Four Decades of Literature on Native Canadian Child Welfare: Changing Themes.
1995; Child Welfare League of America; Volume: 74; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
0009-4021
Autores Tópico(s)Indigenous Health, Education, and Rights
ResumoNative* Canadian concerns were largely ignored by child welfare academics and the literature was sparse until the issues became high profile in the late 1970s. Much of the early data flowed from government-funded studies. Constitutional talks between 1980 and 1987 and a major Parliamentary Inquiry [Penner 1983] accompanied the transfer of control of many government services Native organizations and accelerated gains toward self-government. Now the suffering of Canada's Native people is frequent news. Accounts of suicide attempts of groups of children in Davis Inlet Labrador [Former glue sniffer...1993], reports of exorbitant rates of youth suicides in Northern Ontario [Platiel 1991; Mombourquette 1993], and disclosures of past sexual abuse by church officials in the residential schools are common.This article overviews the body of academic and nonacademic literature, identifying themes as they reflected the political climate. In the early period from 1960 1978, service providers wrote about the difficulties in providiing services. The middle period promoted the negative effects of non-Native agencies on Native people and the relationship between the state and the new Native agencies. The most recent period focuses on child maltreatment in Native communities from the perspective of both academicians and Native leadership.Early Period: Difficulties in Providing ServicesFrontline service workers, board members, and foster parents of Ontario Children's Aid Societies (CAS) wrote fervent, nontheoretical accounts of early experiences in providing child welfare services First Nations** [Lugtig 1963; Copeland 1965; Bennett 1966; Goodwill 1968; Albrecht 1970]. This largely uncited body of literature in the Journal of the Ontario Association of Children's Aid Societies (JOACAS) later addressed difficulties in adoption and family foster care [McClone 1973; Knight 1974; Brouse & Ward 1976; Sangster 1977; Woolner 1979]; deprived social conditions [Kenora CAS 1974; Kushnier 1976; Timpson 1978a]; adaptive approaches in urban and Northern settings [Beamish & Lee 1973; Metcalfe 1973; Carlson 1975; Hackney 1978]; related services such as education [Rosseter & Homberg 1973; Hackney 1976]; critiques of the child welfare services [Toronto Native Times 1978; Timpson 1978a, 1978b]; and proposed alternative approaches [Timpson 1978b; King & Maloney 1979]. In contrast, the professional journal The Social Worker published only two articles on Native matters during the same period [Andrewartha 1976; Noble 1976]. The problems seemed visible only those directly involved.In the late 1960s, many practitioners described social conditions related child welfare problems in Northern Ontario First Nations. In response criticism of CASs for not taking additional reserve*** Indian children into care because of inadequate social conditions, one CAS director wrote:If the Children's Aid Society were to do its job, basing its thinking on the fact that all the social needs and inadequacies affecting the Indian would be met by removal of the children from the environment as advocated, one can imagine the increase in budget, staff, and facilities needed...for a negative concept. I am not being facetious when I say that the collective arrival of children into care would be likened the march of the Pied piper. [Morgan 1968: 9]Unlike other children whose behaviour problems or housing difficulties were often cited as reasons for their coming into care, Native Indian children were taken into care only for extreme reasons such as desertion and neglect [Glenesk 1971]. A study of the admissions of Native children care in Northwestern Ontario showed that many admissions were unplanned emergencies in relation neglect and abandonment, with few referrals for abuse [Timpson 1993]. It is not known whether the reasons for admission were different for non-Native children, but a disproportionate number of Native children were in family foster and adoptive care. …
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