Hey Y‘all, Max here.
Lies and Incongruences is the last project this year for humanities 10. As you may or not have been able to tell from the project name, this project was focused on the mistreatment of First Nations and Indigenous populations in Canada. Of course PLP has done a few projects on somewhat similar topics ( “The More Things Change”, “Ology of Apology”, etc. ) in the past, and to be honest this one wasn’t too much different.
Throughout the whole project we would be reading the book “The Marrow Thieves” by Cherie Dimaline. It’s a fictional post-apocalyptic novel that revolves around a band of First Nations castaways trying to survive the Canadian Government, who are trying to harvest their bone marrow for their own purposes. That is a simple explanation, but I would recommend the book because I think it’s interesting.
There was a lot of written work in this project, and a lot of focus on expression through art. The first was a written piece explaining the significance of any important event in Canadian-First Nations relations. I chose to write about the Oka Crisis, one of the larger Indigenous uprisings in the 20th century. I then found a piece of art connected to the Oka Crisis, and wrote a short piece about it’s significance. You can view that here.
In between the assignments, there were a lot of lessons on the history of these lies and Incongruences in question. The 60’s scoop and Residential Schools, Indigenous rights throughout the 70’s and 80’s, The updating of the Indian Act, and finally the closure of the last Residential School. Though I said this project didn’t feel very new, I still learned a few things regardless.
I would repeat this process twice more, with both focusing on Indigenous art in context to important Indigenous-Canadian history ( Emma Hassenchal-Perley, Ruth Cuthand ). I didn’t mind these written assignments, I just found it annoying to have to refine my writing to be specific with the criteria. I know my writing is my strongest area of any work I do, but it feels as if there’s a dampener placed on my writing when It’s in my best interest to write about the subject matter, and the subject matter alone.
Speaking of my writing, I nearly forgot about this small Showbie submission I wrote in between assignments. It’s my opinion on being a Canadian and knowing the Canadian Government’s history with a variety of ethnic and cultural groups. I will attach it below.
As for the final work, there were two things; the first was a collage, and the second was ( yet another ) written reflection on the Marrow Thieves, and how it relates to current issues in Canada. the collage was fairly straightforward. I was able to finish it quickly, while still being able to pinpoint my chosen subject, indigenous-Canadian Conflicts throughout history.
My Collage
The written reflection was almost as simple, but it took longer. Mostly because I had finished the Marrow thieves a few weeks earlier than everyone else and forgot almost everything because I forgor 💀 to take notes. You can read my reflection below, which also includes the driving question for this project.
Thanks for reading.