Orange Shirt Day Booklist

Updated December 19, 2023
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The church and indigenous peoples in the Americas : in between reconciliation and decolonization
Andraos, Michel
Indigenous and non-Indigenous voices come together in this volume to discuss both the wounds of colonial history and the opportunities for decolonization, reconciliation, and hope in the relationship between the church and Indigenous peoples across the Americas. Scholars and pastoral leaders from...
As long as the rivers flow
Bartleman, James
From the accomplished memoirist and former Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario comes a first novel of incredible heart and spirit for every Canadian. The novel follows one girl, Martha, from the Cat Lake First Nation in Northern Ontario who is "stolen" from her family at the age of six and...
4 years-- and then some
Bryant, Mary Harrington.
Shi-shi-etko
Campbell, Nicola I.
Winner of the Anskohk Aboriginal Children's Book of the Year Award. Finalist for the TD Canadian Children's Literature Award, the Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award and the Ruth Schwartz Award In just four days young Shi-shi-etko will have to leave her family and all that she knows to...
Shin-chi's canoe
Campbell, Nicola I.
Winner of the TD Canadian Children's Literature Award and finalist for the Governor General's Award: Children's Illustration This moving sequel to the award-winning Shi-shi-etko tells the story of two children's experience at residential school. Shi-shi-etko is about to return for her...
From truth to reconciliation : transforming the legacy of residential schools
Castellano, Marlene Brant
They called me.... 33 : reclaiming Ingo-Waabigwan
Chaboyer, Karen
Karen longed for acceptance, validation and love, but had no ability to form healthy, meaningful relationships. Born into a large family already suffering the effects of two generations of residential school, and surviving her own nine years at St. Margaret Indian Residential School, Karen (like...
The circle game : shadows and substance in the Indian residential school experience in Canada
Chrisjohn, Roland David.
Red skin, white masks : rejecting the colonial politics of recognition
Coulthard, Glen Sean
WINNER OF: Frantz Fanon Outstanding Book from the Caribbean Philosophical Association Canadian Political Science Association's C.B. MacPherson Prize Studies in Political Economy Book Prize Over the past forty years, recognition has...
Reconciliation in practice : a cross-cultural perspective
Datta, Ranjan
In 2015, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission released a report designed to facilitate reconciliation between the Canadian state and Indigenous Peoples. Its call to honour treaty relationships reminds us that we are all treaty people -- including immigrants and refugees living in Canada. The...
Secret path
Downie, Gordon
Secret Path is a ten song digital download album by Gord Downie with a graphic novel by illustrator Jeff Lemire that tells the story of Chanie "Charlie" Wenjack, a twelve-year-old boy who died in flight from the Cecilia Jeffrey Indian Residential School fifty years ago. ...
I am not a number
Dupuis, Jenny Kay
When eight-year-old Irene is removed from her First Nations family to live in a residential school she is confused, frightened, and terribly homesick. She tries to remember who she is and where she came from, despite the efforts of the nuns who are in charge at the school and who tell her that she...
Gaawin gindaaswin ndaawsii = I am not a number
Dupuis, Jenny Kay
The dual language edition, in Nishnaabemwin (Ojibwe) Nbisiing dialect and English, of the award-winning I Am Not a Number. When eight-year-old Irene is removed from her First Nations family to live in a residential school she is confused, frightened, and terribly homesick. She tries to remember who...
Je ne suis pas un numéro
Dupuis, Jenny Kay
See below for English description. Irene, huit ans et ses deux frères sont forcés de quitter leur famille pour aller dans un pensionnat loin de chez eux. C'est la loi! Dans cet endroit austère, on les empêche de parler leur langue et on leur donne un numéro en guise de nom. À la fin...
Final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada
Between 1867 and 2000, the Canadian government sent over 150,000 Aboriginal children to residential schools across the country. Government officials and missionaries agreed that in order to "civilize and Christianize" Aboriginal children, it was necessary to separate them from their parents and...
Final report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada
Between 1867 and 2000, the Canadian government sent over 150,000 Aboriginal children to residential schools across the country. Government officials and missionaries agreed that in order to "civilize and Christianize" Aboriginal children, it was necessary to separate them from their parents and...
Where are the children? : healing the legacy of the residential schools = Que sont les enfants devenus? : l'expérience des pensionnats autochtones
kimotinâniwiw itwêwina
Florence, Melanie
The dual language edition, in Plains Cree and English, of Stolen Words, the award-winning story of the beautiful relationship between a little girl and her grandfather. When she asks her grandfather how to say something in Cree, he tells her that his language was stolen from him when he was a boy....
