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features CONTENTS
42
THE TRIBAL CANOE JOURNEY
COVER: THOMAS FRICKE/CAN GEO. THIS PAGE: JULIAN BRAVE NOISECAT
An odyssey to reclaim tradition and territory Story and photography by Julian Brave NoiseCat
65 THE SURVIVORS CIRCLE
Six members of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation’s Survivors Circle and one member of its Governing Circle share glimpses of their residential school experiences As told to Alanna Mitchell
48 THE INUIT FUTURE
Natan Obed, president of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, on the idea of a nation-to-nation relationship, Canada’s Inuit homelands and the role of Inuit in the world Interview by Aaron Kylie
54 THE MÉTIS HOMELAND
How to define the territory of a people barred from claiming land of their own? By Michel Hogue
ON THE COVER One of the faces on the bentwood box that was used during the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s mandate to hold objects symbolizing the journey toward healing.
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
5
departments CONTENTS
24 DISCOVERY
16 18
BIG PICTURE Celebrating Canada’s grandeur
EXPOSURE Showcasing Can Geo’s photo club
IN A SNAP Sharing Can Geo via Instagram
33
POLAR BLOG
34
ON THE MAP
Char trackers
Exploring cartography Bonus: Pull-out Indigenous languages poster, with essay by Wade Davis
21
INTERVIEW Ry Moran, director of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation
24
WILDLIFE A caribou lifeline, saving Nova Scotian snakes, birchbark oil benefits and more
26
HISTORY How Indigenous Peoples helped Champlain map New France
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30
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PLACE Eight settlements in Alberta are still the only recognized Métis land base in Canada
76 YOUR SOCIETY
INFOGRAPHIC The real story of Nuvumiutaq, an Inuit ancestor from northern Baffin Island
81
NEXT ISSUE
82
OUR COUNTRY
News from The Royal Canadian Geographical Society
74 YOUR SPACE COMMENT Your feedback WHAT’S THIS? Recognize this mystery object?
January/February 2018, Canadian Geographic celebrates the nationconnecting Great Trail
Cree singer-songwriter Buffy Sainte-Marie on Saskatchewan’s beautiful Qu’Appelle Valley
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: PAUL COLANGELO/CAN GEO; ADAM SHOALTS; CHRIS BRACKLEY/CAN GEO
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digital
CONTENTS
STORIES OF SURVIVAL Read Alanna Mitchell’s reflections on the process of interviewing the six members of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation’s Survivors Circle about their experiences in residential schools.
cangeo.ca/nd17/survivors
CANOEING FOR CREDIT Learn about an innovative experiential education course that teaches Indigenous youth from northern Ontario about water safety and leadership while they travel traditional canoe routes.
cangeo.ca/nd17/matawa
Take Canadian Geographic wherever you go, while also accessing bonus videos and photos with the digital issue for tablets.
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MAPPING MÉTIS SETTLEMENTS
CONNECT WITH US ONLINE
In 1938, Alberta passed an act setting aside land specifically for Métis people — the only province to do so. Explore an interactive map of the eight Métis settlements and learn more about each one.
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on a ship, but these experiences allow you to explore even farther, to have more freedom. When we sailed into Bonne Bay by Gros Morne National Park, we used stand-up paddleboards to get up close to a waterfall. That sort of flexibility gives you an experience you just can’t get on a cruise with 5,000 other people.
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on a plane and started my journey to Canada’s East Coast, I knew a little about the region — major cities, landmarks, national parks, those sorts of things — but I’d never been there. The “Fins and Fiddles” trip with One Ocean Expeditions changed that, obviously, but in the most unexpectedly amazing and rewarding ways. I was looking forward to going to Sable Island, even though I expected it to be nothing more than a sandbar. But it was far more than that. The sheer amount of wildlife on the island blew me away, from the world’s largest breeding colony of grey seals to birds such as the roseate tern, and the horses, of course — you can’t see horses like that anywhere else on the planet. I think part of what made stopping in places such as Sable Island, the Magdalen Islands and Gros Morne National Park so memorable was the variety of ways I was able to explore them. I got to learn about and see the incredibly diverse landscapes, wildlife and cultures of the region while biking, hiking, kayaking, stand-up paddleboarding and going on Zodiac cruises. Yes, you’re
EDITOR’S NOTEBOOK
ADVENTURES See us at canadiangeographic.ca
The journey
H
HOW DO YOU distil 15,000-plus years of history into one magazine? You can’t. In this Indigenous-themed issue, we’re giving readers a slice of Canadian Indigenous experiences and hoping to inspire you to discover much more yourself. Those experiences comprise thousands of perspectives and numerous cultural heritages, so the stories here are as individual as you and I. In this time of truth and reconciliation, it’s critical that non-Indigenous Canadians learn more about the past and present of the First Nations, Inuit and Métis whose traditional lands we occupy. When the Truth and Reconciliation Commission presented its report in Ottawa on June 2, 2015, commission chair senator Murray Sinclair said: “We have described for you a mountain. We have shown you the path to the top. We call upon you to do the climbing.” He was clearly speaking of the commission’s 94 recommendations and directly to the gathered politicians. Still, all of us should heed his message. For your climb, we offer these stories, from an interview with Natan Obed, president of the national Inuit representational organization Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (page 48), to defining the Métis homeland (page 54), from highlighting an annual First Nations canoe journey (page 42, above), to profiles of the members of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation’s Survivors Circle (page 65) and more. After these, please keep climbing. —Aaron Kylie
150 objects. 2 magazines. 1 issue.
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JULIAN BRAVE NOISECAT
To comment, please visit cangeo.ca or email editor@canadiangeographic.ca. For inside details on the magazine and other news, follow editor Aaron Kylie on Twitter (@aaronkylie).
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DR. WADE DAVIS is one of Canada’s great storytellers, and has been described as a rare combination of scientist, scholar, poet and passionate defender of all of life’s diversity. An author of 20 books, including One River, The Wayfinders, The Sacred Headwaters, Into the Silence and River Notes, he is also known for his stunning photography, which has been widely published and celebrated in exhibits. A recipient of the RCGS Gold Medal and the Explorers Club Medal, Wade was made a Member of the Order of Canada in 2016 and currently serves as Honorary Vice-President of the RCGS.
