INUVIK - Stories of abuse and the negative effects from assimilation for residential school survivors will be heard next week when the Northern national event comes to Inuvik for four days.

John Banksland, an Inuvialuit elder from Ulukhaktok, spent 15 years in residential schools. He is a member of the survivors advisory committee for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. - Samantha Stokell/NNSL photo

John Banksland, an Inuvialuit elder originally from Ulukhaktok and living in Inuvik, attended the Immaculate Conception residential school in Aklavik for 11 years before attending Yellowknife's Akaitcho Hall for four. The hearings of the Truth and Reconciliation event will help survivors exorcise the abuse they received at the schools.

"There are a lot of survivors in their 60s, 70s, 80s, even 90s who have been carrying this around for years and years," Banksland said. "It's the negative stuff they've been carrying around and this is part of the healing process. It's a long process."

Banksland, 69, sits on the residential school survivor advisory board for the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. He was responsible in part for bringing the northern national event to Inuvik. The sheer number of schools and survivors in the region necessitated the larger event being held there.

Banksland compares his 15 years in residential schools to a life sentence. He does not remember ages five to 10, when he first attended residential school.

"They had to get rid of my language. I don't know what happened," he said. "The purpose was to kill the Indian in the child, up here the Eskimo. How do you reconcile a child who doesn't remember five to 10?"

Banksland still doesn't speak Inuvialuit, and has heard of other children having their mouths sewn shut after speaking their own language.

"The difference between residential schools and jail is that I would have been better treated in jail for 15 years," Banksland said. "There was real traumatic abuse children went through. Why were they so mean to us? People ended up committing suicide or they ended up on the streets. It wasn't a lovefest. It was pretty bad."

The results from residential schools continue on through generations, Banksland said. What people learned in school they pass ed on to their kids, resulting in attitudes about people, both aboriginal and non-aboriginal.

"We have to get all aboriginal people together; not take a harpoon to each other," Banksland said. "We are getting results, but we still have this burden, this crazy monkey on our back."

This event will allow people to share their stories and learn what experiences other people had, which will hopefully lead to reconciliation and understanding. An important part of the mandate, Banksland said, is that the event is not just for aboriginal people or survivors, but for all Canadians.

"This is our homeland and we were treated as second-class citizens. I was born in 1942 as a sub-human and for me to get a job I had to get an education without the consent of my parents," Banksland said.

For the survivors, the event will help them identify their own culture and traditions. The goal of the residential school was to "kill the Indian in the child," to complete assimilation of the people living in Canada before it became colonized. One example of the destroyed culture is the missing Gwich'in drum, he said.

"To this day the Inuvialuit and Dene have their drums, but the Gwich'in don't have a drum anymore. They have a fiddly guitar," Banksland said. "I can see that fiddling and dancing in the Highlands, in Scotland and England. We have to find the Gwich'in drum."

If the TRC achieves success, it could have implications across the entire country. It could affect social programs, health programs, the justice system. Once people know who they are and where they come from, they can have confidence and improved self-esteem in themselves which will lead to a stronger people, Banksland said.

"It is so necessary. We have an entire population stuck in this way of life that's not good for everybody. For example, why are there so many aboriginal people in jail when they make up a small percentage of the population?" he asked. "If it succeeds, we will start speaking to each other. We'll start putting down our fists and fighting back with words. That's the whole process of reconciliation."

The northern national event will happen in Inuvik from June 28 to July 1. Everyone is welcome to attend. For more information and a schedule visit www.trcnationalevents.ca.

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