Description
Sweet Promises: A Reader in Indian-White Relations in Canada is a collection of 26 previously published articles concerned with the nature of Indian-White relations in the various regions of Canada from the days of New France to the present. Historians contributed most of these previously published essays. Organized chronologically the essays cover topics such as early military alliances; fur trade; Indian policy; treaties and reserves; the Northwest Rebellion; the impact of religious, agricultural and educational policies; the rise of Native political organizations; environmental issues; the struggle for aboriginal rights; and contemporary land claims issues. There is minimal attention to the Maritime and Pacific regions and no articles about the North. Many of the essays are now dated with six published before 1970 and more than half of them published before 1980. Two essays deserve attention. Blair Stonechild provides an "Indian View of the 1885 Uprising" and Sarah Carter discusses Canadian Indian policy as it was administered in the West. As a reader, Sweet Promises presents a dated selection of historical essays that fails to capture the ever-changing nature of Native Studies in Canada. However, the book saves the reader the effort of searching scholarly journals and gives a taste of historical scholarship as it relates to Indian-White relations.