Last week, the sa国际传媒 announced that for sa国际传媒 Day, it would be running a full-page pull-out of the . Designed by the late Curtis Wilson (Mulidzas) of the Wei Wai Kum First Nation near Campbell River, it is a revised maple leaf flag with swimming salmon in the side bars and an orca in the maple leaf.
Dave Obee, the Times 颅Colonist鈥檚 editor and publisher, 鈥渞eflects the times we are in,鈥� adding: 鈥渟a国际传媒, as we know it, could not exist without the 颅Indigenous presence.鈥� While recognizing that this is not the official flag, he said, 鈥渢his year it seems like the right one.鈥�
I agree. But why only this year, I thought. Why not adopt it as sa国际传媒鈥檚 flag? And while we are at it, why not change the name of this land we call sa国际传媒 to Kanata? After all, the 颅Government of sa国际传媒 website tells us that 鈥渢he name sa国际传媒 likely comes from the Huron-Iroquois word 鈥渒anata,鈥� meaning 鈥渧illage鈥� or 鈥渟ettlement,鈥� so it is an Indigenous name already.
Such an idea is not without precedent. Increasingly, the country we used to call New颅 颅Zealand is renaming itself Aotearoa New Zealand, Aotearoa being the original Maori name for the land, often translated as 鈥渢he land of the long white cloud.鈥�
Go to the government鈥檚 website and you will find it is headlined Government of New Zealand/Te Kawanatanga o Aotearoa, and you are greeted with 鈥淜ia ora,鈥� which means 鈥渉ello鈥� and has come to be the common greeting in Aotearoa New Zealand these days.
The Maori arrived in Aotearoa around the 13th century, populating the country 鈥� until then free of humans 鈥� only 500 years before the first Europeans arrived. As a result, and because they all came from 颅various eastern Polynesian islands with related languages and cultures, there is only one Maori language across the entire country, although with many local dialects, as is true of 颅English.
In 1985, Maori was recognized as a 鈥渢aonga鈥� (treasure) that the government was obliged to protect under the Treaty of 颅Waitangi, and in 1987, it became one of the three official 颅languages of Aotearoa New 颅Zealand, alongside English and New Zealand Sign Language.
So it was wonderful, when I聽attended a large global health-promotion conference in Aotearoa New Zealand in 2019, to hear the Maori elders greet delegates from around the world in Maori, with no English 颅translation available. They were in effect proclaiming with pride 鈥渢his is our language, this is our culture, this is our land鈥� 鈥� and so they should.
Here, of course, things are more complex. There are three main groups of 颅Indigenous 颅people in sa国际传媒. The First Nations (often still called 颅鈥淚ndians鈥�) were the first to arrive, starting some 20,000 years ago, and now comprise more than 50 Indigenous Nations and languages and over 600 communities.
According to the Canadian Encyclopedia, the Inuit arrived about 1,000 years ago 鈥� well before the first Europeans arrived 500 years ago 鈥� 颅moving east across what is now their homeland in the Arctic, from the Bering Strait all the way to Labrador (and beyond, to 颅Greenland). There are eight main Inuit ethnic groups and five main dialects in Inuktitut, the Inuit language.
Finally, the Canadian 颅Encyclopedia says the M茅tis are people of mixed European and Indigenous ancestry and possess 鈥渁 singular cultural heritage of dual origins鈥� that first emerged in the 18th century, west of Sault Ste. Marie (although much of this is still debated).
So, as far as I know, there is no single agreed-upon 颅Indigenous term for the land we today call sa国际传媒. But the term Kanata has an historic 颅relationship to the modern word for the country and is an eastern sa国际传媒 Indigenous term, nicely balancing the western sa国际传媒 imagery on the Canadian 颅Indigenous Flag.
I put this idea forward not as a definitive answer 鈥� for one thing, it has not had any input from Indigenous people 颅themselves, who would be key to any such change 鈥� but in the spirit of reconciliation.
So why not start the 颅discussion here: How should the name and flag of the country we call sa国际传媒 be changed to reflect and honour the 颅Indigenous people of this land?
Dr. Trevor Hancock is a retired professor and senior scholar at the University of Victoria鈥檚 School of Public Health and Social Policy.
