‘Indian drum in the house’

Abstract

This article investigates the production and consumption of Canadian Prime Minister Harper’s 2008 apology to the victims of residential schools. The apology used contextual elements and linguistic devices to construct a particular reality of both the government’s role in residential schools and the nature of Canadian diversity. By comparing themes from Harper’s speech to responses on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s website, the article seeks to understand whether Canadians reaffirm or contest the prime minister’s message. The analysis reveals that although the majority felt the apology was appropriate and important, many contested the discourse that suggested that the attitudes that led to the schools have ‘no place’ in modern-day Canada. Instead the intercultural audience offered competing discourses of genocide and colonialism suggesting that Canada’s identity as it relates to its Aboriginal peoples is still a site of struggle.