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Reconciliation and Cultural Genocide: A Critique of Liberal Multicultural Strategies of Innocence

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 January 2020

Elisabeth Paquette
Elisabeth Paquette*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, University of North Carolina Charlotte, 9201 University City Blvd., Charlotte, North Carolina28223
*
Corresponding author. Email: epaquet1@uncc.edu
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Abstract

The aim of this article is to interrogate the concept of cultural genocide. The primary context examined is the Government of Canada's recent attempt at reconciliation through the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Drawing on the work of Audra Simpson (Mohawk), Glen Sean Coulthard (Yellowknives Dene), Kyle Powys Whyte (Potawatomi), Stephanie Lumsden (Hupa), and Luana Ross (Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, located at Flathead Indian Reservation in Montana), I argue that cultural genocide, like cultural rights, is depoliticized, thus limiting the political impact these concepts can invoke. Following Sylvia Wynter, I also argue that the aims of “truth and reconciliation” can sometimes serve to resituate the power of a liberal multicultural settler state, rather than seek systemic changes that would properly address the present-day implications of the residential school system. Finally, I argue that genocide and culture need to be repoliticized in order to support Indigenous futurity and sovereignty.

Type
Articles
Information
Hypatia , Volume 35 , Special Issue 1: Indigenizing and Decolonizing Feminist Philosophy , Winter 2020 , pp. 143 - 160
Copyright
Copyright © by Hypatia, Inc. 2020

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