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The Spirit Of The Arctic. We have so much to share with you! Experience history through majestic landscapes, gaze at wildlife found nowhere else on earth and immerse yourself in the authentic Inuit culture. Discover the Spirit of the Arctic. www.DestinationNunavut.ca
PHOTO BY RYAN DICKIE A wood bison saunters along the Liard Highway, which connects northeast British Columbia to the Northwest Territories. Endemic to Western Canada’s boreal and aspen forests, wood bison populations went from historical estimates of nearly 170,000 to just 200 in 1957. Today there are more than 2,800 in the wild, thanks largely to reintroduction programs. The species was long an important source of food, clothing and other materials for boreal First Nations. Visit photoclub.cangeo.ca/photooftheweek to see the best of recent images submitted to Canadian Geographic’s Photo Club.
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CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2017
big picture CELEBRATING CANADA’S GRANDEUR
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
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exposure SHOWCASING CAN GEO’S PHOTO CLUB
PHOTO BY DAVID HO Susie Evyagotailak tends to a qulliq in an igloo in Kugluktuk, Nunavut. Such oil lamps — traditionally fuelled by seal oil or blubber soaked into a wick of Arctic cottongrass collected during the summer — served as the sole source of light and heat in igloos for thousands of years. Tending a qulliq through long Arctic winter nights demands careful attention and practice. Join Canadian Geographic’s Photo Club for a chance to have your photography featured in this space. Visit photoclub.cangeo.ca.
in a snap
INSTAGRAM CHALLENGE: “THE GREAT TRAIL” This issue’s In a snap features three Indigenous photographers making waves on Instagram. January/February’s theme is “The Great Trail.” Hit your local section of the trail and tag your best shots with #ShareCanGeo!
SHARING CAN GEO VIA INSTAGRAM @photolaliberte Amanda Laliberte, Victoria
T’lisalagi’lakw School Christmas concert Alert Bay, B.C.
“Alan’s hands” Alert Bay, B.C.
A raven over St. Michael’s Indian Residential School Alert Bay, B.C.
C.J., a traditional Mi’kmaq drummer/dancer Cavendish, P.E.I.
Aurora borealis Prince Edward Island National Park
@trishab223 Patricia Bourque, Charlottetown
Kindra, a Mi’kmaq jingle dress dancer Wood Islands, P.E.I.
@carla_lewis_photography Carla Lewis, Wet’suwet’en First Nation, B.C.
Nadina Mountain Wet’suwet’en First Nation, B.C.
François Lake in winter Wet’suwet’en First Nation, B.C.
Hereditary chiefs Wet’suwet’en First Nation, B.C.
Check out the Canadian Geographic Instagram page at instagram.com/cangeo or share your photos with us using the hashtag #ShareCanGeo. 18
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DISCOVERY INTERVIEW
Ry Moran The director of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation looks ahead to Canada’s bicentennial
Ry Moran at the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg.
INTERVIEW BY ALEXANDRA POPE
I THOMAS FRICKE/CAN GEO
In an opinion piece published by the CBC in December 2016, Ry Moran wrote that he hoped Canada’s 150th year would mark a turning point in the country’s relationship with its Indigenous Peoples. As director of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, Moran has a challenging mandate: ensure that both Indigenous and non-Indigenous people in Canada can access the often painful truth of our shared history, so that we can move forward in mutual respect and understanding. Here, as the sesquicentennial celebrations draw to a close and Canada looks ahead to its next 50 years, Moran reflects on the progress we’ve made — and how far we’ve yet to go. On the inclusion of Indigenous perspectives in Canada 150 There have been strong efforts made to include Indigenous voices in the conversation about our history this year. I went to the opening of the new Canadian History Hall
at the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, and Indigenous Peoples and perspectives are now much more prevalent. That exhibition also covers things such as residential schools and the Sixties Scoop, which is really positive. But there was a lot of other stuff happening that was not fully reflective of the much longer history Indigenous Peoples have on this land. I think we need to look at 2017 as a starting point on this journey of reconciliation. On coming to terms with the truth When we talk about truth and reconciliation, we’re talking about providing a voice to Indigenous people who have been marginalized. Change is inherently uncomfortable, but I think that as a country, we need to become much more comfortable with discomfort. We need to find a degree of peace hearing messages that perhaps we don’t want to hear or don’t understand. And we need to try to create the spaces within ourselves, within our
society, within our organizations and institutions, within public discourse, for these uncomfortable truths to emerge. On the debate surrounding the removal of monuments and renaming of public buildings We have to remember that what we’re trying to do with reconciliation is create safe places. Indigenous Peoples’ safety has been affected by this colonial experiment that we’ve called Canada, and we have to think about what those historical figures represent now that this truth is coming out. How does it feel for an Indigenous child who walks into a school that’s named for Sir John A. Macdonald — somebody who oversaw the destruction of his or her ancestors’ culture, identity and livelihood, whose intent was to eliminate Indigenous Peoples from this country? It’s a sign of the process of maturation that we’re going through as a country that we’re able to have a much CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
21
The bentwood box, which held offerings commemorating personal journeys toward reconciliation during the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s mandate.
On the need for an Indigenous geography of Canada It’s interesting how many places in Canada recall or evoke really specifically British memories and realities. We have to remember that is a very recent layer that has been imposed upon this land. It’s not like once upon a time people went around naming mountains and rivers after individuals; there were meaningful descriptors embedded within the names that helped to give shape and identity to where we live and to our relationship to the land. We’ve got this kind of national narrative that people
“discovered” this place, and we pretend for a second that all of these mountains and all of these lakes didn’t already have names, that the land was devoid of people and connections. But the reality is there’s a much deeper, much older narrative. On his hopes for Canada in 2067 I hope we’ll have seen a fundamental shift in the level of understanding of Indigenous Peoples and their histories and perspectives. I also hope that society will have really
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recognized the harmful effects of colonization and the traumas that have been wrought upon Indigenous Peoples, and that we will have taken serious steps to heal those traumas. For Indigenous Peoples themselves, I’m hopeful that we’ll have seen enough of the right kind of support provided to communities, nations and individuals so that healing work is really able to occur. Read an extended version of this interview at cangeo.ca/nd17/reconciliation.
THOMAS FRICKE/CAN GEO
deeper conversation about these figures and decide whether these are the types of people that we actually want representing us.
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DISCOVERY WILDLIFE
A CARIBOU COMMITMENT Canada’s declining population of boreal caribou was thrown a potential lifeline in July when the federal government released its proposed plan to help protect the threatened species. Carl McLean, deputy minister of lands and natural resources for the Nunatsiavut government in Labrador, welcomed the news, saying the decline “has really devastated all of our communities, and trying to fill the void has been challenging.”
