Talk:First Nations of Canada

A Wki page can have more than one category. This article needs to be linked to both the country category and to the general LC category of "Indians of North America." Please do not remove the latter category designation.Jbparker 14:47, 20 March 2008 (MDT)

First Nations/Indians of Canada
It's my understanding that Native American groups north of the U.S. border refer to themselves as First Nations and not Indians. Should this page and the pages for the different provinces of Canada be changed to First Nations of... as opposed to Indians of...? If I'm incorrect on this please let me know.

-- Lotje2 06:00, 21 July 2012 (UTC)


 * You are correct that First Nations is the preferred term for most Indians in Canada. However, the Inuit and Metis seem to be considered separate groups.  These pages were created by Jimmy Parker and I was going to work on them back in 2009 but my other duties got in the way.  He thought "Indians of ...." would be most appropriate.  The problem I see is that when someone is searching ... some will search for "First Nations"  and some will search for "Indians."  Still others might search for "aboriginal" or "indigenous" which are older terms which have fallen out of favor.  There should be a page for Inuit and Metis, which I will create in due time.  Perhaps we need several categories?  Not sure how to handle this.


 * --MistySky


 * I wouldn't worry much about categories if you mean the categories we use on the wiki. They can be easily changed or renamed later. For now everything can be put in the Category:Indians of Canada and put into sub-cats or moved to other cats at a later time. I was just wondering about the page names since those can be much more of a mess if things are renamed, moved, moved back etc.


 * The reason I was asking was because I was thinking about adding some links to the sidebar and wasn't sure how the pages should be named. Whatever, we do I think it should be consistent.


 * As far as searching goes. Any page that contains the terms, First Nations or Indians, will show up as a search result for both terms as long as the terms are both used somewhere on the page or the page name, so I wouldn't be too worried about that.


 * -- Lotje2 00:42, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

I would be in favor of renaming the pages "First Nations of British Columbia" etc. That was my original idea. I would like to talk to a couple Canadian acquaintances who might have more insight. I also find that references are often made to "First Nations, Metis, and Inuit". That is something we need to pin down - are Metis and Inuit also properly called First Nations? That is something I want to see if my Canadian people can clarify for us. These groups might be handled separately.

--MistySky


 * Regarding the Inuit and Metis, I've wondered if they are actually referred to as First Nations or not as well. Maybe we should post these questions on the forum pages to get more input.


 * -- Lotje2 20:59, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

I have emailed my "cousin" in Ontario. Got a reply. The Inuit are not considered First Nations nor do they have Indian status exactly the same way as others in the "lower" part of Canada. They do have rights in the northern areas of their traditional homelands. They are said to have come from Siberia about 3000 years ago - relative newcomers. The Metis are interesting - the specific definition are those who are descended from French/Indian or Scot/Indian ancestry. They are not given the same status as others and are not part of the First Nations except where they would reside on a Reserve. There is one reserve which had some land set aside for them - I do not know the history of that. They have, in fact, lobbied for years to be recognized and given Indian status. As was pointed out, however, the term means "mixed blood" and a large perecentage of all First Nations people meet that technical definition, as at this point there has been a lot of intermarriage. "First Nations" is a term that has come into use in the past 25 years. It basically refers to those who fall under a treaty which was created either under the British Crown or the Canadian government. Highway signs indicate "First Nation of..." With this information, it would seem perfectly appropriate to re-name the pages "First Nations of ..." each province. It seems to be clear, also, that the Metis could be treated best with a separate page detailing their history and sources of records. I would think the Inuit would be treated as a separate indigenous group and excluded from the Canadian Indians. They would also have a separate page with a history and sources of records.

--MistySky