Statement of Apology to former students of Indian Residential Schools, on behalf of the Government of Canada.
The Truth and Reconciliation Commission also known as TRC was formed in 2008 as a requirement of the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement.
In 2009 the Late Honorable Murray Sinclair, from Peguis First Nation, MB, was appointed chief commissioner of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada. Over six years, this work shed light on one of the darkest chapters in Canadian history and the devastating legacy of Canada’s Indian residential school system which continues to this day.
The resulting 94 Calls to Action in the TRC’s final report provided a blueprint for redefining Canada's (the Crown) relationship with Indigenous Peoples. Learning about the 94 Calls to Action is essential in understanding next steps to re-developing relationships with Indigenous Peoples across Canada.
From the Late Honorable Murray Sinclair:
“It’s hard for two people to talk if they are standing facing different directions and each shouting at the other. In order to talk, people need to walk together, he said. Sometimes you need to extend a hand and walk with someone over the same path you may already have covered … so that you can start your journey together.”
From the Canadian Museum for Human Rights:
“We can’t talk about reconciliation unless we are grounded in truth. Truth comes first. We believe that the Indian residential school system was genocide. We also believe the policies and practices of colonization, from which the residential school system flowed, were genocide. We also recognize that this is a truth that has only very recently begun to be discussed in classrooms and churches, in meeting rooms and coffee shops. The work of the TRC was instrumental in bringing this conversation forward.
We acknowledge that we have only just begun this important dialogue. We also acknowledge that there are many in Canada who aren’t there yet. For them, the suggestion that there was a genocide right here in Canada – one planned and implemented through different policies and practices – is contrary to everything they hold dear as Canadians.
On the international stage, Canada has a very positive image. We are the country that invented the concept of peacekeeping. We are a country that accepts refugees. We are a country that has enshrined human rights in our constitution. Many of us are rightly proud of Canada’s achievements. But we also need to acknowledge our wrongs; otherwise, our collective memory isn’t complete. We must also look at the shadowy corners of our past and examine them in the harsh light of day.
Make no mistake: some of Canada’s history is dark. And perhaps there is no darker chapter in our past than that of the Indian residential school system.”
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Visit the Pickering Central Library from Saturday, December 20, 2025 to Thursday, January 8, 2026 for the ‘Interactive Experience: Indigenous Peoples Atlas of Canada.’
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