We have come together online to find a way to contribute to the decolonizing project in which Canadian Literature is presently engaged. We all agree that one of the most effective means of furthering decolonization is exploring and understanding Indigenous literature.
Upon doing our research, there has been overwhelming evidence pointing to the dangers of neoliberal multiculturalism in Canada. To preface, it is not to say that multiculturalism is a bad thing; by no means are we promoting the dismantling of multiculturalism. Instead, the issue at hand stems from the transformation of a minority group to an economic subject through neoliberalism and the propagation of a capitalist system. As pointed out by Ryan LaMothe in his article titled “The Colonizing Realities of Neoliberal Capitalism,” neoliberal capitalism “establishes a superior-inferior value system, rooted in the commodification of everyday life, that introduces an ontological falsehood in individuals’ psyches and relationships (23). Hence, neoliberal capitalism becomes a new form of colonization of the psyche in which individuals become objects or workers, not persons (LaMothe 29).
By propagating neoliberal capitalist ideas, colonizers “promulgate racists beliefs regarding the inferiority of native populations and the superiority of the race of colonization” (LaMothe, 32). While LaMothe heavily discusses this issue regarding the United States, it is as much of a prevalent and pervasive topic here in Canada; the social hierarchy of minority groups in terms of their compliance to governmental policies is an issue that persists within our borders. When Indigenous communities fail to comply with Canadian policies, they are not welcomed, “especially an Aboriginal view which challenges, resists, and transforms, while an official multiculturalism tends toward consensus, adjustment and reform”(MacDonald, David B. 80). A more recent example of this can be seen in the 2020 Mi’kmaq lobster disputes. Mi’kmaq fishers were accused of breaking federal guidelines by catching lobsters outside of the government-mandated season. As pointed out by MacDonald in his paper, “multiculturalism, as promoted from 1971, was not designed to recognize Aboriginal distinctiveness, but developed from the same liberal traditions that created the assimilationist White Paper of 1969, with a desire to convert collective rights into individual ones” (66-67). In neoliberal capitalist multiculturalism, Indigenous communities are, through the expedient of multi-cultural policies, often placed alongside perceived ethnic minorities.
At a superficial level, multiculturalism is positive; it appears to promote inclusivity and acceptance. However, multiculturalism is not perfect in that it has “obliged immigrants to integrate into a fairly rigid set of values and ideas” (MacDonald 82). The process of integration has produced tropes of what consists of a desirable minority subject– integration comes at the cost of assimilation and economic strata. Unfortunately, Indigenous communities have often been marginalized and vilified for not “integrating” or complying with other minority communities.
When it comes to conversations regarding climate change, there then needs to be recognition of the specific nuances and needs of Indigenous communities. There is urgency placed in recognizing that Canada is stolen land. The impact of climate change on Indigenous peoples is wide and immediate. Indigenous peoples who choose or are forced to migrate away from their traditional lands often face double discrimination as both migrants and indigenous peoples (Climate Change | United Nations for Indigenous Peoples). Indigenous communities cannot be grouped in with the rest of Canada when it comes to climate change projects and solutions– they must be at the forefront and centre, being the most protected and cared for.
Multiculturalism is something that is celebrated in Canada, but it is celebrated through two languages. “Official Language Bilingualism to the exclusion of multilingualism” by Callie Mady provides an interesting correlation to the topic of decolonizing Canada’s Literature. As many of us experienced in our high school careers, there are a very limited number of languages offered in their course load. Kyle explained that at his high school, apart from English, courses in other languages were limited to French and Mandarin. He suggested that the offering of a broader range of multilingual courses in the pre-university education system has the potential of being a major contributor to multiculturalism in Canada. Giving students the option of expanding their horizons beyond the traditional dual-language system at this developmental stage in their cognitive progression could prove to be beneficial in regards to the decolonization of Canadian Literature, due to an increase in accessibility. This has some connection to “Pushing Comfort Zones: Promoting Social Justice Through the Teaching of Aboriginal Canadian Literature” by Wiltse, Lynne et al. It is a call to break the mold of colonial education. A revised and more inclusive approach to the literature that is being offered in the classroom could prove to be beneficial. Coinciding with this integration of multilingualism into the education system, is the publishing of more Canadian Literature into a broader range of languages. This is something that McCormack touches on in his article “Undisciplining CanLit.” He explains that with CanLit expanding the languages its offered in, the accessibility and reach would grow exponentially. As Statistics Canada confirms, almost 7 million Canadians do not speak either English or French, the two official languages, when they’re at home.
However, as all dialogues should, there were a few points made to the potential negatives to this multi-linguistic suggestion. Another team member provided some counter-arguments with the stance Mady took in her article. He draws on a study done by Grimaldi et al. that when a foreign language is introduced, the emphasis on “lexical and grammatical training” and the act of the “L2” being “uttered by L1-accented teachers interferes with the perception even for native listeners of the L2” (Grimaldo et al, 2014.) It leaves room for error and misinterpretation in regards to the learning and distribution of information. This counter to the ideas proposed by Mady is a strong one. In addition to this, there are some Indigenous language immersion programs in Canada, but an increase in these programs and their effectiveness is important. As mentioned earlier, youth are at a very developmental stage, so being exposed to this literature and language is critical. As Garcia explains in her article “En/Countering Indigenous Bilingualism,” she advocates for the “maintenance of Indigenous language practises, and “demands that Indigenous languages not be “tainted” by more powerful European Languages” (Garcia, 2009.)
