The terminology is confusing me and i need to clear this up. According to the Canadian Constitution, we have officially three ‘groups’ of Aboriginals residing in Canada. Right?
i) Metis - descendants of mixed relationships between European furtraders/settlers and ‘native’ women
ii) Inuit - the group of people living in the northern regions, previously referred to as ‘eskimos’
iii) Indian - everyone else ? Who are their ancestors ? And are their three groups of Indians - Status Indians, Non-Status Indians and Treaty Indians. What’s the difference between a Status Indian and a Treaty Indian? Is one entitled to land and the other isn’t?
Where do the Iroquois and the Cree fit in? And what about groups that speak the Algonquian language - which group above do they belong to, if any?
i hate social classifications but this is a necessity. Any informative insight would be much appreciated.
This is a topic I'm very interested in myself. I attended a superb lecture by Russell Nahdee (an aboriginal researcher) and according to him the classifications by the Canadian Constitution are mostly incorrect.
He named another group called "Anishnahbees" (I'm not sure about the spelling).
If you want, I can really find out about all this :)
Many many thanks for the replies, Hum Sa and Fret Wizard. i find this topic very interesting too. i don’t know the correct spelling either, but the “Anishinabek” have their descendants today amongst the Chippewa Indians, i believe. Hum Sa, If you have any (internet) sources by the researcher you mentioned, i would love to read them. He sounds really interesting.
You both are right, the Constitution doesn’t classify Aboriginal groups correctly, but unfortunately - i HAVE to go by what the Constitution states simply for other reasons. It’s presenting a lot of problems if i don’t. There is a really good 4-series booklet out, by Aboriginal peoples themselves, titled simply “Aboriginal self-government”. It’s regarding the constitutional/legal/political development of Canada’s Northwest Territories. In that, they go by the three classifications from the Canadian Constitution…which i admit has its own problems, but unfortunately i sort of have to go by the Constitutional definition. i can’t follow any other structure, as most sources tend to follow the Constitutional approach.
unfortunately - i HAVE to go by what the Constitution states simply for other reasons. It’s presenting a lot of problems if i don’t. There is a really good 4-series booklet out, by Aboriginal peoples themselves, titled simply “Aboriginal self-government”. It’s regarding the constitutional/legal/political development of Canada’s Northwest Territories. In that, they go by the three classifications from the Canadian Constitution…which i admit has its own problems, but unfortunately i sort of have to go by the Constitutional definition. i can’t follow any other structure, as most sources tend to follow the Constitutional approach.