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Just whose land is it anyway?
Jan. 23rd, 2025 03:23 pmThis land's not your land, this land's not my land,
Tho' I was born and live here, right on Turtle Island,
Does it really matter how and when we got here?
This land preceded you and me!
I think I was probably around 7 or 8 when I first heard either the Woody Guthrie original or a Canadian version of this song. At the time, I just assumed it to be some boring patriotic song that we had to sing at school or during camp singalongs. I don't recall ever going beyond the second verse in those days.
But I later realized, probably around the time that his son Arlo penned some more modern social commentary with songs like Alice's Restaurant Massacree and the Motorsickle Song, that This Land is Your Land was not quite the paean to the glorious greatness of America that I had naively believed it was. The later verses in particular point to a rather different narrative:
https://www.woodyguthrie.org/Lyrics/This_Land.htm
Does anyone know who wrote the Canadian lyrics? Or maybe there are several versions by several authors? Do all the verses have Canadian versions to them? I did find this site, providing some Canadian lyrics in both English and French. Offhand, I prefer the French ones as they at least give a token nod to the indigenous folk, sort of like the way we now begin public events with a land acknowledgement:
https://www.canadianspecific.ca/this-land-is-your-land/
Mind you, I'm not terribly fond of some of the current woke terminology we use either. Settlers? Colonizers? Are we to be forever branded by the sins of the fathers or the great-great-great grandparents?
But there's one thing I will readily concede. Although this land preceded you and me, it's up to us to do our best to curb our destructive habits and ensure it also follows us to nourish future generations.
Tho' I was born and live here, right on Turtle Island,
Does it really matter how and when we got here?
This land preceded you and me!
I think I was probably around 7 or 8 when I first heard either the Woody Guthrie original or a Canadian version of this song. At the time, I just assumed it to be some boring patriotic song that we had to sing at school or during camp singalongs. I don't recall ever going beyond the second verse in those days.
But I later realized, probably around the time that his son Arlo penned some more modern social commentary with songs like Alice's Restaurant Massacree and the Motorsickle Song, that This Land is Your Land was not quite the paean to the glorious greatness of America that I had naively believed it was. The later verses in particular point to a rather different narrative:
https://www.woodyguthrie.org/Lyrics/This_Land.htm
Does anyone know who wrote the Canadian lyrics? Or maybe there are several versions by several authors? Do all the verses have Canadian versions to them? I did find this site, providing some Canadian lyrics in both English and French. Offhand, I prefer the French ones as they at least give a token nod to the indigenous folk, sort of like the way we now begin public events with a land acknowledgement:
https://www.canadianspecific.ca/this-land-is-your-land/
Mind you, I'm not terribly fond of some of the current woke terminology we use either. Settlers? Colonizers? Are we to be forever branded by the sins of the fathers or the great-great-great grandparents?
But there's one thing I will readily concede. Although this land preceded you and me, it's up to us to do our best to curb our destructive habits and ensure it also follows us to nourish future generations.
