This is a working draft and will be modified as we receive
input from partners, collaborators, administrators, and others.
Vision
The goal of a National Research Centre is to take the truth of Canadian historical reality as a
learning tool to provide Canadians an opportunity to transform their differences into national
assets. – Residential school survivor and scholar Dr. Richard Atleo
The University of Manitoba recognizes the national significance of the Truth and Reconciliation
Commission’s task. As our recent apology indicates, we accept responsibility to be an active partner in
helping Canadians understand the Indian residential school legacy and move towards reconciliation. In
collaboration with Aboriginal organizations, we are committed to the sacred trust of archiving the
stories of residential school survivors and establishing a National Research Centre on residential schools.
The National Research Centre we envision will be a place for commemoration, learning and research by
residential school survivors and their families, scholars, students, teachers and members of the general
public. In addition to archives management and access, the University of Manitoba will provide display
space and social support for visitors, as well as encouraging indoor and outdoor ceremonial observance.
Prairie Architects has been commissioned to design an expansion to Migizii Agamik (Bald Eagle Lodge) to
accommodate the new National Research Centre and ensure it is a welcoming, respectful and accessible
place for research and community dialogue with Indigenous peoples from across Canada. Migizii Agamik
on our Fort Garry campus bursts with energy, reflecting the linguistic and cultural diversity that thrives
in Indigenous communities.
At the heart of the National Research Centre will be the records and testimonies of residential school
survivors. These records will form a unique participatory archive managed under professional
stewardship, using international standards of archival practice. Innovative digital technologies will
enable survivors and scholars to arrange and rearrange the archives so they can tell many stories: the
story of each residential school survivor, of particular families, of communities, of schools and of
regions. Digital collections will be made available online, subject to privacy, access and intellectual
property laws, as well as policies developed by the centre.
One of the university’s major priorities is “advancing Aboriginal education by providing students with
the tools they need to be successful and reinforcing the University of Manitoba’s role as a national
centre for Aboriginal scholarship” (University of Manitoba, Strategic Planning Framework, 2009-14). We
have more Indigenous students than any other university in Canada and we believe we are secondhighest in terms of the number of Indigenous faculty. The University of Manitoba has a decades-long
track record of innovation in Indigenous education and President David Barnard recently appointed an
executive lead for Indigenous achievement, Deborah Young.
The University of Manitoba’s history department already has one of Canada’s leading masters’-level
archival studies programs. It is developing a specialization in Aboriginal archiving, and has produced
ground-breaking research on Aboriginal participatory archiving and the use of digital technologies. The
University Archives has a full complement of professional and technical staff and state-of-the art
preservation facilities for digital and analog materials and it has significant Aboriginal holdings.
February 8, 2016
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This is a working draft and will be modified as we receive
input from partners, collaborators, administrators, and others.
The TRC archives would be a magnet to attract further Indigenous archives, which could either be cared
for at the University of Manitoba or remain in Indigenous communities with assistance, where needed,
from our professionals. A national Indigenous archiving program, centred at the U of M, would develop
a wider network of archival activity focusing on Indigenous materials, acquisitions, exhibits, online
access and educational tools. First Nations, Métis and Inuit people would participate in such archives,
including by training to become professional archivists. This archival work would greatly expand the new
knowledge base created by the TRC's archival work, helping fulfill its goal of reconciliation and societal
renewal.
We are developing networks with Aboriginal organizations, universities, other research institutions and
organizations holding mass atrocity archives across Canada and the world. These networks will engage
in archives-related work, collaborative research, and educational and public outreach activities. Our
networks already stretch from UBC on the west coast through University of Alberta and University of
Winnipeg on the Prairies to Lakehead University, and include two national organizations – the Canadian
Museum for Human Rights and the Legacy of Hope Foundation. Through these networks, we expect
community-based satellite sites and research nodes to be developed for enhanced regional access to
digital archives.
The National Research Centre will have a Governing Circle with members appointed by the University of
Manitoba and our partner Aboriginal organizations. The members will be predominately Indigenous and
include residential school survivors or their descendants. The Governing Circle will establish a Survivors
Circle, through which major decisions will be filtered. Committees will advise on matters such as
archives management and access, research, education and outreach. Everyone involved in the centre’s
work will be expected to respect the principles of community control of research and maintain the spirit
and intent of the TRC's work.
The University of Manitoba is the ideal institution for collecting and maintaining TRC materials because
of our location in the geographical center of Canada; our record of supporting high-quality and
accessible education for Indigenous students; our world-class research and archival expertise, our
association with Winnipeg’s new Canadian Museum for Human Rights and our proximity to the UNESCOdesignated Hudson’s Bay Company archives.
We already have an impressive record of public engagement on issues related to Indian residential
schools, truth and reconciliation, including: the survivor statement gathering project; the Prairie
Perspectives conference and legal question-and-answer table at the first TRC national event in Winnipeg
(2010); the Critical Conversations seminar series during the 2010-11 academic year; the upcoming
Where are the Children? exhibit (Feb. 2011) and the Colonial Genocide and Indigenous North America
workshop being planned for Sept. 2012.
Using evidence of the residential school experience, we want to create a living memory that animates
the process of healing, reconciliation, education and Indigenous community development. Our aim is to
stimulate an interaction with the past that enables personal and community renewal and well-being.
The story of the residential schools and this historic commission – supplemented over time by other
nationally significant Indigenous records – will inspire education, research and action. The words of the
survivors, carefully preserved in state-of-the-art facilities and made available to all through digital
technologies, will be their own best monument. Reconciliation can only occur if the truth is known.
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