Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens: A History of Native-Newcomer Relations in Canada, Fourth Edition

First published in 1989, Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens continues to earn wide acclaim for its comprehensive account of Native-newcomer relations throughout Canada’s history. Author J.R. Miller charts the deterioration of the relationship from the initial, mutually beneficial contact in the fur trade to the current displacement and marginalization of the Indigenous population. The fourth edition of Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens is the result of considerable revision and expansion to incorporate current scholarship and developments over the past twenty years in federal government policy and Aboriginal political organization. It includes new information regarding political organization, land claims in the courts, public debates, as well as the haunting legacy of residential schools in Canada. Critical to Canadian university-level classes in history, Indigenous studies, sociology, education, and law, the fourth edition of Skyscrapers will be also be useful to journalists and lawyers, as well as leaders of organizations dealing with Indigenous issues. Not solely a text for specialists in post-secondary institutions, Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens explores the consequence of altered Native-newcomer relations, from cooperation to coercion, and the lasting legacy of this impasse.

Table of Contents:
Preface to the Fourth Edition Note on Terminology Preface to the Third Edition Preface to the First Edition INTRODUCTION 1 Indigenous Peoples and Europeans at the Time of Contact PART ONE: COOPERATION 2 Early Contacts in the Eastern Woodlands 3 Commercial Partnership and Mutual Benefit 4 Military Allies through a Century of Warfare PART TWO: COERCION 5 From Alliance to "Irrelevance" 6 Reserves, Residential Schools, and the Threat of Assimilation 7 The Commercial Frontier on the Western Plains 8 Contact, Commerce, and Christianity on the Pacific 9 Resistance in Red River and the Numbered Treaties: "Bounty and Benevolence" 10 The North-West Rebellion 11 The Policy of the Bible and the Plough 12 Residents and Transients in the North: Relations to the 1960s PART THREE: CONFRONTATION 13 The Beginnings of Political Organization 14 Land Claims and Self-Government from the White Paper to Guerin 15 Meech, Oka, Charlottetown, Nass, and Ottawa: Relations 1986-2000 PART FOUR: RECONCILIATION? 16 Relations in the Twenty-First Century 17 Do We Learn Anything from History? Notes Select Bibliography Illustration Credits Index Maps First Nations of Canada First Nations of northeastern North America at contact Iroquoia (showing height of land) The Ohio and Illinois Country, 1754 French possessions in North America, 1750 Effect of the Royal Proclamation of 1763 Location of western nations, 1821 First Nations of British Columbia The numbered treaties, 1871–1921 North-West Rebellion, 1885

About the Author :
J.R. Miller is a professor emeritus of history at the University of Saskatchewan. He is the author of numerous works on issues related to Indigenous peoples including Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens and Shingwauk’s Vision, both published by University of Toronto Press.

Review :
"If we learn anything from history it will be because of histories like Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens, which help put into perspective what Buffy Ste. Marie sings about as the ‘bitter past’ and give to Indian-white relations a sense of hope." - M.T. Kelly (Globe and Mail) "Drawing on recent scholarship, [Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens] is both broad and even-handed, covering developments in the Indigenous-settler relationship as it headed into the twenty-first century…." - Susan Neylan, Wilfred Laurier University (The Canadian Historical Review, Vol 100 1, March ‘19)