Alberta curriculum to include study of internment operations (11/19/00)

Alberta curriculum to include study of internment operations

CALGARY - Some blank pages of Canadian history are about to be filled in. The Ukrainian Canadian Civil Liberties Association has announced that materials dealing with Canada's first national internment operations will be included in the Alberta's Grade 10 social studies curriculum.

Under the internment operations of 1914-1920 a total of 8,579 people, including men, women and children, and even some Canadian-born and naturalized British subjects, were imprisoned in 24 concentration camps across Canada as "enemy aliens." Several major camps were found in Alberta, including the Cave and Basin and Castle Mountain sites in Banff National Park, Lethbridge, and Jasper National Park.

Other discriminatory measures included the confiscation of some of the internees' property, forced conscription of their labor and disenfranchisement.

Japanese and Italian Canadians were interned, also under the terms of The War Measures Act, during the second world war.

UCCLA member Craig Mahovsky stated: "We believe this episode in Canadian history must not be forgotten. As educators it is crucial that we teach our students how racism has impacted on many different Canadian ethnic, religious and racial minorities, even so-called invisible ones."

"Including information about Canada's first national internment operations in the Alberta schools," he continued, "will help provide educators and our students with a relevant example by drawing on our own national experience. And that will allow us all to reflect on basic notions of justice, citizenship and historical memory, hopefully helping to ensure that no other minority in Canada ever again suffers as Ukrainians once did."

The UCCLA expressed gratitude to to Mark Hlady, member of the Legislative Assembly for Calgary Mountain-View, for helping to ensure that this story will now be taught in our schools. "We are also particularly moved by his continuing efforts to ensure that information about the genocidal Great Famine of 1932-1933 in Soviet Ukraine is someday also part of the mandated learning experience for Alberta's students. Too few Canadians appreciate how destructive Stalinism was in Ukraine, or know about the millions murdered during the artificial famine and the terror," added Mr. Mahovsky.

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