Program Learning Outcome 1: Articulate and apply advanced, interdisciplinary theories and practices of human rights and social justice, from legal, academic, and experiential perspectives. 

This program has given me the tools to articulate an array of interdisciplinary theories and practices of human rights and social justice. I will share two examples that demonstrate this praxis, namely from in HRSJ 5110 Genocide in the 20^th Century and In HRSJ 5020: Indigenous Ways of Knowing: Pedagogy and Practices. Both examples tackle similar issues from radically different social locations and theoretical contexts and have been developed from prior assignments completed in these respective classes.

In HRSJ 5110 Genocide in the 20^th Century, we learned about Raphael Lemkin – the nominal father of ‘genocide’ – and his efforts to expand the term’s framework beyond the physical/biological destruction of peoples. Lemkin drew influence from Sir James George Frazer and Bronisław Malinowski, who theorized culture to be essential to the “functioning of collectivities,” (Woolford, 2015, p. 26) enabling groups to meet their survival needs through a shared matrix of meaning, or rather, a “family of mind.” (Woolford, 2015, p. 24) In this view, the destruction of one’s culture jeopardizes the very existence of the group that practices it. This insight folds cultural destruction into genocide and allows for a range of complex and destructive interventions across time and space to be considered, namely colonial assimilation measures and their ongoing impacts.

In HRSJ 5020: Indigenous Ways of Knowing: Pedagogy and Practices, we learned about Indigenous activist Arthur Manuel’s surmising of colonialism and its constituent parts. The main thrust of Manuel’s analysis endeavours to ground the experience of colonialism in the lives of indigenous peoples through the identification of its three core components: dispossession, dependence, and oppression (2018). Dispossession was achieved through the forced separation of Indigenous populations from the land they dwelled in and relied upon. This deprivation produced scarcity, and this scarcity, in turn, produced the second of Manuel’s colonial components, dependence. The cumulative effect of this land dispossession and subsequent dependency is captured in Manuel’s final colonial component, oppression. Oppression, in Manuel’s own words, is the devastation “of our social, political, economic, cultural and spiritual life”. (2018, p. 21) This, in my view, is the apotheosis of settler colonial genocide, fully realized through a mixture of systemic violence, isolation, resource privation, arbitrary legalities, and land grabs. His argument rests on the (indisputable) fact that the dereliction and alienation felt by the Indigenous communities in Canada was no mere accident of history, but rather an intended outcome of colonial design.

The examples illustrate the interdisciplinary frameworks I have learned to articulate through the course of my studies. By examining genocide through Raphael Lemkin’s expanded definition, which includes cultural destruction as a key component, and Arthur Manuel’s articulation of settler colonialism’s core tenants – dispossession, dependence, and oppression – I have come to understand how systemic harm occurs across time, space and theoretical contexts. Lemkin’ and Manuel converge on the notion of cultural survival as a crucial battleground for human rights and social justice. This is a crucial insight that can be deployed to address the full spectrum of colonial violence.

Citations:

Manual, A. (2018). The grassroots struggle: Defenders of the land & Idle No MOre. In P. McFarlane & N. Schabus (Eds). Whose Land Is It Anyway? : a Manual for Decolonization. (pp. 28-31). Federation of Post-Secondary Educators of BC. https://www.deslibris.ca/ID/10095983

Woolford, A. J. (2015). This benevolent experiment: indigenous boarding schools, genocide, and redress in Canada and the United States. Lincoln, University of Nebraska Press.

Program Learning Outcome 8: Challenge and critique social and political structures and legalistic definitions based on a knowledgeable, socially responsible, and sustainable perspective. 

In my capacity as a Human Rights and Social Justice Consultant, the British Columbia Legal Institute (BCLI) tasked me with developing a memorandum of best practices for consultation and engagement to aid the BCLI’s ongoing law reform efforts. The final document was broken down into three key sections. The first section, Distinguishing Consultation from Research, clarifies guidelines and possible exemptions that distinguish the two processes. The second section, Benchmarking Consultation Practices: Evidence-Based Insights, reviews literature from various academic, institutional, and law reform organizations to inform consultation and engagement strategies. The third and final section, Engaging Impacted Populations: Best Practices, provides recommendations based on the relevant literature for engaging with underrepresented and marginalized populations. These populations include Indigenous communities, individuals who may experience trauma responses, and 2SLGBTQIA+ individuals.

Through the course of this project, I found a prevailing theme across the literature decried a sort of epistemic violence. Epistemic violence refers to the different ways in which systemic violence is exercised in relation to the production, circulation and recognition of knowledge (cite) . At the root of this violence, we find the allocation of political subjects and cultural systems into one of two different and discrete categories: “us” the legal professionals, the academics, the technocrats, the knowledge keepers and “the others” who suffer a historically and socially situated denial of their own subjectivity, legitimacy, or existence – the Indigenous girl, the trauma survivor, the non-binary youth. This top-down neglect is common among legal, academic, and governmental institutions alike, and leads to an impoverishment of knowledge within these systems, they become unresponsive, extractive, and ultimately lose the contents and capacity for self-criticism and reform. By mapping these margins, through models of circular collaboration we can begin to reshape our legal system to reflect a sense of informational authorship and inclusion, gaining a better appreciation of where the law works, who it works for, and where it doesn’t.

Program Learning Outcome 9: Demonstrate a sophisticated understanding of and respect for the values of a range of Indigenous knowledge and wisdom.

Much of my academic background has been in political science, which at the undergraduate level, is largely preoccupied with early modern European thought. Therefore, the work of epistemological decolonization has been at once challenging and deeply rewarding. At the end of it all, I’m eager to engage in a more compassionate, relational, wholistic, and ecologically conscience academic praxis, like the kind I have learned about in this program. Following the completion of my master’s degree, I hope to apply what I have learned by promoting Indigenous legal plurality and allying with Indigenous lead social justice causes.

Program Learning Outcome 10: Creatively engage in finding solutions to issues of justice and fairness in contemporary society at a community, provincial, national, and/or global level. 

Together with several other colleagues in the HRSJ program, I organized a public forum titled Conversations (In) Humanity, concerning the ongoing human rights crisis in Gaza. The initiative sought to engage the TRU community through the mediums of film and open discussion, working to reduce the ‘othering’ of marginalized communities. Additionally, I have served as a research assistant for two projects. The first involved gathering data on non-market housing within Kamloops and the interior of British Columbia, aiming to identify best practices for the development of subsidized and cooperative housing to assist municipal governing bodies and private stakeholders. The second position has me actively involved in developing an open-access online textbook for the philosophy department at TRU. As an author on this project, I have been responsible for writing clear and concise descriptions of primary materials, to enhance the student’s comprehension and engagement with philosophical ethics. Introduction to Ethics is in the final copyediting stage through TRU Open Press and will be available to all in September. In short, each of these experiences afforded me significant opportunities to facilitate meaningful public discourse concerning issues of justice and fairness in contemporary society through fostering public discourse, conducting research with practical applications, and contributing to educational resources that enhance ethical literacy.

Image Credit

Photo Credit: Pawel Czerwinkski via Unslpash