Partnerships of Settler Violence: Language, Decolonisation, and the News Media, an examination of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the 2019 National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls


Trevor Green, York University

Every day across Canada, news outlets (be it the CBC, the Aboriginal People’s Television Network, or independent news outlets such as the Narwhal) publish stories on Indigenous Peoples, including coverage of settler violence and government inquiries. Both the 2015 Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) and the 2019 National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (MMIWG) put forth specific recommendations (Calls to Action and Calls to Justice, respectively) that pertain or involve Indigenous communities (be it First Nations, Inuit, or Métis) and the news media. A mollifying term that is often employed within news stories and government reports is “partnerships” with Indigenous communities or organizations and non-Indigenous actors, entities or people (whether in relation to governments, academic institutions, or newsrooms). Indeed, “partnership” is used in both the TRC and especially the MMIWG, and this generic term – “partnership” and/or “partnerships” – to describe the relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Peoples is ambiguous, conceptually vague and ultimately problematic. Partnership as a concept within these reports or news stories is not legally binding and is rarely mentioned within the context of Section 35 of the Constitution Act, 1982, which specifically focuses on aboriginal rights and treaty rights. Can reconciliation or decolonization in Canada ever be sustained with a “mainstream” media that uses terms such as “partnership” and is itself entangled in a web of cultural misrepresentation, and disingenuous historical commemoration which hinders Indigenous resurgence and ignores treaty rights and self-sovereignty? This question examines the convoluted and often mistrustful relationship between the Fourth Estate, national inquiry reports, and Indigenous communities. There have been grassroots-led movements that use social media, such as Idle No More. Although admirably in its ambition, it is telling that such movements have been met with limited influence within the current capitalist media landscape (which is, of course, facing its own crisis—declining business models, ‘fake news’ and the blocking of Canadian content on social network platforms in retaliation to the Online News Act). Given this crisis, my work asks whether a de-colonized iteration of the recommendations outlined in the TRC and MMIWG can truly offer a pathway for decolonization and reconciliation within the current media landscape. My research paper will employ a critical discourse analysis employing discursive practices and methods developed by Norman Fairclough and James Paul Gee, to contrast and compare the use of the term “partnership” within the text of the final reports of the TRC and MMIWG. Furthermore, using keyword searches on various news organization websites (specifically CBC, the Aboriginal People’s Television Network website, and The Globe and Mail) I will collect quantitative data involving news stories (published between 2015 and 2019) that use words such as “Indigenous” and “partnership” in relation to stories involving the MMIWG and TRC. As a Status Indian (I am affiliated with my mother’s Cowichan community in what is now British Columbia, which does not have a treaty), I will employ Indigenous research methods using creation myths from my Cowichan nation, to help contextualize and “talk back” to the Western/Eurocentric research methodology. Within this research framework, I have developed a question that will be explored through a mixed-methods approach: which terms, other than “partnership,” can lead to substantive change or decolonization when these news outlets are themselves within a violent and capitalist hegemony that is egregiously out of sync with Indigenous sovereignty and self-determination?

This paper will be presented at the following session: