They Called Me Number One

One woman's account of triumph over a childhood spent in an Indian residential school.

Table des matières

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
FOREWORD - Hemas Kla-Lee-Lee-Kla
INTRODUCTION
What Pain Have You Suffered?
Chapter 1
My Grandmother
First Memories
My Grandfather (xp'e7e)
Grasshoppers Looking For Work
Radios, Dances, Electricity And Running Water
Uncle Leonard
My Brother Ray Was Born in Prison
Sardis Hospital = Loneliness
Chapter 2
St. Joseph's Mission = Prison
Families Separated
Duties At The Mission
The Food They Gave Us You Wouldn't Give Your Dog
I'd Rather Kiss a Dog Than an Indian
Chapter 3
I Get Religion But What Did It Mean?
Sexual Abuse
Mental Abuse - A Lifelong Sentence
Forbidden Languages
Chapter 4
Health Care?
Uncle Ernie
Teachers
Gangs and Acceptable Touching
Boot Camp Style Supervision
Letters and Visitors Were Screened by the Authorities
Chapter 5
Pain and Pleasure
Some Good Memories
The Puffed Wheat Bandits and Other Runaways
Chapter 6
Home Sweet Home
Christmas
The Shame of Puberty
The RCMP, Priests, Indian Nurses and Indian Agents
The Training I Received to Be a Productive Part of Society
Chapter 7
The Summer of '67 - Big Changes in My Life
Going to School With Whites and The Cache Creek Motors Bus
White People Can Be Stupid?
Living With Dysfunction
Family Chaos
Leaving the Safety of Gram's House
My Epiphany at Sixteen
My Dark Years
Grooming for Violence
Chapter 8
My Attempted Suicide and Other Attempts
Jacinda, Scott and Tony Mack, My Saviors
Stepping Off the Rez
Deaths From Car Accidents
Finally - An Education
The Turning Points: Ernie Phillip and a 25 Cent Book
Chapter 9
Becoming a "Leader"
Cariboo-Chilcotin Justice Inquiry
Examining the Aftermath of the Residential Schools
Anger
Hemas Kla-Lee-Lee-Kla

Chapter 10
Indians - An Industry With No Product
Don't Ever Think I Don't Miss You, Bev
Institutions and Aboriginal People
A.I.M. and Other Political Teachings
Going to University
Final Thoughts ... for Now

A propos de l'auteur

Bev Sellars is a former Chief and Councillor of the Xat'sull (Soda Creek) First Nation in Williams Lake, British Columbia. First elected chief of Xat'sull in 1987, a position she held from 1987-1993 and then from 2009-2015. She also worked as a community advisor for the BC Treaty Commission. Ms. Sellars served as the representative for the Secwepemc communities on the Cariboo Chilcotin Justice Inquiry in the early 1990s. Ms. Sellars has spoken out on racism and residential schools and on the environmental and social threats of mineral resources exploitation in her region.
Ms. Sellars is the author of They Called Me Number One, a memoir of her childhood experience in the Indian residential school system and its effects on three generations of women in her family, published in 2013 by Talon Books. The book won the 2014 George Ryga Award for Social Awareness, was shortlisted for the 2014 Hubert Evans Non-Fiction, and was a finalist for the 2014 Burt Award for First Nations, Métis and Inuit Literature. Her book, Price Paid: The Fight for First Nations Survival, published in 2016 by Talon Books, looks at the history of Indigenous rights in Canada from an Indigenous perspective. Sellars has a degree in history from the University of Victoria and a law degree from the University of British Columbia. She is currently Chair of First Nations Women Advocating Responsible Mining (FNWARM) and serves as a Senior Advisor to the Indigenous Leadership Initiative (www.ilinationhood.ca).

Résumé

BC Book Prize, Non-Fiction, Bev Sellars, They Called Me Number One (Finalist)
Burt Award for First Nations, Métis, and Inuit Literature: Bev Sellars, They Called Me Number One (Third Prize winner)
Like thousands of Aboriginal children in Canada, and elsewhere in the colonized world, Xatsu'll chief Bev Sellars spent part of her childhood as a student in a church-run residential school.
These institutions endeavored to "civilize" Native children through Christian teachings; forced separation from family, language, and culture; and strict discipline. Perhaps the most symbolically potent strategy used to alienate residential school children was addressing them by assigned numbers only—not by the names with which they knew and understood themselves.
In this frank and poignant memoir of her years at St. Joseph's Mission, Sellars breaks her silence about the residential school's lasting effects on her and her family—from substance abuse to suicide attempts—and eloquently articulates her own path to healing. Number One comes at a time of recognition—by governments and society at large—that only through knowing the truth about these past injustices can we begin to redress them.

Détails du produit

• Auteurs: Bev Sellars
• Edition: Talonbooks
• Langues: Anglais
• Format d'édition: Livre de poche
• Sortie: 29.05.2012
• EAN: 9780889227415
• ISBN: 978-0-88922-741-5
• Pages: 227
• Dimensions: 141 mm x 216 mm x 20 mm
• Poids: 335 g
• Catégorie: Littérature > Littérature (récits) > Correspondance, journaux intimes