Multiculturalism, Colonialism, and Racialization: Conceptual Starting Points

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Notes

The language for and idea of Canada can be challenged from an anti-colonial perspective. Canada, and its geographic, physical, and governmental claims to land and power, exist because of imposed hegemonic control.

Using cultural background to account for, or contextualize, the actions of individuals, as Benhabib (2002, 89) contended, “imprisons the individual in a cage of univocal cultural interpretations and psychological motivations; individuals’ intentions are reduced to cultural stereotypes; moral agency is reduced to cultural puppetry.”

For a critique of the article by Lawrence and Dua (2005), see Sharma and Wright (2008–2009) who raise two central areas of critique. First, Sharma and Wright questioned whether it is “historically accurate or analytically precise” to identify those enslaved or displaced as settlers. They also challenge the idea that “decolonization may be secured through the nationalist project” (Sharma and Wright 2008–2009, 121). Simpson et al. (this issue) believe that however we name non-whites or visible minorities in Canada, these groups do have a relationship to Indigenous people and lands that has its origins in colonialism. That is, white settlers and non-whites in Canada live on occupied territory, and daily situate our practices and choices in relationship to colonialism.

For a useful discussion of land and treaty rights in the context of the Sparrow case, see Asch (2010).