Dictionary

maplewashing en · NOUN

Etymology

From maple + -wash + -ing, after the model of greenwashing etc. Reportedly coined by writer Luke Savage in 2016.

Meanings

1. (neologism, uncountable) The tendency for Canada and its history, culture, and politics to be idealized or sanitized, especially in relation to its neighbour the United States.
   • The 2016 election provided an especially becoming foil for Canada, whose history of "maple-washing"–sweeping unsavory aspects of its history and culture, like settler colonialism and genocide against Indigenous peoples, under the rug–was widespread even before such a handy distraction. 2022, Tajja Isen, Some of My Best Friends: And Other White Lies I've Been Told, unnumbered page:
   • Luke Savage is a Toronto writer and producer with the Broadbent Institute. He says "maple washing" needs to end. 2016 September 7, Melissa Mohr, “Maple washing: don't be smug about Canada during the U.S^([sic]) election”, in CBC News:
   • New stories are told to highlight the gaps, now visible, in settler narratives concerning photography’s extractive tendency and the role tourism plays in perpetuating what is increasingly called ‘maplewashing’, attempts to whitewash the settler history of what is now Canada. 2024, Frédéric Bigras-Burrogano, Jordan B. Kinder, “Crown Fossils: Extractive Museums, Authorized Narratives, Institutional Critique, and the Artist-as-Museologist”, in Museum & Society, volume 22, numbers 2-3, page 112:

Forms

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