SNAKE SAVERS
‘It’s not good for the environment, the food that we eat and the water that we potentially want to drink.’ Madeleine Redfern, mayor of Iqaluit, describes the effect that decades-old debris and hazardous material near the city has had on residents. In July, Transport Canada awarded an Iqaluit company a $5.4-million contract to clean up the site, which was used as a dumping ground when the U.S. Air Force closed its Frobisher Bay Air Base in 1963.
$120 MILLION THE AMOUNT members of the Northwest Territories Métis Nation want the federal government to put into a trust fund as compensation for hunting revenue that was lost after almost 2,000 Métis were involuntarily removed from Wood Buffalo National Park shortly after its creation in 1922. Read the latest wildlife stories at cangeo.ca/topic/wildlife. 24
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NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
‘One gram is three times
more expensive than gold.’
Matthias Bierenstiel, an associate professor of chemistry at Cape Breton University explains the value of birchbark oil to the CBC. Bierenstiel and his colleague Tuma Young, an assistant professor of Indigenous studies who is Mi’kmaq, were recently awarded $150,000 by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research to study how the oil can be used to treat skin conditions such as psoriasis. Part of their research involves finding more efficient ways to produce the oil, which Indigenous groups have long valued for its anti-inflammatory properties.
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: MATHIEU DUMOND/CAN GEO PHOTO CLUB; AVALON_STUDIO/ISTOCK; PAUL COLANGELO/CAN GEO; ERIKA SQUIRES/CAN GEO PHOTO CLUB
Nova Scotia’s Acadia First Nation and the Canadian Wildlife Service are developing a conservation plan for the threatened Atlantic population of the eastern ribbon snake, marking the first time in Atlantic Canada that the government agency has collaborated with an Indigenous community to protect critical habitat for a species at risk on a reserve. It’s estimated that there are between 4,000 and 9,000 of the semiaquatic reptiles in the province, mostly around the Wildcat and Ponhook Lake Mi’kmaq reserves.
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Episode Three: Commemorating the Battle of Vimy Ridge The past and the present dramatically come together during the 100th Anniversary celebrations of the Battle of Vimy Ridge in Vimy, France. See it on the Cable Public Affairs Channel (CPAC) on December 22 and 26 A Nation Soars episodes viewable anytime at cpac.ca/anationsoars
at 9 PM.
DISCOVERY HISTORY
Champlain’s cartographic debt The unheralded role Indigenous Peoples played in helping the famous explorer map New France By Harry Wilson*
I
“I HAD MUCH conversation with them regarding the source of the great river and regarding their country … they spoke to me of these things in great detail, showing me by drawings all the places they had visited, taking pleasure in telling me about them.” —Samuel de Champlain, Les Voyages, 1613 HE MAY HAVE been one of the greatest explorers and cartographers of his era, but Samuel de Champlain didn’t hesitate to give credit where it was due. He certainly does so in the passage above, which describes how the Huron people helped him navigate the wilds of New France and, ultimately, create maps such as the one shown here, Champlain’s first detailed depiction of the territory and one of the first to illustrate parts of the Great Lakes. European explorers relying on Indigenous geographic knowledge wasn’t a new tactic. During Jacques Cartier’s voyage of 1541-42, for instance, Iroquois guides used sticks and twigs to show him the course of the St. Lawrence River and the location of rapids and waterfalls. But Champlain counted on Indigenous expertise like no other white man had. Whatever his motivations were — colonial glory, commercial riches, conversion of the “savages” to Christianity — Champlain knew that “the way to overcome physical obstacles to exploration was to become accepted by the Native people and learn to proceed with their help,” as Conrad Heidenreich notes in The Beginnings of French Exploration out of the St. Lawrence Valley: Motives, Methods, and Changing Attitudes towards Native People. Doing so included adopting the use of the birchbark canoe (Champlain shot the Lachine Rapids with Indigenous companions in 1613, an event alluded to in the painting shown opposite) and asking endless questions. For example, much of what 26
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
is shown along the St. Lawrence River west of the Lachine Rapids (labelled as “grand sault”) on this map he gleaned not from personal experience but from Indigenous accounts in 1603 — accounts that also contained descriptions of Lake Ontario and what could have been either
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
Lake Erie or a composite of other Great Lakes. Champlain included both bodies of water on his map and illustrated each with manned canoes, noting the time it would take to cross the former — “15 Journees des canaux des sauvages” — and the length of the latter — “300 lieux de long.”
Champlain’s descriptions of how his Indigenous companions had continued to enlighten him. As he writes in Les Voyages, “I was not weary of listening to them, because some things were cleared up about which I had been in doubt until they enlightened me.”
MAP: SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN, CARTE GEOGRAPHIQUE DE LA NOUVELLE FRANSE FAICTTE PAR LE SIEUR DE CHAMPLAIN SAINT TONGOIS CAPPITAINE ORDINAIRE POUR LE ROY EN LA MARINE. FAICT LEN 1612, 1612, LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA, E010764733; PAINTING: [CHAMPLAIN IN AN INDIAN CANOE], J.H. DE RINZY, C 1897-1930, LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA, C013320K
Were these and other delineations on the map imperfect? Of course — but that hardly seems to matter now. What’s more thought-provoking today is the spirit in which the information was shared, and whether Canadians can find some reconciliation-era wisdom in
* with files from Isabelle Charron, early cartographic archivist, Library and Archives Canada Read more stories about the maps in Library and Archives Canada’s collection at cangeo.ca/topic/map-archive. CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
27
DISCOVERY PLACE
Land of their own Eight settlements in Alberta are still the only recognized Métis land base in Canada Paddle PaddlePrairie Prairie Métis MétisSettlement Settlement
By Stephanie Cram
Fort Fort McMurray McMurray
A AL LB BE ER RT TA A
Peavine Peavine Métis MétisSettlement Settlement Grande Grande Prairie Prairie
Gift GiftLake Lake Métis MétisSettlement Settlement
East EastPrairie Prairie Métis MétisSettlement Settlement Buffalo BuffaloLake Lake Métis MétisSettlement Settlement
Kikino KikinoMétis Métis Settlement Settlement
Elizabeth ElizabethMétis MétisSettlement Settlement Fishing FishingLake LakeMétis MétisSettlement Settlement Fort Saskatchewan Fort Saskatchewan EDMONTON EDMONTON
Harold Blyan, the vice-chairman of Alberta's Buffalo Lake Métis Settlement, looks out over the water near his home.
