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Who was Israel Wood Powell?

a man speaks next to a screen in front of a packed room

Examining the origins of settler colonial rule in British Columbia

Who was Israel Wood Powell and what is his legacy? To answer these questions, Dr. Sean Carleton examines Israel Wood Powell's tenure as BC's first Superintendent of Indian Affairs between 1872 and 1889. Carleton’s research explores Powell’s role in the development of the Province of British Columbia as a settler capitalist society in the late nineteenth century and the use of "schooling" as a tool of settler colonial rule.

Sean Carleton is a settler historian and Assistant Professor in the Departments of History and Indigenous Studies at the University of Manitoba. He is the author of Lessons in Legitimacy: Colonialism, Capitalism, and the Rise of State Schooling in British Columbia (UBC Press, 2020), which was awarded the Canadian Historical Association's Clio BC Book Prize.

His talk was hosted by VIU's tiwšɛmawtxʷ campus at the Powell River Public Library. 

Watch the presentation: 

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