Maybe this is irrelevant or "blindered," but I find it interesting how so much of native identity appears to be tied to the land itself. When I think of other cultural groups in Canada, they hold onto their identities through traditions they've brought with them. I realize these people often left their homes voluntarily, but not always; refugees come to mind. But Native claims are often based on traditional <hunting/burial/praying> grounds or the idea that a certain <plain/mountain/river> is home to a sacred spirit or things like that.
I guess other groups still have strong ties to physical locations (Abrahamic faiths, for one), but those are specific places tied to identifiable (quasi-)historical events. That doesn't seem to be the case here.
Europeans did some pretty inexcusable things trying to wipe the aboriginal culture form the face of the earth. And many of us are still doing things that are harmful, based on that history. So I'm not going to say "get over it." There's a lot of reparation due to natives as a group, if not individually. But it has to be based on reality, and the reality is that the "traditional" version of the land is gone, and we can't bring it back. We can try to help preserve what's left of the culture, and also help patch some of the wounds that are festering, but changing some road signs is not going to do that.
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