Stolen words
Florence, Melanie
The story of the beautiful relationship between a little girl and her grandfather. When she asks her grandfather how to say something in his language - Cree - he admits that his language was stolen from him when he was a boy. The little girl then sets out to help her grandfather find his language...
Broken circle : the dark legacy of Indian residential schools : a memoir
Fontaine, Theodore
Now an approved curriculum resource for grade 9-12 students in British Columbia and Manitoba. Theodore (Ted) Fontaine lost his family and freedom just after his seventh birthday, when his parents were forced to leave him at an Indian residential school by order of the Roman Catholic Church and the...
Finding my talk : how fourteen Native women reclaimed their lives after residential school
Grant, Agnes
When residential schools opened in the 1830s, First Nations envisioned their own teachers, ministers, and interpreters. Instead, students were regularly forced to renounce their cultures and languages and some were subjected to degradations and abuses that left severe emotional scars for generations...
No end of grief : Indian residential schools in Canada
Grant, Agnes
Resistance and renewal : surviving the Indian residential school
Haig-Brown, Celia
One of the first books published to deal with the phenomenon of residential schools in Canada, Resistance and Renewal is a disturbing collection of Native perspectives on the Kamloops Indian Residential School(KIRS) in the British Columbia interior. Interviews with thirteen Natives, all...
Tsqelmucwílc : the Kamloops Indian Residential School--resistance and a reckoning
Haig-Brown, Celia
In May 2021, the world was shocked by news of the detection of 215 unmarked graves on the grounds of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School (KIRS) in British Columbia, Canada. Ground-penetrating radar confirmed the vestiges of children as young as three on this site of the infamous...
Reconciling Canada : critical perspectives on the culture of redress
Henderson, Jennifer
Truth and reconciliation commissions and official governmental apologies continue to surface worldwide as mechanisms for coming to terms with human rights violations and social atrocities. As the first scholarly collection to explore the intersections and differences between a range of redress...
Les bas du pensionnat : une histoire vraie
Jordan-Fenton, Christy
See below for English description. Margaret supplie son père de la laisser aller à l'école des étrangers. Il finit par accepter. Mais avant, il met sa fille en garde : comme l'eau façonne la pierre, les étrangers vont façonner son esprit et le rendront étroit. Au pensionnat,...
Quand j'avais huit ans
Jordan-Fenton, Christy
See below for English description. Une adaptation du roman à succès Les bas du pensionnat pour les lecteurs débutants! Olemaun a huit ans et elle sait beaucoup de choses. Mais elle ne sait pas lire. Faisant fi des avertissements de son père, elle effectue un long voyage pour...
When I was eight
Jordan-Fenton, Christy
Bestselling memoir Fatty Legs for younger readers. Olemaun is eight and knows a lot of things. But she does not know how to read. Ignoring her father's warnings, she travels far from her Arctic home to the outsiders' school to learn. The nuns at the school call her Margaret. They...
Fatty legs : a true story
Jordan-Fenton, Christy.
Eight-year-old Margaret Pokiak has set her sights on learning to read, even though it means leaving her village in the high Arctic. Faced with unceasing pressure, her father finally agrees to let her make the five-day journey to attend school, but he warns Margaret of the terrors of residential...
21 things you may not know about the Indian Act : helping Canadians make reconciliation with indigenous peoples a reality
Joseph, Robert P. C.
#1 National BestsellerBased on a viral article, 21 Things You May Not Know About the Indian Act is the essential guide to understanding the legal document and its repercussion on generations of Indigenous Peoples, written by a leading cultural sensitivity trainer.Since its creation in...
Talking back to the Indian Act : critical readings in settler colonial histories
Kelm, Mary-Ellen
Talking Back to the Indian Act is a comprehensive "how-to" guide for engaging with primary source documents. The intent of the book is to encourage readers to develop the skills necessary to converse with primary sources in more refined and profound ways. As a piece of legislation that is central...
The inconvenient Indian : a curious account of Native People in North America
King, Thomas
WINNER of the 2014 RBC Taylor Prize The Inconvenient Indian is at once a "history" and the complete subversion of a history--in short, a critical and personal meditation that the remarkable Thomas King has conducted over the past 50 years about what it means to be "Indian" in...
Goodbye Buffalo Bay
Loyie, Larry
Drama and humour combine in Goodbye Buffalo Bayby award-winning Cree author Larry Loyie. The sequel to the award-winning book As Long as the Rivers Flowand the award-finalist When the Spirits Dance, Goodbye Buffalo Bayis set during the author's teenaged years. In his last...
