Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Canadian Truth And Reconciliation Commission: Healing, Reconciliation, Resolution?, Jessica K. Howsam

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

This thesis assesses the Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), which was created to redress the legacy of the Indian Residential Schools system. Using discourse analysis, it examines the commission’s success in promoting holistic healing within Aboriginal communities and reconciliation as decolonization of settler society and government. This thesis argues that the TRC promoted individual, communal, and cultural healing despite government rhetoric supporting premature termination of healing processes. Although it remains too soon to evaluate the Canadian TRC’s effect on decolonization, this thesis contends that the commission has not yet advanced reconciliation. As of the publication of this thesis in …