THERE ISN’T MUCH to see along the stretch of Highway 855 about 150 kilometres northeast of Edmonton other than trees, tarmac and a sign welcoming you to a type of community that doesn’t exist anywhere else in Canada but Alberta. “Welcome to the Buffalo Lake Metis Settlement,” it says, with no mention that along with seven other settlements scattered across northern Alberta — East Prairie, Elizabeth, Fishing Lake, Gift Lake, Kikino, Paddle Prairie and Peavine — it makes up the country’s only recognized Métis land base, which with an area of 512,121 hectares is only slightly smaller than Prince Edward Island. That this is the case would probably surprise most Canadians, given the prominence of Manitoba and Saskatchewan (site of the Red River and Northwest resistances, respectively) in Métis history. But it’s Alberta and not its Prairie siblings, British Columbia, the Northwest Territories or Ontario (all of which are considered part of the Métis homeland) that has set aside land for a people who have long been without any.
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At the beginning of the 20th century and in the wake of the failed Northwest Resistance of 1885, Métis across the Prairies had trouble finding a place to call home. They weren’t permitted to live on First Nation reserves, and many felt they didn’t belong in cities. They resorted to squatting on Crown land set aside for roads and railways, creating makeshift settlements known as Road Allowance communities. Recognizing that the living conditions in these communities were not ideal, in 1938 the government of Alberta passed the Métis Population Betterment Act, which set aside land for Métis. The settlements helped preserve the traditional Métis way of life, which includes hunting, fishing, trapping and berry picking, says Gerald Cunningham, president of the Metis Settlements General Council, the governing authority for the eight communities and the body that holds the title to the land (an arrangement unlike the one between First Nations and the Crown, which holds title to reserve lands). Even though the eight settlements remain connected through the council,
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
Cunningham says the history of each is unique. Buffalo Lake, for instance, was established in 1951 with the intent to provide land for Métis veterans of the First World War and Second World War. Since then, Buffalo Lake has come a long way. Harold Blyan, vice-chairman of the community’s council, recalls arriving as a four-year-old with his family in 1966. “There was just one gravel road, which came in from Caslan,” he says. “From there, there were just wagon trails that went out in different directions.” Blyan says that living in Buffalo Lake now is no different than city living — “We have Wi-Fi and cable TV,” he jokes — but he and his fellow Métis know that the settlements are about much more than modern conveniences. “Without land, you will never have local autonomy and self-reliance,” says Cunningham. “Without land, you won’t have a place you can call home. See an interactive map of all eight Métis settlements in Alberta at cangeo.ca/nd17/metis.
AMBER BRACKEN/CAN GEO; MAP: CHRIS BRACKLEY/CAN GEO
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DISCOVERY INFOGRAPHIC
Nuvumiutaq By Nick Walker
A
Archeologists found his remains in a stone cairn on northern Baffin Island in 1959 and, as would never be done today, they took them south for study and storage. The Inuit Heritage Trust is now leading the repatriation of this Thule man’s 800-year-old bones and belongings from the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Que., to his homeland, but in the meantime, the people of Arctic Bay, Nunavut, the museum and a French forensic artist have worked together to create this lifelike figure of what he looked like. Given the name Nuvumiutaq (simply, “person from the peninsula”) by Arctic Bay elders, he now stands in the museum’s new Canadian History Hall. Around the time he hunted in the waters off northern Baffin Island, Crusades began and ended in the eastern Mediterranean and Genghis rose to power as Great Khan of the Mongols. European sails would not appear in the Northwest Passage for another four centuries. Read on to find out how forensics, traditional knowledge and clues left by Nuvumiutaq himself came together to give this Inuit ancestor new life.
BONES The formation and tendon attachments of Nuvumiutaq’s clavicle, scapula, wrist and leg bones are consistent with those of a frequent, skilled kayaker, and it’s evident that he regularly carried a heavy weight in his elevated left hand (a harpoon). He would have hunted caribou that had been driven into the water from his kayak, and bowhead whales and possibly narwhal from a larger craft called an umiak.
WALKING STICK That Nuvumiutaq would have depended on a walking stick is an educated guess. His bones show multiple signs of trauma, from whiplash and back injuries to broken ribs (possibly having been struck by a whale’s tail while hunting), and one ankle never had the opportunity to knit.
Abc
Teachers! Bring this and other science innovations into your classroom by visiting cangeoeducation.ca/resources.
Original name Unknown Died circa AD 1200 Approximate age 40 Height 157.5–162.5 cm. (5'2"–5'4") Home Today’s Borden Peninsula and surroundings, near Arctic Bay, Baffin Island Craft Hunter, kayaker Culture Thule, direct ancestors of modern Inuit; occupied Arctic Canada AD 1000-1600
HEAD AND BODY No actual remains were used in the exhibit, of course, and out of respect, Nuvumiutaq’s bones were handled as little as possible during analysis and laser scanning. Elizabeth Daynès, a renowned forensic artist in France, built his face using a 3D-printed skull provided by the museum, and developed with the Arctic Bay community a visage that made him “look proud, looking out on the land, remembering his past.”
CLOTHING Seamstress Olayuk Kigutikakjuk of Arctic Bay sewed the traditional sealskin parka (Arctic spring and summer wear) from the skins of four ringed seals.
THE BOW DRILL In the toolkit buried with Nuvumiutaq was a walrus-ivory bow drill, used to bore holes or start fires by pulling a hide string back and forth to spin a drill shaft (the replica shown here is relative to his height). Etched into it are potentially autobiographical scenes, including kayaking, bow hunting and caribou, sex, people with walking sticks and children.
NUVUMIUTAQ AND BOW DRILL IMAGES: CANADIAN MUSEUM OF HISTORY; BACKGROUND PHOTO: MICHELLE VALBERG
How the Canadian Museum of History and the community of Arctic Bay are telling the real story of an Inuit ancestor
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THE POL A R B L OG
Char trackers HOW RESEARCHERS AND LOCALS IN CAMBRIDGE BAY, NUNAVUT, ARE KEEPING THE STAPLE ARCTIC FISH HEALTHY BY JOHN BENNETT
J JEAN-SÉBASTIEN MOORE
JEAN-SÉBASTIEN MOORE knows firsthand that building relationships with Inuit communities can be key to successful research in the Arctic. The biologist from Quebec City’s Université Laval collaborates with a Fisheries and Oceans Canada team and Cambridge Bay locals to track the behaviour of migrating Arctic char around southeast Victoria Island, Nunavut, using acoustic transmitters and genetic data. The project, which is supported by Polar Knowledge Canada (POLAR) and its Canadian High Arctic Research Station campus, is of keen interest to the community. People in Cambridge Bay depend on Arctic char for food and operate a small commercial fishery that’s an important part of the local economy. “Our goal,” says Moore, “is to provide information that will help keep the subsistence and commercial char fisheries healthy well into the future.”
