Commentary
Since the media release by the Kamloops Indian Band on May 27, 2021, about “the confirmation of the remains of 215 children [buried in unmarked graves] who were students of the Kamloops Indian Residential School,” similar announcements across the country have come fast and furious.
The news stories and unabated attention devoted to unmarked graves and missing students quickly accelerated after the Trudeau government’s announcement on Aug. 10, 2021, of $320 million “in additional support [on top of the millions already promised] for Indigenous-led, Survivor-centric and culturally sensitive initiatives and investments to help Indigenous communities respond to and heal from the ongoing impacts of residential schools,” including “to research and locate burial sites as well as to commemorate and memorialize the children who died at residential schools.”…