Neoliberal ideology’s strong tendency to resist and prevent government regulation generated increased profits after 1980, but the research outlined by the 4hands annotated bibliography shows that it also caused problems, the worst of which seems to involve destruction of the commons, and, particularly dangerous, global warming forced by uncontrolled emission of greenhouse gases such as methane and carbon dioxide. Although profits are necessary for private companies and corporations to thrive and continue providing goods and services to consumers, that cannot be allowed to destroy the environment. Prior to the neoliberal surge in 1980, profits were sufficient to support a thriving Western post-war economy, yet wealth remained fairly evenly shared but, after 1980 government regulations were continually reduced and wealth became increasingly unequal. Even worse, the move to limit greenhouse gas emissions that coincidentally began at that same time, as scientists raised the climate change alarm, was thwarted by strongly neoliberal governments in Canada and most Western countries, as denial of climate change science was used as a convenient reason for neoliberal policies. Now, recent developments in post-modern literature threatens to give Neoliberals new and dangerous literary tools.
Research into Herb Wyile’s concerns that “neoliberal thinking has substantially changed the landscape in which Canadian literature is written, published, and promoted” and how neoliberal ideology “threads through celebratory narratives of globalization in various ways,” led to the alarming discovery of GPT-3 (Hutson). That is, Generative Pretrained Transformer 3, an Artificial Intelligence (AI) that generates fluent streams of text after reading and remembering billions of words from books, articles and websites. GPT-3 is the third in a series of “transformers” and it is more than 100 times larger than its 2019 predecessor, GPT-2; GPT-3 shows itself to be particularly dangerous by parroting extremest communities such as Nazis, conspiracy theorists and white supremacists. Over the last decades the world has seen the damage done by human-generated radicalizing messages on social networks in terms of extremists and their conspiracies, but today we have high-speed computers doing the same evil for literature. Already many companies, such as Google, FaceBook, Microsoft and Nvidia, provide services using related software for translations and for searching the Internet, but this “transformer” is capable of taking AI into new and alarming fields. The GPT-3 software itself is kept secret by its owner, OpenAI, who partners with Microsoft and whose name OpenAI is misleading; it’s anything but open.
There may be no other means of controlling these crises and breaking developments other than political measures. The lack of vaccine production in Canada is a newsworthy example of government regulation missing in action due to neoliberal thinking and steps are now underway to ensure that vaccines will be available when needed––too late for this pandemic. Regulation of greenhouse gas emissions and regulation of industry generally will offend Neoliberals, but they have shown themselves to be unreasonable, with deregulation as an act of faith no matter how dangerous; the Boeing 737 Max 8 crashes are another recent newsworthy example of missing regulation leading to disaster. CanLit must throw itself into the fray to have effective regulation restored.
Both Mullen (2021) and Wiltse (2014) discuss the processes and benefits through a pedagogical lens of incorporating multiculturalism and eco-justice into education systems across Canada. It is crucial to address these topics through this field because educating future generations on these subjects can positively change the direction of how these matters are handled in the future. For example, addressing different perspectives throughout education creates countercultural forces that raise awareness of colonization that Mullen describes as intentionally creating a “decolonization mindset” (Mullen, 149). Thus, reshaping young individuals thinking to know that we live in a society built through colonialism will contribute to academic research and what policies will be implemented in the future.
Among the dialogue, Wiltse’s (2014) article “Pushing Comfort Zones: Promoting Social Justice Through the Teaching of Aboriginal Canadian Literature” drew similar connections and conclusions among peers around the positive outcomes that came about teachers breaking away from traditional curriculum material and incorporating Indigenous literature into their lessons. Historically, Indigenous works have been absent from educational curriculums across Canadian provinces, but Wiltse (2014) suggests that incorporating them offers students and teachers different perspectives expanding their knowledge around climate change matters and how Indigenous culture plays an influential role (273). For example, both Aidan and Amanda state:
Amanda – The engagement with complex topics challenged the teacher and students alike to think deeper and more critically.
Aidan – Not only would this be beneficial for the students to have insight from this new perspective they were previously unfamiliar with, but from a teacher’s outlook, this must have been such a refreshing change of scene, a breath of fresh air.
Both agree that the positive learning experience benefited the students, but the teachers also reported they learned from these perspectives and taught both parties to think deeper around these subjects. These connections are drawn fall upon Wiltse’s (2014) main argument throughout the essay that students across different cultures in Canada can equally benefit from curriculum reformation that focuses on incorporating literature around marginalized communities.
Mullen’s (2021) essay “What Does Canadian Indigenous Literature Impart About Colonization, and the Future” was not touched upon during the dialogue summary; however, she makes some crucial arguments how decolonizing literature will impact Canada in the post-colonial era. Like Wiltse (2014), Mullen agrees that incorporating multicultural literature into lessons promotes different perspectives allowing students to be more informed around the importance of cultural and environmental sustainability. However, Mullen (2021) tends to focus more on the concept of unity and how incorporating Indigenous perspectives into education will “transpire around shared goals, tribal governance, emancipatory vision, and remedied transgression of colonial wrongdoing” (156). The idea of promoting unity through an educational lens will encourage Indigenous and non-indigenous people to bring their perspectives together in decolonizing inequitable systems and reforming them.
Our explorations and dialogue have strongly suggested that the most robust seeds for the decolonization of CanLit are located in Settler society. In particular, the Euro profit motive needs to be curtailed so that a clear humanist ideology can prevail. To begin that curtailment, we believe that the place to begin is with a rollback of neoliberal deregulation, which, in the last half-century, has made a bad situation much worse. However, a return to postwar regulation of the industry is not the final goal; instead, corporate regulation that stops climate change is the minimum target. We believe that when that is accomplished, decolonization will naturally ensue; when Settler society is itself decolonized from the anomie of capital, it can and will cease colonizing others.
Works Cited
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