Moore implants tiny transmitters into the char that send acoustic signals to floating receivers, telling him where the fish go and how their behaviour changes from year to year. If they’re poorly placed, these instruments won’t receive signals, but, he explains, local experts have guided the research team to excellent locations that would otherwise never have been considered. “We’ve learned that in the ocean the char follow the coastline, stopping for a while at each estuary. That means that in the event of an environmental emergency like an oil spill from a ship, those areas need immediate protection.” Fishery managers have long assumed that char winter along their natal rivers where they spawn every few years. But by using genomics to identify the natal rivers of individual fish, Moore and his colleagues have discovered that in years when they don’t spawn, char from a wide area swim
Jack Omilgoetuk (left) and Les Harris of DFO at a sampling site on the Ekalluk River north of Cambridge Bay, Nunavut, where they will implant char with acoustic transmitters.
up a short river to Ferguson Lake (Tahiryuaq) to winter, rather than up the longer rivers to their spawning grounds. Moore speculates that they do this to save energy by travelling a shorter distance when they’re not spawning. That knowledge is important in managing the fishery and developing quotas for individual rivers that reflect how the fish actually behave. Cooperation with Cambridge Bay residents continues to be essential to the research, says Moore, who in 2016 had the opportunity to learn from local experts at Iqaluktuuq, a fishing site west of the hamlet that Inuit have used for centuries. There, during a knowledge exchange camp supported in part by POLAR, elders fished with and passed generations of expertise on to local young people. “Arctic char is ingrained in their lives,” says Moore. “It’s food, community, culture, home, survival and history.”
This is the latest in a blog series on polar issues and research (cangeo.ca/blog/polarblog) presented by Canadian Geographic and Polar Knowledge Canada, a Government of Canada agency with a mandate to advance Canada’s knowledge of the Arctic and strengthen Canadian leadership in polar science and technology. Learn more at canada.ca/en/polar-knowledge. CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
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THE
NORTHERN LIGHTS IN CHURCHILL, MANITOBA
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THE NORTHERN LIGHTS, according to an Inuit legend, are the ancestors playing football with a walrus skull. In Norse mythology, the glimmering lights are the spears, armor and helmets of the Valkyries. There are countless stories around the world of these otherworldly lights that hang like fluorescent curtains in the night sky, and the real phenomenon behind the northern lights, or aurora borealis, is just as awe-inspiring. High-energy particles stream out from the sun toward Earth and collide with gases in the atmosphere to create the brilliant green, yellow and purple bands of light. Churchill, Man., is one of the best places in the world to see this amazing display. Situated beneath the Auroral Oval, a band of activity in the atmosphere circling each of Earth’s poles, Churchill sees the northern lights an impressive 300 days per year, with the best chances of seeing them from January to April. Here are some of the best ways to view the northern lights in Churchill.
AURORA LOUNGE Take in the northern lights from panoramic wall-to-ceiling windows in the Aurora Lounge, the newest train-car style lounge from Frontiers North Adventures located at the edge of Churchill’s boreal forest. Once the lights really start to dazzle, snap a photo from the rooftop observation deck. Food lovers will enjoy the Northern Lights and Winter Nights package, which includes an evening at RAW:churchill (ABOVE), a transparent pop-up restaurant within the walls of a 300-year-old fort. Enjoy a meal prepared by one of Canada’s top chefs as the northern lights dance overhead. frontiersnorth.com
AURORA DOMES Natural Habitat Adventures offers two options for northern lights gazers. Aurora Domes are bubble-like structures made of clear Plexiglass positioned in complete darkness outside of town. Guests relax on sofas in the dome or step up to the upper level for an unimpeded circular view of the night sky. nathab.com
ADVERTORIAL
TOP: DAN HARPER; BOTTOM, LEFT TO RIGHT: HANDCRAFT CREATIVE; BRAD JOSEPHS; ALEXANDER DE VRIES; COURTESY CHURCHILL NORTHERN STUDIES CENTRE
VIA RAIL DOME CAR Discover the romance of the rails on VIA Rail’s Tundra Train, where a glass-domed observation car lets passengers gaze at the aurora borealis at night, and panoramic views reveal the picturesque landscape during the day. The train runs from Winnipeg to Churchill and passes through three distinct biomes as it journeys north: the sprawling plains, boreal forest and subarctic tundra. Guests may even catch a glimpse of the northern lights from the window of their private sleeper accommodation. viarail.ca
AURORA POD The Aurora Pod, the second offering on tours by Natural Habitat Adventures, is the newest innovation in accessibility and luxury. Custom built by Great White Bear Tours, the heated structure features a geometric glass construction and comes equipped with reclining chairs for a comfortable, 360-degree view of the northern lights. Located just outside Churchill, photographers have the option of enjoying the dancing lights from inside the Aurora Pod or capturing the spectacular display in the open air. nathab.com
LEARNING VACATION Astronomers and physicists have long visited Churchill to study space, so there’s no better place to learn more about this amazing phenomenon than one of the aurora borealis learning vacations offered by the Churchill Northern Studies Centre. During the five-day stay at the centre, guests can marvel at the aurora borealis from a heated viewing dome while an instructor explains the science behind it. churchillscience.ca
YOUR NORTHERN ADVENTURE STARTS HERE
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©Simon Gee/Canukimages.com
©Eric Lindberg
For over 30 years Frontiers North has been offering expert-guided journeys in Churchill, Manitoba that celebrate the wildlife, history, and culture of this part of Canada’s incredible north. Join us on an inspiring adventure in the beautiful north, where polar bears roam and spar right outside your window, beluga whales sing and swim by the hundreds, the northern lights dance across the night sky, and the vast tundra surrounds you as far as the eye can see. Contact us today to learn more about these unique experiences that will leave you in awe of the beauty of Canada’s north. CONTACT US TODAY: Info@frontiersnorth.com
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T h e l o c a l H O S P I TA L I T Y E X T E N D S WELL BEYOND t h e s h o r e l i n e .
