INDIGENIZING AFRICANS - DISAPPEARING INDIANS Black/Mi 'kmaq Relations in Nova Scotia A Thesis Submitted to the Committee on Graduate Studies in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in the Faculty of Arts and Science TRENT UNIVERSITY Peterborough, Ontario, Canada © Copyright by Paula C. 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The author retains copyright L'auteur conserve la propriete du droit d'auteur ownership and moral rights in et des droits moraux qui protege cette these. this thesis. Neither the thesis Ni la these ni des extraits substantiels de nor substantial extracts from it celle-ci ne doivent etre imprimes ou autrement may be printed or otherwise reproduits sans son autorisation. reproduced without the author's permission. In compliance with the Canadian Conformement a la loi canadienne Privacy Act some supporting sur la protection de la vie privee, forms may have been removed quelques formulaires secondaires from this thesis. ont ete enleves de cette these. While these forms may be included Bien que ces formulaires in the document page count, aient inclus dans la pagination, their removal does not represent il n'y aura aucun contenu manquant. any loss of content from the thesis. Canada 11 ABSTRACT INDIGENIZING AFRICANS - DISAPPEARING INDIANS Black/Mi'kmaq Realations in Nova Scotia Paula C. Madden This thesis explores the relationship between the self-named "indigenous black" community and the Mi'kmaq communities of Nova Scotia. The Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission serves as a site of inquiry. It is interested in exploring and understanding the idea of "indigenous blackness" in Mikmaki. It examines the role and meaning of human rights declarations and legislation within the racial state. David Theo Goldberg's conception and articulation of the racial state serves as the major theoretical foundation underpinning this project. We learn that the relationship between black and Mi'kmaq people in Nova Scotia is complex. While in some instances they shared a common ancestry racism and racial violence had negative effects on their relationship. Government intervention through human rights legislation including the creation of the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission was inadequate and fixed them as "other" while doing little to change their material reality. Ill ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I would like to thank Dr. John Wadland for his care, guidance and unwavering support throughout this project. He has been steadfast in his commitment and belief in the possibility and importance of this work. Thank you Dr. J.W. I would also like to thank Dr. James Struthers and Dr. Davina Bhandar for their support. Each provided me with the theoretical foundation that was critical to my articulation of the state and racial subjectivities. This work could not exist in its present form without their guidance. I wish to thank Dr. Barrington Walker for reading my thesis and agreeing to be the examiner. I am also grateful for the editorial changes he suggested. I would like to thank the six men and women who allowed me to interview them for this project. They gave me their time and ideas generously and I hope that I have honored their contribution. I would like to thank Boyce Richardson for his unintentional but powerful lesson on the importance of locating myself in this settler nation. My friends and family have supported me throughout my work on this project thank you. Thank you also to my Frost Centre friends and family for your generosity and care. Importantly I would like to thank my son Ngozi Richardson. Thank you, Ngozi for your time, patience and loving support. IV TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Abstract ii Acknowledgements iii Table of Contents iv Chapter 1 Introduction 1 Chapter 2 33 Citizenship Race and Identity Chapter 3 50 The Mi'kmaq People and the Descendants of the Pre-Confederation Black community: A Brief History Chapter 4 96 Racial Subjects and Human Rights Chapter 5 126 Black/Mi'kmaq Relations in Nova Scotia Chapter 6 146 Conclusion Works Cited 151 1 Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION This project examines the relationship between the self-named "indigenous black" community and the Mi'kmaq communities of Nova Scotia. My emphasis will be on the period from 1960 to 1980 but I will be alluding to the 1950s and subsequent periods as well as examining the state of the relationships in 2006. The Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission serves as a site of inquiry. Human rights legislation and discourse within the province is placed within the context of Canadian rights discourse with brief glances at conversations and legislation in Ontario. I begin with an examination of the idea of "indigenous blackness" and the construction of black identity. What are other constructions of black identity? I argue, "indigenous blackness" accomplishes the same erasure of indigenous peoples as assertions of indigenous whiteness and on that basis it must not stand unchallenged. I assert that at the heart of claims to indigeneity by descendants of African slaves, United Empire Loyalists and refugees of the War of 1812 is a sense of exclusion from the nation and the absence of their stories from the national story. I argue further that efforts towards inclusion within a racial state, as conceptualized by David Theo Goldberg,1 are unattainable as it is the very nature of such a state to include and exclude at will. What is the role and meaning of human rights declarations and legislation within the racial state and specifically within Nova Scotia? What conditions necessitated the creation of a commission to "protect" human rights? Whose 1 David Theo Goldberg, The Racial State (Oxford: Blackwell, 2002). 2 interests did it serve? Through interviews with members of the Mi'kmaq and the previously identified black community members we get a sense of life from their perspective and the meaning of the legislation in their day to day lives and the life of their communities over time. Legislative records, minutes from the Human Rights Committee and Commission meetings, and other government sources, as well as newspaper articles and secondary sources assist in the examination. In using the Human Rights Commission as a site of inquiry this project necessarily asks the questions, what is the condition of the relationship between Mi'kmaq peoples and the state and what is the relationship between "indigenous Black" Nova Scotians and the state? In chapter two I explore the issue of black identity, its construction and articulation. I pick up on the discussion initiated here in the introduction with W.E.B DuBois and Frantz Fanon and move to more recent expressions in Canada by M. Nourbese Philip and others. I interrogate and analyze the idea of "indigenous blackness" and its meaning in the work of George Elliot Clarke. I conclude that "indigenous blackness" can best be understood in the context of place, and belonging to and within the nation. Chapter three lays out the conditions that may have given rise to a black claim of indigeniety. It also locates black and Mi'kmaq people in a parallel historic and contemporary trajectory. It looks at the black liberation struggle in Nova Scotia and Canada and connects it to the movement in the United States. The human rights legislation, discourse and program in Nova Scotia taken up in chapter four cannot be seen outside of the context of the local, national and international black liberation struggles. What is 3 the meaning and effect of rights legislation in the province? This question is taken up in chapter four. It concludes that human rights legislation and discourse in the province was and is a failure in dealing with the issues of inequality faced by both groups. In chapter five we end where we began, seeking to understand the relationship between the two groups. Given that both shared a common experience of oppression, were there collaborations, alliances and or moments of collective action? This inquiry leads to an often unspoken and unexamined conclusion far away from the rather erroneous assumptions marking the project's inception. Genesis In February 1992 I attended a conference at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia on racism in the education system. The conference was a joint project of the black and Mi'kmaq communities. It focused on the effects of racism on Black Nova Scotian and Mi'kmaq students. Later that week I visited North and East Preston, Cherry Brook and Beechville. I visited those communities because when my friend insisted that separate, segregated black communities existed in Canada I was surprised. I was well aware of Reserves and thought them to be the only segregated communities within Canada. These experiences led me to think about the similarities between the two communities and I began to wonder about historic or other contemporary examples of collaboration between them.