Residential schools : with the words and images of survivors
Loyie, Larry
For over a century, Canada removed more than 150,000 Aboriginal children from their families to attend church-run residential schools, often in remote locations far from home. This hidden history is told by award-winning author and former student Larry Loyie in Residential Schools, With the Words...
The sleeping giant awakens : genocide, Indian residential schools, and the challenge of conciliation
MacDonald, David Bruce
Confronting the truths of Canada's Indian residential school system has been likened to waking a sleeping giant. In The Sleeping Giant Awakens, David B. MacDonald uses genocide as an analytical tool to better understand Canada's past and present relationships between settlers and...
A call to action : an introduction to education, philosophy, and native North America
Malott, Curry
A Call to Action challenges current and future teachers to take seriously the philosophical implications of being an educator on land indigenous to a particular human group with both Native and non-Native students. Readers are introduced to the interrelated histories of education, philosophy,...
The reconciliation manifesto : recovering the land, rebuilding the economy
Manuel, Arthur
In this book, leading Indigenous rights activist Arthur Manuel offers a radical challenge to Canada and Canadians. He questions virtually everything non-Indigenous Canadians believe about their relationship with Indigenous peoples.The Reconciliation Manifesto documents how governments are attempting...
Unsettling Canada : a national wake-up call
Manuel, Arthur
Unsettling Canada, a Canadian bestseller, is built on a unique collaboration between two First Nations leaders, Arthur Manuel and Grand Chief Ron Derrickson. Both men have served as chiefs of their bands in the B.C. interior and both have gone on to establish important national and...
Arts of engagement : taking aesthetic action in and beyond the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada
Martin, Keith
Arts of Engagement focuses on the role that music, film, visual art, and Indigenous cultural practices play in and beyond Canada's Truth and Reconciliation Commission on Indian Residential Schools. Contributors here examine the impact of aesthetic and sensory experience in residential...
Cultivating Canada : reconciliation through the lens of cultural diversity
Mathur, Ashok.
Highway of Tears : a true story of racism, indifference, and the pursuit of justice for missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls
McDiarmid, Jessica
"These murder cases expose systemic problems... By examining each murder within the context of Indigenous identity and regional hardships, McDiarmid addresses these very issues, finding reasons to look for the deeper roots of each act of violence." --The New York Times Book Review
The education of Augie Merasty : a residential school memoir
Merasty, Joseph Auguste
The Education of Augie Merasty offers a courageous and intimate chronicle of life in a residential school. Now a retired fisherman and trapper, Joseph A. (Augie) Merasty was one of an estimated 150,000 First Nations, Inuit, and Metis children who were...
Up Ghost River : a chief's journey through the turbulent waters of Native history
Metatawabin, Edmund
A powerful, raw and eloquent memoir about the abuse former First Nations chief Edmund Metatawabin endured in residential school in the 1960s, the resulting trauma, and the spirit he rediscovered within himself and his community through traditional spirituality and knowledge. After...
In this together : fifteen stories of truth & reconciliation
Metcalfe-Chenail, Danielle
The release of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's (TRC) findings and recommendations in the spring of 2015 was an immensely important day for the people of Canada. It marked the hopeful beginning of change--a change of thinking, a change of opinion, a change in understanding. But how do...
Reconciliation from an indigenous perspective : weaving the web of life in the aftermath of residential schools
Michell, Herman
"'We are all Treaty People, ' and as Treaty People we are called to actin to reconcile the legacy left by the intentional system set in place to assimilate the 'Indian' into mainstream society -- the Residential School System. But what does that really look like? Reconciliation is not about fixing...
Canada and the aboriginal peoples, 1867-1927
Miller, J. R.
Compact, contract, covenant : Aboriginal treaty-making in Canada
Miller, J. R.
One of Canada's longest unresolved issues is the historical and present-day failure of the country's governments to recognize treaties made between Aboriginal peoples and the Crown. Compact, Contract, Covenant is renowned historian of Native-newcomer relations J.R. Miller's exploration and...
Lethal legacy : current native controversies in Canada
Miller, J. R.
Canadians greeted the disruptions in Native-newcomer relations that occasionally erupted during the 1990s with incomprehension. Politicians, journalists, and ordinary citizens understood neither how nor why the crisis of the moment had arisen, much less how its deep historical roots made it...
Reflections on native-newcomer relations : selected essays
Miller, J. R.
The twelve essays that make up Reflections on Native-Newcomer Relations illustrate the development in thought by one of Canada's leading scholars in the field of Native history - J.R. Miller. The collection, comprising pieces that were written over a period spanning nearly two decades,...