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NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
THE
TRIBAL CANOE
JOURNEY An odyssey to reclaim tradition and territory STORY AND PHOTOGRAPHY BY JULIAN BRAVE NOISECAT
A traditional Indigenous glwa, an oceangoing canoe, departs Stz’uminus First Nation waters in British Columbia en route to Snuneymuxw First Nation territory during the 2017 Tribal Canoe Journey. CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
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M
Y ALARM SOUNDS at 3:45 a.m. — so early it might be considered night. There’s only one bed in my dad’s rental cottage in Shelton, Wash., so when I visit, we choose sides. I roll over, smacking him with my forearm, waking him, too. I have work to do. At 6 a.m., the Quinault Nation’s oceangoing canoe is setting out to sea on the Tribal Canoe Journey, an annual trans-national Indigenous voyage and gathering in the Pacific Northwest. Of 87 participating canoes, the Quinault were scheduled to voyage farthest, and I want to cover their departure. Their reservation is two hours’ drive west of my dad’s place on the Olympic Peninsula, so we need to get on the road. I haven’t communicated my early departure imperative to my father clearly enough. As I hop into my jeans, he ambles into the kitchen to put on a pot of coffee, then into the bathroom to lather his face and shave his stubble. While I march out to the car, my ears catch the familiar flick of the lighter followed by a deep inhale as dad sparks a one-hitter. My dad is an artist — carver, sculptor, printmaker, magician — suffering from 44
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chronic back pain. Marijuana, legal in Washington, stokes his imagination and soothes his pain. “We are going to be late!” I tell him. By the time we leave at 4:15 a.m., I am thoroughly exasperated. I am wrong. We barrel down backwoods highways, pulling up to the Quinault launch point with time to spare. For two years running, the canoe journey has brought my father and me together, reminding us of who and how we love, and what it means to be Indigenous men. For the last two years, we’ve joined the Squaxin Island Canoe Family on this remarkable voyage. Squaxin Island is just one of dozens of communities that participate in the canoe journey. Every year since 1993, canoe families have departed from home waters throughout the Pacific Northwest on a collective odyssey to reclaim tradition and territory. This year, our journey had begun on July 17 at Arcadia Point, Wash. — traditional territory of the Squaxin Island Tribe — and ends dozens of days and hundreds of kilometres later in the waters of the Wei Wai Kum First Nation in Campbell River, B.C. For the two of us, honoured to be welcomed by our Squaxin Island relatives, these journeys are both personal and political.
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I GET SOME OF my best material from the trip on the Quinault reservation that morning of July 18. As the lone Quinault canoe prepares to set out to sea just below Point Grenville, I listen to Harold Curley, an elder and direct descendant of legendary Chief Taholah, who signed the 1855 Quinault Treaty establishing this reservation. “Did you hear the story of the Spaniards coming out here in a great big battle ship?” he asks, looking out to sea. In 1775, the Spanish Empire sent a two-ship expedition from Mexico captained by Basque explorer Bruno de Heceta to claim the Pacific Northwest over British, Russian and French rivals. The Spanish came ashore at this beach in Quinault territory on July 12 that year — a summer day just like this one — becoming the first Europeans to set foot in what is now Washington state. “What happened is they came here, and there was nine Indians who was up there cooking crabs and clams,” he explains, gesturing at Point Grenville. “They invited [the Spanish] in, but they didn’t want to eat. Instead, they went over here and planted a cross in the name of King Carlos III.” According to the Spanish, Quinault territory was now part of Mexico and the Kingdom of Spain. According to the
TRIBAL CANOE JOURNEY Port Simpson July 16
Tribal Journeys 2017 Northern B.C. and northern Vancouver Island Inside Passage (Puget Sound) Outside coast Washington state B.C. Lower Mainland West coast Vancouver Island Southern Vancouver Island and San Juan Overnight stop
BRITISH COLUMBIA CAMPBELL RIVER August 5
Kyuquot July 14
Nanoose Bay July 31 Vancouver
Pacific
Tsawout July 26 Victoria
Ocean
0
150 km
MAP: CHRIS BRACKLEY/CAN GEO
Quinault July 18
Quinault, this territory is, and always has been, jurisdiction of the Quinault Indian Nation. “The next morning, [the Spanish] came in and they went off chopping wood to fix a broken mast,” he continues. “So, they sent in a johnboat, and the narrator [a crewmember who logged the day’s events] on that ship (there were about two or three narrators in each ship) said that there was 300 savages came out of the woods and came on them and then [the Spanish] tried to chase them away by shooting the cannons and everything, and they just seen their seven men lost.” The Spanish named the point at the end of the beach “Punta de los Martires” (Point of the Martyrs), after their fallen compatriots. Bruno de Heceta never again visited Quinault territory. “I have two cannonballs at home from that johnboat,” says Curley, Julian Brave NoiseCat is a member of the Canim Lake Band Tsq’escen in British Columbia. His writing regularly appears in The Guardian and numerous other media outlets.
pausing to let the weight of this littleknown history sink in — two cannonballs fired at his ancestors on this very beach. “Ain’t that something?” As I took in Curley’s remarkable story — in which the Spaniards failed and his family passed on cannonballs that missed their targets like souvenirs, I saw my dad out of the corner of my eye, standing proud — and a little stoned.
The canoe journey has brought my father and me together, reminding us of what it means to be Indigenous men. MY FATHER’S FRIEND Frank Brown from Bella Bella is a trickster, of sorts. According to ancient oral histories of the Pacific Northwest, the world was born from curiosity and mischief. Raven stole the sun, moon, stars and water from Creator. Coyote’s schemes turned the land and coyote himself from supernatural to worldly. As these tricksters
Lummi July 23
Swinomish July 21 WASHINGTON Seattle Squaxin Island July 17
Wei Wai Kum council members (opposite) welcome journey participants in Campbell River, B.C. K’ómoks dancers perform for the canoeists near Courtenay, B.C. (above).
