Buffy Sainte-Marie has been scrubbed out of an exhibit at the Canadian Museum for Human Rights because of questions surrounding the folk singer and activist’s claims of First Nations identity.
The Winnipeg-based national museum said in a statement to Radio-Canada Tuesday it has removed a profile of Sainte-Marie from an exhibit dedicated to human rights defenders.
The decision comes more than a year after an investigation by CBC’s The Fifth Estate raised questions about Sainte-Marie’s claims of Indigenous ancestry.
For many years, Sainte-Marie claimed she was born on the Piapot First Nation near Regina and is of Cree ancestry — claims contradicted by genealogical documentation, including her own birth certificate, historical research and personal accounts, the CBC investigation found.
The Fifth Estate‘s investigation — which aired in late 2023 — found a birth certificate showing she was born in 1941 in Massachusetts, listing her and her parents as white. The information on the certificate was corroborated by other documents.
Robert-Falcon Ouellette, a Winnipeg-based professor at the University of Ottawa and a former member of Parliament, said he was surprised it took so long to remove Sainte-Marie from the human rights museum exhibit after the revelations came to light.
“She lied on a continuous basis,” Ouellette said. “Not just a little bit, not a misunderstanding, but she purposely created a fog around her identity.”
The museum said the removal of Sainte-Marie’s profile took place in December, following consultations with advisers, colleagues and elders.
The exhibit, which is located in the museum’s “Rights Today” gallery, showcased Sainte-Marie’s career, and her use of music to advocate for change, it said.
Ouellette said the exhibit was very elaborate, but that it was full of falsehoods the museum and the rest of the world had accepted as truth.
“The exhibit [had] this photo of her singing to a crowd. The crowd is non-Indigenous peoples,” he said.
“She became essentially the ‘First Nations person,’ the ‘Indigenous person’ that America and Canada wanted …and sometimes, yes, you might have truths to say. But at the same time, she took the place of someone else.”
Sainte-Marie has been a guest at the museum through the years, and even performed during its opening ceremony in 2014.
The Fifth Estate reported her backstory and identity shifted throughout her career, saying she identified as Algonquin and Mi’kmaw before later saying she was Cree, adopted from a mother in Saskatchewan.
Sainte-Marie said shortly after the report aired the story was full of mistakes and omissions.
Governor General Mary Simon ordered the termination of Sainte-Marie’s Order of Canada in January. The decision was made public earlier this month.
Ouellette said the incident should give the museum an opportunity to address the issue of stolen Indigenous identity, suggesting the museum could replace it with something that explores those who pretend to be Indigenous for financial gain or other benefits.
“When someone comes along and takes those truths and purports to be more expert than Indigenous peoples, it’s extremely hurtful not only to the Indigenous people, but actually also to the Western society,” he said.
“It makes it harder for us then later on to repair that, because there is less trust.”
