Aboriginal Tourism
The Niitsitapi (Blackfoot) from Siksika Nation, an hour east of Calgary, recently settled a 100-plus-year-old land claim, granting them compensation and rights to economic development in Banff [...]
Indigenous Culture
Indigenous Culture
Goodbye, Hobbema
“So,” says Pat Buffalo, “are you going to report what everybody else reports on—the shooting and the violence and all the stuff the media jumps on as soon as they hear it’s going on? Or are [...]
Coming Together
For well over a decade I’ve talked to Canadians about the issues Indigenous peoples face. I’ve challenged stereotypes and tried to build relationships that will get us beyond stubborn [...]
On Gifted Ground
This is just a wisp of a memory, of the Native man at the back door of our 1950s bungalow north of Alberta Avenue, in early January, carrying a pail full of frozen whitefish. He knew his [...]
On Sleeping Buffalo
It is the late 1980s and my daughter, smart from primary school, wants to see what many visitors to Banff National Park ask of guides in the mountain playground—to point out Tunnel Mountain’s [...]
By Don Hill
Our Human Rights Commission
In May 2007, a teenaged employee at a Lethbridge Tim Horton’s posted a sign near the drive-thru window that read “No Drunk Natives.” Tim Horton’s took the sign down and issued a statement [...]
Listening to Stones
It is a brilliant way to learn. Students of Socrates used to gather around the great man and exchange heady ideas that arose out of provocative questions—what we know now as the Socratic dialogue [...]
By Don Hill
Der Indianer
The first thing John Blackbird learned when he was growing up on the Canadian prairies was that his people were no good. Indians were history’s losers: dethroned, displaced, rounded up and [...]
Return to Blackfoot Crossing
Blackfoot Crossing, on the Bow River east of Calgary, is a site of great significance for the Siksika Nation. Here, in a broad and lush valley carved out of the soft prairie landscape, the [...]
MOST READ
MOST READ
Perpetual War
I have always tried to avoid getting into arguments with Alberta premiers. After all, as a journalist it’s my job to question politicians, not quarrel with them. But sometimes premiers seem to want to get into arguments with journalists.
In 2006, for example, I got into a verbal tussle with then-premier Ralph ...
Heritage Trust Fund
A decade ago, when Alberta was debt-free and staring at a $7.4-billion surplus, Premier Ralph Klein decided it was time to spread the wealth. He announced that every person who lived in the province—and, as it turned out, more than a few who didn’t—would receive a cheque for $400 as ...
Kenney’s First 100 Days
On August 7, 2019, Premier Jason Kenney gave a press conference announcing his government’s progress over its first 100 days—“promises made, promises kept.” There’s no magic in “The First 100 Days.” It’s an arbitrary construct used by the media and political observers to measure how a new political leader is ...