wandered the Earth looking for food, treasure and love, propelling change and finding trouble, they made our planet into what it is today. These stories are mostly characterized as legends or fables — thereby infantilizing them. But I think they are better understood as metaphors, offering poetic theses about who changes society and the planet, and how. In a world shaped by Hollywood narratives (the Rebels blow up the Death Star, the Avengers save the world), trickster stories offer explanations that are complicated, ambiguous and often ironic. Change happens through actions intentional and coincidental, clever and lucky, noble and cunning. Changemakers stand at the edge of one world, forming the next from whatever is at hand — especially pilfered materials. While Brown and my father were young bucks running the streets of Vancouver, Brown organized the first CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
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symbolic canoe journey as part of Expo 86, Year of the World’s Indigenous People. annihilation that bent his body and spirit the world’s fair in Vancouver that coin- The gathering, thereafter known as the into permanent defensive pride, has a cided with the city’s centennial. In 1984, Tribal Canoe Journey, has been held warrior’s heart. He is 5'10", but in these moments, even as his 57-year-old frame Brown, a college student working at the every year since. “The people of the coast have fades, his presence is much taller. Vancouver Aboriginal Friendship Centre, Our bodies are failing — my father’s received a request from the city’s mayor embraced the vessel as an empowering for native participation in the exposition. tool in our process of decolonization,” from decades of carving hulking tree Brown jumped at the opportunity. Expo says Brown. “However, it does not come trunks and downing thousands of bottles, wasn’t about revitalizing native culture, without a challenge, and that’s what our mine from a bad case of coxsackievirus, young people need: to challenge them- with accompanying flu-like symptoms, but Brown was. “My interest was to represent ourselves, selves through thinking through, and that landed me in the emergency room to show the first form of transportation and working through, the process of getting just a few days prior — but our spirits are unyielding. The skipper calls out 100, 200, communication on the coast,” says Brown. from one destination to another.” then 300 “power pulls” — hard, “And for us, that was the glwa, or prayerful strokes, to muscle our oceangoing canoe.” crew of 11 through the rough Post-Expo, the idea continued ‘My interest was to represent waters of the narrows and the to spread. In 1989, the late hard knocks of life. Despite collecEmmett Oliver of the Quinault ourselves, to show the first tive struggle, our canoe barely proNation organized the Paddle to gresses. Dad swears in pain and Seattle to ensure native represenform of transportation and frustration. After 500 power pulls, tation during Washington state’s centennial. Ironically, twice it was communication on the coast. ’ we stop counting altogether and break into song. the celebration of a century of “Wi-la, Wi-la, Wi-la-wi!” our colonial settlement that provided the platform for a resurgence of OUR SKIPPER GUIDES the canoe’s young pacesetter calls out from the bow. “He-yo!” we respond from the stern. Indigenous canoes. I think of these his- bow into the onrushing white waters of “Hu! Hu! Hu!” After 20 minutes of torical moments as Thanksgivings in Dodd’s Narrows, a treacherous coastal reverse — Indigenous people appropriat- bottleneck between Vancouver Island backbreaking work, we pull through the far ing colonial celebrations to bring back and Gabriola Island just south of side of the narrows. Along the voyage, crews sing paddle traditional life-ways and reclaim connec- Nanaimo, B.C. My father braces his foot against mine songs, new and old, to keep rhythm and tions to ancestral lands. In 1993, Brown’s home community of and leans forward, poised to charge into uplift spirit. After each long day of pulling Bella Bella hosted the first annual battle against the mighty Salish Sea. Dad, under the summer sun, canoes, support Qatuwas, or “people gathering together,” veteran of rez fisticuffs, inheritor of a boats and road crews stop to visit with in conjunction with the International centuries-long resistance against their hosts, rekindling connections that 46
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NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
TRIBAL CANOE JOURNEY Wei Wai Kum dancers perform the holy Hamatsa for journey guests (opposite). Elder Harold Curley (far right) and other Quinault tribal members form a prayer circle near Point Grenville, Wash. (left).
criss-cross the Northwest, extending north and south, to the inland and out onto the sea, like the warp and weft of the traditional cedar bark hats the pullers wear on the water. It takes days and even weeks of paddling across hundreds of kilometres of ocean for the canoes to reach each year’s final port-of-call in early August. There, the participants celebrate with a week of potlatch singing, dancing, feasting and giveaways. Contrast this with the modern world that is habituated to jets, trains, ships and automobiles, where travel is solo or in small groups with little labour entailed. Spaces traversed are liminal, sometimes termed “fly-over country.” The destination is is what matters. If you need to get from point A to point B, buy a ticket or fill up the tank, grab a bag and go. The traditional oceangoing canoe, meanwhile, is a communal vessel. Groups work together to fell and carve old-growth cedar, ideal for a hull. Generations of master carvers have finetuned the canoe’s dynamic form. Meticulous craft and care go into burning the log hollow and shaping it with an adze. Every year, dozens of hands come together to carry watercraft to the sea. Teams of pullers paddling in unison pilot their way through churning tides, crashing waves and swift currents to traverse the coastal
Both of my father’s parents were sent to residential schools. He was born in a residential school hospital and spent his childhood bouncing from one home to the next. He has lived a life of intergenerational trauma, struggling to be a father. His absence from my childhood left me — the next generation — with an enduring wound where a parent should have been. Yet despite persistent efforts to stamp out Indigenous cultures and communities — to make my grandparents and my father forget who they are — today, Indigenous people such as me are born seascape that connects ocean to continent into a world where the beauty and power of who we are is embraced. In the Pacific and past to future. “This canoe movement is the most sig- Northwest, the canoe is central to this nificant gathering of Indigenous Peoples resurgence. It brings communities together to paddle ancestral waterways. in the Americas today,” says Brown. “What it does is it endears [our territo- It challenges elders and youth to revive ries] into the hearts of our young people so old songs and dances and compose new that when it comes time and they’re called ones so they can paddle onto their neighupon to stand up for those resources that bours’ shores, proudly singing-in the we depend on, and that environment, then spirits of our ancestors. In an age of digithe community has a very strong ethic and tal relationships, it brings families a value and a commitment, because they’re together to celebrate and work through troubles. It reintroduces people to water practising the lifestyle.” in an elemental way, reminding us that water sustains life. This is a messy process. It’s not ‘This canoe movement a weekly church service. After genthe most significant gathering erations of colonial trauma, native families and communities have serious issues to work through over of Indigenous Peoples in early morning canoe departures, cannonballs that memorialize our the Americas today.’ trickster past and marijuana bowls that signify our painful present. NOT LONG AGO, generations of But if we rise to the challenge and learn Indigenous children were abducted to live and work together again, the resurand incarcerated in residential schools. gence of Indigenous values and teachings Their languages and cultures were just might carry transformative potential quite literally beaten out of them in for a world hurtling toward ecological an organized effort to “kill the Indian disaster. We are the progeny of tricksters, in the child.” At the same time, after all. And this is how tricksters Indigenous cultural and spiritual gath- change the world. erings were outlawed under the potlatch ban in 1886, which remained in See more images from the 2017 Tribal Canoe effect until 1951. Journey at cangeo.ca/nd17/canoe. CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
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Natan Obed is president of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, the national organization that advocates for the people of Inuit Nunangat and works to preserve Inuit language and culture. 48
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
The Inuit future Natan Obed, president of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, on the idea of a nation-to-nation relationship, Canada’s Inuit homelands and the role of Inuit in the world INTERVIEW BY AARON KYLIE
I
N LATE AUGUST, Natan Obed, president of the national Inuit representational organization Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, joined Catherine McKenna, the minister of environment and climate change, on her visit to the Nunatsiavut region of northern Labrador and Torngat Mountains National Park. Obed, who grew up in Nain, the administrative capital of the Labrador Inuit region, helped tour the minister around the area, showing her signs of climate change and explaining the success of the park’s cooperative management board, representatives of which claim is the country’s only such all-Indigenous body. Canadian Geographic was invited to join the tour and conducted the following interview with Obed from a rocky beach at the end of North Arm, Saglek Fiord, in the park.
