Recent revelations of Indigenous identify fraud are just the tip of the iceberg in Canadian universities, government and other institutions, author of report suggests.
“It does boggle my brain, how do you keep all those lies, balls up in the air, for decades,” said Jean Teillet, a Vancouver-based lawyer who wrote a report for the University of Saskatchewan last year exploring Indigenous identify fraud.Start your day with a roundup of B.C.-focused news and opinion delivered straight to your inbox at 7 a.m., Monday to Friday.By clicking on the sign up button you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc.
It’s not a new phenomenon, though, Teillet’s report says, pointing to Archibald Stansfield Belaney, a British-born man who claimed his mother was Indigenous and called himself Grey Owl, rising to fame as a writer and environmentalist while living in Canada in the 1920s and ’30s.She said it undermines what it means to be Indigenous, after two centuries of government policies aimed at curtailing Indigenous rights and stamping out Indigenous languages and cultures.
The term “pretendian” making the rounds is clever, Teillet said, “but, to my mind, ‘pretend’ makes it too innocent. It makes it difficult to see the harm.” In addition to reliance on stereotypes, Teillet’s report says red flags include vague claims, family secrets, shifting or conflicting stories, or reliance on DNA testing to find some kind of Indigenous ancestry dating back several hundred years ago.
Canadian institutions generally lack and must establish procedures for verifying Indigenous identity, Teillet said, starting with a “big sign” on all of their application forms for grants, scholarships, faculty and staff positions saying “we will check.”
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