What I Learned This Year

One of the main things I learned this year is that Aboriginals have hundreds of stereo types. Along with living on reserves that offer them nothing, natives are constantly struggling to be accepted. Aboriginals cant even leave the reserves because the rest of the world will not live or work with them due to the stereotypes that have been put on them.  This semester has shown me that a lot of these stereotypes are false. Yes its a fact that reserves do have a higher percentage of alcoholics, but that does not mean that every native is like that. Also Natives are know as being lazy or dumb, but simply due to stereotypes, people wont give them a chance to get a job, so some don't even try. These few individuals make their culture look lazy. For the people who think they are dumb, Natives may appear this way simply because most cannot get to a school or if they do they are bullied out of it. So they are not as "book smart" as we may be but they are not dumb. Before this class I never even knew of the Native reserve issue that we are having in Canada. This class opened my eyes to the struggle any Native must go through everyday just to live in Canada.