Residential schools and reconciliation : Canada confronts its history
Miller, J. R.
Since the 1980s, successive Canadian institutions and federal governments as well as Christian churches have attempted to grapple with the malignant legacy of residential schooling through official apologies, the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples, the Indian Residential Schools Settlement...
Skyscrapers hide the heavens : a history of Indian-white relations in Canada
Miller, J. R.
A comprehensive account of Indian-white relations throughout Canada's history. Miller charts the deterioration of the relationship from the initial, mutually beneficial contact in the fur trade to the current impasse.
Sweet promises : a reader on Indian-White relations in Canada
Miller, J. R.
In his earlier work, Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens, J.R. Miller explored the history of relations between whites and native peoples in Canada. Sweet Promises is a companion volume. It brings together the work of a number of scholars on a wide range of issues in Indian-white relations...
Picking up the pieces : residential school memories and the making of the Witness Blanket
Newman, Carey
"Will educate and enlighten Canadians for generations to come. It's a must-read for anyone seeking to understand Canada's residential-school saga. Most importantly, it's a touchstone of community for those survivors and their families still on the path to healing."--Waubgeshig Rice, journalist...
The Witness Blanket : truth, art and reconciliation
Newman, Carey
For more than 150 years, thousands of Indigenous children were taken from their families and sent to residential schools across Canada. Artist Carey Newman created the Witness Blanket to make sure that history is never forgotten. The Blanket is a living work of art--a collection of...
A reconciliation without recollection? : an investigation of the foundations of Aboriginal law in Canada
Nichols, Joshua
The current framework for reconciliation between Indigenous peoples and the Canadian state is based on the Supreme Court of Canada's acceptance of the Crown's assertion of sovereignty, legislative power, and underlying title. The basis of this assertion is a long-standing interpretation of...
Truth and indignation : Canada's Truth and Reconciliation Commission on Indian residential schools
Niezen, Ronald
The original edition of Truth and Indignation offered the first close and critical assessment of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) as it was unfolding. Niezen used testimonies, texts, and visual materials produced by the Commission as well as interviews with survivors, priests, and...
Genetic resources, justice, and reconciliation : Canada and global access and benefit sharing
Oguamanam, Chidi
When the oral history of a medicinal plant as a genetic resource is used to develop a blockbuster drug, how is the contribution of indigenous peoples recognized in research and commercialization? What other ethical, legal, and policy issues come into play? Is it accurate for countries to self...
No time to say goodbye : children's stories of Kuper Island Residential School
Olsen, Sylvia
No Time to Say Goodbyeis a fictional account of five children sent to aboriginal boarding school, based on the recollections of a number of Tsartlip First Nations people. These unforgettable children are taken by government agents from Tsartlip Day School to live at Kuper Island Residential School....
Emotions, remembering and feeling better : dealing with the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement in Canada
Reynaud, Anne-Marie
As the largest class action suit in Canadian history, the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement (2007-2015) had a great impact on the lives of Aboriginal survivors across Canada. In a rare account exploring survivor perspectives, Anne-Marie Reynaud considers the settlement's reconciliatory...
Sugar Falls : a residential school story
Robertson, David
Inspired by true events, this story of strength, family, and culture shares the awe-inspiring resilience of Elder Betty Ross. Abandoned as a young child, Betsy is adopted into a loving family. A few short years later, at the age of 8, everything changes. Betsy is taken away to a...
When we were alone
Robertson, David
Winner of the 2017 Governor General's Literary Award! A young girl notices things about her grandmother that make her curious. Why does her grandmother have long, braided hair and beautifully coloured clothing? Why does she speak Cree and spend so much time with her family? As the...
Speaking my truth : reflections on reconciliation & residential school
Rogers, Shelagh
Drawing from the Aboriginal Healing Foundation¿s three-volume series Truth and Reconciliation¿which comprises the titles From Truth to Reconciliation; Response, Responsibility, and Renewal; and Cultivating Canada¿acclaimed veteran broadcast-journalist and host of The Next Chapter on CBC Radio...
They called me number one : secrets and survival at an Indian residential school
Sellars, Bev
BC Book Prize, Non-Fiction, Bev Sellars, They Called Me Number One (Finalist) Burt Award for First Nations, Métis, and Inuit Literature: Bev Sellars, They Called Me Number One (Third Prize winner) Like thousands of Aboriginal children in Canada, and elsewhere in the colonized world,...
