Newcomer how Canada was named by mistake: Acknowledging this stolen land
By: Callum Denault
Published on: December 27th, 2024
Like any country, the story of how Canada got its name intertwines with its history, both good and bad. In fact, the names of several provinces and cities within Canada share a similar origin to how the country itself earned its title.
Oddly, the second largest nation in the world owes its name to a small village, according to the Canadian government. Jacques Cartier was a French explorer who ran into two Indigenous youths in 1535, who told him about the route to the village of Kanata, located in a place called Stadacona.
Cartier misunderstood the name of the village to also apply to the wider area of land controlled by the-Iroquois chief Donnacona. Ironically, Kanata is a word which itself means “village.” Before then, French settlers were thinking of the land they were colonizing as “New France,” before Cartier’s misappropriated Indigenous name stuck. Several places within Canada are also named after Indigenous words, usually with a much more accurate usage of their original meaning.
For instance, Quebec comes from the Algonquin for “narrow strait,” which is how settlers described the Saint Lawrence River they rode down to build Quebec City. Ontario—which means “sparkling water” in Iroquois—was originally considered part of Quebec, until the British declared it separate from Quebecois lands downstream the Ottawa River. Still, other names come from European languages, like Nova Scotia which is Latin for “New Scotland.”
In many cases, the names of Canadian places are a convenient description of what it looks like, spoken in the language of either Indigenous people or settlers. For instance, Toronto comes from Tkaronto, a Mohawk word for “shallow water where trees go,” while Montreal was named by Cartier, meaning “royal mountain” in his native French.
While naming Canada and its various regions after Indigenous words is arguably a good way to honour the country’s original inhabitants, these names were not picked by the people whose languages were barred by the settlers. Even though Ontario is an Iroquois word, it was white British colonizers who decided that word would be used to describe a large swath of land that fit their purposes. It was also the French Jacque Cartier whose misinterpretation of “Canada” became much more famous worldwide than what that word originally meant.
This is one of the reasons why land acknowledgements are important in modern Canadian culture. Land acknowledgements are short statements given before events in an attempt to remember Canada’s history of colonial genocide committed against Indigenous people. They became widespread after the Truth and Reconciliation Act of 2015, although their effectiveness varies based on how authentic and accurate each land acknowledgement truly is.
Some First Nations advocates do not have a problem with the idea of land acknowledgements, but do provide advice on how they could reach their goals. This advice includes stating that the land is stolen from Indigenous people—rather than portraying that as merely something that happened in the past—and doing proper research on Indigenous culture.
Many land acknowledgements list multiple names for the same tribe as if they are separate groups of people, or misinterpret treaty concepts into something they are not, such as portraying “the dish with one spoon” as a metaphor for multiculturalism. Debatably, this repeats the same mistakes Canada’s early colonizers made, in recycling Indigenous meaning to fit Western culture rather than truly understanding the people native to North America.
However, these past mistakes can be avoided by remembering them alongside the truth. It is just as important to remember what Kanata means in the Iroquois language, as what Canada means to non-Indigenous Canadians. To learn more about all the different places in Canada named after Indigenous words as well as the history behind their naming, check out this interactive map made by the Geographical Names Board of Canada.