Reading Log #2

After reading the articles by Maureen Lux and Ian Mosby and the chapter out of Colonizing Bodies by Mary-Ellen Kelm, there were several ideas that ran throughout all three. The first being that the definition of what health is varies drastically between the indigenous people and Canadians. To many citizens health means taking care of oneself. The common idea is that you will be a more effective member of society if you are healthy. However, indigenous people few health in a very different way. In Lux’s article she explains that indigenous people thought that “individual wellness required community support”[1]. This completely different view of health shows how as a people they do not separate one person from that of the rest of the community. Therefore, it makes it easier to understand how they felt resistant to hospitals that segregated them from there community and holistic medicine. Secondly, throughout all of the readings each one focused on the effect that Tuberculosis has had on the indigenous community. In Kelm’s book she shows the fact that “31 percent”[2] of deaths by diseases were caused by Tuberculosis. This is absolutely astounding and terrifying to see how much the indigenous people of the country suffered under the hands of this terrible disease. In Mosby’s article, he discusses the effects that the different research teams had on individual residential schools. The frightening thing about these studies was the knowledge that the research teams knew that the children were malnourished in these schools, but instead of feeding them properly, they chose to use them as experiments for good health. Now while they may have had intentions on helping the children in some ways, they still let these kids lack some important nutrients in order to test out their hypothesis. It’s interesting how the children responded to the conduct of the research teams. The letters often sounded like they were “spurred by a set of specific instructions from the teacher”[3]. While in reality these children were too frightened to say how they really felt about being poked and prodded and treated like experiments. The overarching thread in all these articles is indigenous health and the way in which their traditional practices influenced their health. Canadian society was trying to push our ways onto the indigenous people. While in some ways this is beneficial, in many ways it makes the indigenous ways of health seem to be inferior. Lux points out that Indigenous people view their health as part of a collective whole, which is something that Canadian society could adopt. Kelm shows the devastating effect that Tuberculosis had on the Indigenous community. Mosby points out that this had a lot to do with their overall health and the fact that many of the children in residential schools were malnourished. In conclusion, these articles show the way in which the Indigenous people of the time handled their health and also how the Canadian government wanted to control this aspect of their lives. This is seen in the hospitals built exclusively for the native people to segregate them from society. It is also present in the research that was done at the residential schools of the time. It’s upsetting that more care was not taken to ensure the health of the indigenous people of Canada.

[1] Maureen Lux, “Care for the ‘Racially Careless’: Indian Hospitals in the Canadian West, 1920-1950s.” The Canadian Historical Review 91, no.3 (September 2010): 411.

[2] Mary Ellen-Kelm, Colonizing Bodies (Vancouver: UBC Press, 1998), 7.

[3] Ian Mosby, “Administering Colonial Science: Nutrition Research and Human Biomedical Experimentation in Aboriginal Communities and Residential Schools, 1942-1952.” Social History 46, no.91 (May 2013): 169.

Bibliography

Ellen-Kelm, Mary. Colonizing Bodies. Vancouver: UBC Press, 1998.

Lux, Maureen. “Care for the ‘Racially Careless’: Indian Hospitals in the Canadian West, 1920-1950s.” The Canadian Historical Review 91, no.3 (September 2010): 407-434.

Mosby, Ian. “Administering Colonial Science: Nutrition Research and Human Biomedical Experimentation in Aboriginal Communities and Residential Schools, 1942-1952.” Social History 46, no.91 (May 2013): 145-172.