Article content continued

Geiger met with this newspaper to talk about the atlas on National Aboriginal Day.

Q: Can you explain the origin of the project?

A: Coming out of the truth and reconciliation process, we as an organization felt it was very, very important to take this seriously. Education is a very important part of the reconciliation process. It really began in an informal talk I had with Carolyn Bennett (minister of Crown-Indigenous Relations), who is a great lover of geography and a great lover of maps.

I didn’t at the time have a sense of what it would look like when it was finished — the idea that it would be four volumes instead of one was something that evolved out of the process. But one thing that was clear from the very beginning was that we needed to have Indigenous partners and the content had to be Indigenous led. This wasn’t the society trying to tell a story on behalf of Indigenous people, this would be a story as told by Indigenous people.

Q: How difficult was it to bring all of this information together from such a vast country?

A: It’s been an enormously challenging project. Fair to say it’s one of the most ambitious projects we’ve ever taken on as an organization. The depth of the content, the fact that there are various partners participating … they all have different stories and different experiences.

Q: What are you hoping that people who buy the atlas or download the app take away from it?

A: I hope this is a foundational document in the reconciliation process … and that it will be a resource for understanding. This is a magnificent story to tell of the incredible cultures that existed pre-European contact and the depth of these cultures and the beauty of them. I think this book really captures that. It’s going to help people understand why there are issues and help to bring all Canadians around the issue of reconciliation, which is one of the great issues of our time.