These are my words : the residential school diary of Violet Pesheens
Slipperjack, Ruby
Acclaimed author Ruby Slipperjack delivers a haunting novel about a 12-year-old girl's experience at a residential school in 1966. Violet Pesheens is struggling to adjust to her new life at residential school. She misses her Grandma; she has run-ins with Cree girls; at her "white" school,...
Moving beyond : understanding the impacts of residential school
Stonefish, Brent
Canada's Residential Schools : Reconciliation
Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada
Canada's Residential Schools : The History, Part 2, 1939 to 2000
Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada
Between 1867 and 2000, the Canadian government sent over 150,000 Aboriginal children to residential schools across the country. Government officials and missionaries agreed that in order to "civilize and Christianize" Aboriginal children, it was necessary to separate them from their parents and...
Canada's Residential Schools : The Legacy
Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada
Between 1867 and 2000, the Canadian government sent over 150,000 Aboriginal children to residential schools across the country. Government officials and missionaries agreed that in order to "civilize and Christianize" Aboriginal children, it was necessary to separate them from their parents and...
The history. Part 1, Origins to 1939
Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada
Between 1867 and 2000, the Canadian government sent over 150,000 Aboriginal children to residential schools across the country. Government officials and missionaries agreed that in order to "civilize and Christianize" Aboriginal children, it was necessary to separate them from their parents and...
The Inuit and Northern experience
Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada
The Me tis experience
Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada
Missing children and unmarked burials
Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada
Power through testimony : reframing residential schools in the age of reconciliation
Vanthuyne, Karine
Power through Testimony documents how survivors are remembering and reframing our understanding of residential schools in the wake of the 2007 Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), a forum for survivors, families, and communities to...
Amik loves school : a story of wisdom
Vermette, Katherena
Amik loves going to school, but when he shares this with his grandfather, he finds out Moshoom attended residential school. At Moshoom's school, students were forbidden from speaking their language. It sounds very different from Amik's school, so Amik has an idea... In this heartwarming...
Unbecoming nationalism : from commemoration to redress in Canada
Vosters, Helene
Canada's recent sesquicentennial celebrations were the latest in a long, steady progression of Canadian cultural memory projects. Unbecoming Nationalism investigates the power of commemorative performances in the production of nationalist narratives. Using "unbecoming" as a theoretical framework...
Indian Horse : a novel
Wagamese, Richard.
Saul Indian Horse has hit bottom. His last binge almost killed him, and now he's a reluctant resident in a treatment centre for alcoholics, surrounded by people he's sure will never understand him. But Saul wants peace, and he grudgingly comes to see that he'll find it only through telling his...
L'histoire du chandail orange
Webstad, Phyllis
Lorsque Phyllis Webstad (née Jack) a eu six ans, elle est allée au pensionnat pour la première fois. Pour sa première journée d'école, elle portait un chandail orange tout neuf que sa grand-mère lui avait acheté. À son arrivée à l'école, on le lui a enlevé, pour ne jamais le lui redonner. Voici la...
The orange shirt story
Webstad, Phyllis
The Orange Shirt Story was the best selling children's book in Canada for several weeks in September (Book manager). This true story also inspired the movement of Orange Shirt Day which could become a federal statuatory holidayWhen Phyllis Webstad (nee Jack) turned six, she went to the residential...
Tkwelkwlól̓tse te stektits̓e7 te slexey̓em
Webstad, Phyllis
When Phyllis Webstad (nee Jack) turned six, she went to the residential school for the first time. On her first day at school, she wore a shiny orange shirt that her Granny had bought for her, but when she got to the school, it was taken away from her and never returned. This is the true story of...
Beyond the Orange Shirt Story
Webstad, Phyllis.
Beyond the Orange Shirt Story is a unique collection of truths, as told by Phyllis Webstad's family and others, that will give readers an up-close look at what life was like before, during, and after their Residential School experiences. In this book, Survivors and Intergenerational Survivors share...
From the heart : how 100 Canadians created an unconventional theatre performance about reconciliation
Weigler, Will
Wawahte
Wells, Robert P.
Indian Residential School Survivors Society British Columbia, Canada For all the people who read this book may they be forever enlightened. By shining the light on a dark part of our past we have a chance to create a bright new day for aboriginals and all Canadians. We will all know what happened...
This benevolent experiment : Indigenous boarding schools, genocide, and redress in Canada and the United States
Woolford, Andrew John
A Choice Outstanding Academic Title, 2017   At the end of the nineteenth century, Indigenous boarding schools were touted as the means for solving the "Indian problem" in both the United States and Canada. With the goal of permanently...
Response, responsibility and renewal : Canada's truth and reconciliation journey
Younging, Gregory.

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