Anthropology in the Service of the State: Diamond Jenness and Canadian Indian Policy

• Published in: Journal of Canadian Studies
• Main Author: Kulchyski, Peter
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: University of Toronto Press Inc. (UTPress) 1993
• Subjects: History; Cultural Studies; Arctic; Canada; Indian
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.3138/jcs.28.2.21; https://utpjournals.press/doi/pdf/10.3138/jcs.28.2.21

Diamond Jenness, one of the pre-eminent ethnologists of Canadian aboriginal people, was a vocal critic of Canadian Indian policy. This critical appraisal of Jenness’s life work argues that there was a structural complicity between Jenness and the State. Jenness’s testimony in 1947 before the Special Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons, set up to review Indian administration and policy, as well as Jenness’s explicit policy writings, are examined to illustrate this complicity. As well, a critique of Jenness’s writings, particularly The Indians of Canada and the newly published Arctic Odyssey: The Diary of Diamond Jenness, is developed to illustrate how Jenness provided ideological support for and justification of state policy towards aboriginal Canadians.