Federal board investigating Alexander Graham Bell’s ‘controversial beliefs’
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Alexander Graham Bell is being investigated posthumously for his “controversial beliefs,” in response to data, Blacklock’s Reporter reported.
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A federal board is reviewing posthumous honours for Bell below a broad class of “controversial beliefs and behavior.” It outlined the reference as “views, actions and actions condemned by at the moment’s society.”
Bell died 100 years in the past. Sure Canadian landmarks just like the Halifax Citadel and Crowsnest Cross are additionally up for evaluate due to potential ties to “colonialism, patriarchy and racism,” in response to the report.
Bell’s Brantford, Ont. homestead was designated a nationwide historic web site in 1934. A park close to his Baddeck, N.S. summer time house was designated in 1959 and Bell himself in 1977 was honoured as a “nationwide historic particular person.” The Commons as late as 2002 unanimously handed a movement sponsored by then-Liberal MP Sheila Copps (Hamilton East, Ont.) that celebrated Bell as inventor of the phone, Blacklock’s mentioned.
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The Monuments Board didn’t clarify what “controversial beliefs” Bell held. The inventor in an 1883 essay Memoir Upon Formation Of A Deaf Selection Of The Human Race opposed marriage between deaf {couples}. He additionally opposed signal language and inspired the deaf to assimilate by studying lips. Each Bell’s mom and spouse had been listening to impaired.
Blacklock’s mentioned quite a few landmarks are below evaluate for “colonial assumptions.” The board defined the reference was to designations “from a very European perspective” together with the Halifax Citadel, Crowsnest Cross, Alberta’s Bar U Ranch, Ontario’s Algonquin Provincial Park and a 1924 designation marking “discovery of Prince Edward Island.”
