The Afterlives of Terra Nullius: Unmarked Graves, Indigenous ‘Discoveries’, and Colonial After-Thoughts

Abstract

The 2021 discovery of the unmarked graves of Indigenous children by the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc First Nation on the grounds of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School in British Columbia revealed the brutal genocide at the heart of Canadian colonial rule. Canadian governments and the Catholic Church had sought to leave this issue buried, literally and figuratively, by asserting a modern form of terra nullius in positing that these and other residential schools were ‘empty lands’ in the sense that they did not contain the remains of Indigenous children, even as Indigenous nations knew the truth. This essay argues that these gruesome discoveries are evidence of the after-lives of terra nullius of modern settler colonialism, where Indigenous peoples’ deaths are a colonial after-thought in settler society, which leads to settler denials and avoidance of responsibility for the damage done. This colonial after-thought can be traced right on up to Pope Francis’ apology for the Church’s role in the schools. In resistance to the settler effort to produce Indigenous peoples as ontological absences, as colonial after-thoughts, nations such as the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc demonstrate the power of Indigenous resurgence through their persistence in nation and movement building.