Concordia suspends prof over indigeneity
The story is that Concordia has suspended a professor who claimed she was Cherokee, but apparently isn’t. The story’s not at all clear, and she’s still on the university website, which lists her courses and papers connected with indigenous issues. Columnist Hélène Buzzetti, of Le Soleil, asks whether the university explicitly required indigenous heritage to teach these courses, but the university isn’t talking, and there’s no story on the Link either.
ProposMontreal - Martin 22:13 on 2021-12-03 Permalink
What is it with people saying they are of a certain descent but are not ?
Kate 22:40 on 2021-12-03 Permalink
Some posts and positions and some benefits are intended for people who are, in the Canadian term, status Indians. Against a background where many indigenous people live disadvantaged lives, some non‑indigenous people have shamelessly made claims that allowed them to benefit from these advantages.
There’s a current Canadian writer called Joseph Boyden who has made quite a career over his claims of indigenous ancestry, which he can’t substantiate. But this is nothing new. A British guy called Archibald Stansfield Belaney came to Canada in 1906 and set himself up as a Native writer called Grey Owl, and sold a lot of books and had a career based on this assumed identity.
A U.S. case of assumed identity giving someone false credibility was Jamake Highwater, who passed himself off as a Cherokee and wrote books, and was even a paid consultant for the creation of the Native American character Chakotay on Star Trek (Voyager), but he was actually a Jewish guy from Los Angeles. You couldn’t make it up.
When I was doing census work over the summer I found that an awful lot of white Québécois folks believe they have some indigenous ancestry. You’ll also find that a lot of white Americans – ones whose families have been in the U.S. long enough to make it plausible – will claim they have some Cherokee ancestry. (I don’t know why it’s usually specifically Cherokee, but it is.) Even when there’s no apparent profit in making such claims, people do. It’s a bit of exoticism, I guess. A harmless bit of family legend, until it becomes a big lie.
mare 10:53 on 2021-12-04 Permalink
I’m not saying it’s applicable to this case, but sometimes people are genuinely convinced of their native ancestry. If your parents and/or grandparents claim your great-grand father was from this or that peoples, this information gets past on, and you tend to believe it and as you grow up, you get more-or-less brainwashed that it’s a fact. But if you start to gain benefits from it, one should do some digging
I, for instance, have such a unusual ancestry story, which may or may not true. As a first generation immigrant, it is however not of being native Canadian.
[Story time]
My mother’s mother died when my mother was six years old so none of my family members have ever met her since she was the oldest and her siblings were very young. She was supposedly a rather direct descendant from the Huns, who invaded Europe in the 5th century CE, lead by their famed leader Attilla. My grandmother’s family apparently lived in a very remote valley in Switzerland that was closed off from society for many months every winter because the only pass was blocked by lots of snow. There was some family inbreeding going on so the lineage is supposedly very ‘pure’, even over 15 centuries, more than 30 generations. I’ve always believed this family origin story, as it explained the Asian traits some of my family members, my mother included, have. (I have two cousins who could easily pass for Asian.) But it might be more easily explained by someone getting pregnant after an illicit relationship and the family making up a lineage story to protect their honour. They do have an unusual name though.
I don’t get any benefits from it so I never investigated, but I frankly don’t want to ‘spoil’ the story by for instance doing a DNA test. I don’t have children so I won’t have to pass on this potentially fabricated lineage to them. I can just share the story with my friends and on in a comment on the internet.
Kate 11:00 on 2021-12-04 Permalink
mare, how can you resist the idea of doing a 23andme and finding out more?
I’ve done the ancestry.com DNA thing and it came up exactly as I was expecting: roughly 3/4 Irish, 1/4 English. Everyone very well behaved, no mystery genes at all. Foo.
JaneyB 11:08 on 2021-12-04 Permalink
In addition to stories of hidden Indigenous ancestry, some of which is probably true, Indigenous people historically have been fairly open about membership in their community. From what I’ve read and heard, basically if you spent time in that community, you were considered part of it, regardless of origin. That’s the sensible way to look at membership but it doesn’t play well with the status stuff from the Indian Act or any of the recent measures to make space for Indigenous voices. Very messy.
The people who consciously impersonate Indigenous people because they ‘feel Indigenous’ are trading on the ‘identify as’ language that has seeped into general talk of identity. Many people are comfortable with ‘identify as female’ but feel very, very uncomfortable with ‘identify as Indigenous, Black, disabled (yes – a thing)’. We’re at a strange point culturally; no idea where it’s going.
Kate 11:26 on 2021-12-04 Permalink
JaneyB, agreed, so much.
In the case of ethnicity of course we now have DNA tests, but then there’s apparently no guarantee that if you had one indigenous great-grandmother, it will show up. Genes are a shuffle and deal affair and you simply might not inherit the typical markers.
dhomas 13:16 on 2021-12-04 Permalink
I’m very wary of those DNA services. Sure, they seem pretty innocuous right now. But imagine later on, these companies decide to supplement their income by selling your data. For example, insurance companies could be very interested. “During our research, we’ve found you to be genetically predisposed to heart failure. You do not qualify for life insurance”. Or if the data gets leaked, like almost everything seems to eventually on the internet. It’s one thing when it’s your credit card that gets compromised, but it’s completely different when it’s your genetic makeup.
jayvitybillionandone 17:33 on 2021-12-04 Permalink
These consumer gene sequencing companies already share data with law enforcement, so there’s no need to imagine horrific scenarios about misuse of your genetic data — they’re already here: https://jme.bmj.com/content/47/12/788
Ian 22:56 on 2021-12-04 Permalink
I did a 23andme test and it turns out I’m .5% native which would be something like a 3rd or 4th great grandparent. There aren’t even any family stories so I have no idea what that’s all about.
Joey 11:35 on 2021-12-05 Permalink
Seems that the 23andme style ancestry tests are basically bullshit: https://gizmodo.com/consumer-dna-testing-may-be-the-biggest-health-scam-of-1839358522
Kate 15:11 on 2021-12-05 Permalink
Joey, nonetheless, law enforcement has been able to arrest serious criminals based on tracking down their relatives on these sites. The New Yorker recently had a story about DNA investigations and crime.
Ian 20:23 on 2021-12-06 Permalink
I’ve verified that I am actually related to my great-great grandfather, until the genetic tests we all thought my great grandmother was adopted… turns out she was a bastard. I’ve got lots of 2nd and third cousins and shared markers from older relatives that side of the family I couldn’t otherwise have.
This is not to say that some commercial tests aren’t bullshit, but for some very specific family search stuff it’s invaluable, and they are getting more precise all the time. FWIW I found ancestry.ca’s tests to be way more vague and only useful as an aid to their existing genealogy/ family tree features.
I mean 23andme can’t tell the difference between Scottish and English so it’s clearly imprecise for larger ethnic matching but it can give you DNA relatives with a fair bit of certainty.