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Quttinirpaaq tinirpaaq N.P.
On trying to establish a nation-to-nation relationship with Administrative capital the federal government The relationship we have with the current federal govern500 km ment is better than it has been with previous governments 0 with respect to access. Our ability to talk directly to ministers or to talk directly to the prime minister is impressive, and there have been tangible commitments. For example, the Inuit-Crown Declaration [a commitment for the federal government and Inuit to work together on shared priorities that affect Inuit, signed in February 2017], the Inuit-Crown U k i u q t a q t u u p I m a n g a Arctic Ocean Partnership Committee — which has on it four federal ᐅ ᑭ ᐅ ᖅᑕᖅᑑᑉ ᐃᒪᖕᒐ ministers, the prime minister, our land-claim president and myself, and which creates joint priority areas and works to implement them — and the intent to create an Indigenous language legislation. We are about halfway through the federal mandate, and we are getting a little bit I N U V I A nervous about the huge amount of work that we need to ᐃ ᓅ ᕕ ᐊ do to realize the things we’ve all said we’d do together. But I am also still optimistic. I want to believe that this governIkaahuk Sachs Harbour ment is going to follow through, is going to do what it says, ᐃᑳᓱᒃ especially in relation to Inuit and other Indigenous people, but there’s still a lot of work to do to show that their action Ivvavik N.P. Tuktuuyaqtuq Tuktuuyaqtuq Tuktoyaktuk Tuktoyaktuk mirrors their intent. ᑐᒃᑑᔭᖅᑑᖅ On relationships with federal ministers Vuntut N.P. Aklarvik It’s essential. In order to do work with governments, you Aklavik ᐊᒃᖥᕕᒃ have to do work with people, and the personalities of our ministers differ and their interest in Inuit differ. I’d like to spend time with the prime minister in Inuit Nunangat [Canada’s Inuit regions]. I think that Minister Bennett [Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs] should spend more time in Inuit Nunangat. Minister Philpott [ former health minister, current minister of Indigenous Services] has spent time in Nunavik and had been scheduled to come to Hebron, N.L. We do have good relationships withY U K O N the Crown at this point in time. I’m really happy for those relationships. I’m still pushing for these to transfer into tangible outcomes and actions that we’ve been hoping for for decades — to implement the rights that we already have or to fill in gaps in infrastructure or program funding or legislative scope that we’ve always tried to advocate for within Inuit Nunangat. On communication between Inuit and the minister of environment and climate change There are a lot of ministers that wouldn’t understand our lands, our way of life, our language or our challenges — and who wouldn’t want to. Minister McKenna has wanted to learn and also asks the tough questions after she learns why things aren’t the way that she thought they were or learns ways that we can 50
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INUUVIK INUVIK ᐃᓅᕕᒃ
Paulatuuq Paulatuk ᐸᐅᓚᑑᖅ
I N U I T Qausuittuq Qausui tuq N.P.
Qausuittuq Resolute ᖃᐅᓱᐃᑦᑐᖅ
Aulavik N.P. Aul
L U I T ᓗ ᐃ ᑦ Ulukhaktok ᐅᓗᒃᓴᖅᑑᖅ
Tuktut uktut Nogait N.P.
Ikaluktutiak Cambridge ambridge Bay ᐃᖃᓗᒃᑑᑦᑎᐊᖅ
Umingmaktuk Umingmaktuuq ᐅᒥᖕᒪᒃᑐᖅ
Kugluktuk ᖁᕐᓗᖅᑐᖅ
Kingauk Bathurst Inlet ᕐᑭᖓᐅᒃ
E S T N O R T H W
I E S T O R T E R R I
‘We cover 35 per cent of Canada’s landmass with our land claim agreements. We are also affected by climate change in a much more profound way than most of the country.’
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Ausuittuq Grise Fiord ᐊᐅᓱᐃᑦᑐᖅ
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Kangiqtugaapik Clyde River ᑲᖏᖅᑐᒑᐱᒃ
Qikiqtarjuaq ᕿᑭᖅᑕᕐᔪᐊᖅ
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Mittimatalik Pond Inlet ᒥᑦᑎᒪᑕᓕᒃ
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Salluit ᓴᓪᓗᐃᑦ
Ivujivik ᐃᕗᔨᕕᒃ Akulivik ᐊᑯᓕᕕᒃ Puvirnituq ᐳᕕᕐᓂᑐᖅ
Igluligaarjuk Chesterfield Inlet ᐃᒡᓗᓕᒑᕐᔪᒃ
Inujjuak Inukjuak ᐃᓄᔾᔪᐊᖅ
Kangiqliniq Rankin Inlet ᑲᖏᖅᖠᓂᖅ
Ta s i u j a r j u a q Hudson Bay ᑕᓯᐅᔭᕐᔪᐊᖅ
Sanikiluaq ᓴᓂᑭᓗᐊᖅ
Arviat ᐊᕐᕕᐊᑦ
PREVIOUS SPREAD: ITK/ADAM SCOTTI. THIS SPREAD, MAP: CHRIS BRACKLEY/CAN GEO
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UN D AN LAN D D LA BR AD
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Kangirsujuaq Kangiqsujuaq ᑲᖕᒋᕐᓱᔪᐊᖅ
Kikiak Aqvituq Qipuqqaq Rigolet Hopedale Postville ᑭᑭᐊᒃ ᐊᖅᕕᑐᖅ ᕐᑭᐳᖅᑲᖅ
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Kinngait Cape ape Dorset ᑭᙵᐃᑦ
NUNAJNGUK NAIN ᓄᓇᐃᖕᒍᒃ Kangiqsualujjuaq ᑲᖕᒋᖅᓱᐊᓗᔾᔪᐊᖅ
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ᓄ ᓇ A T S I A V U ᑦ Marruuvik ᑦ ᓯ ᐊ ᕗ Makkovik
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Killiniq ᑭᓪᓕᓂᖅ
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improve our relationship. Ultimately, it comes down to action. It’s good to have a strong relationship with a person who is trying to figure out how to implement these truly massive federal environmental responsibilities across Canada. We cover 35 per cent of Canada’s landmass with our land claim agreements. We are also affected by climate change in a much more profound way than most of the country because the Arctic is warming at a higher rate than the rest of Canada.
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Uqsuqtuuq Gjoa Haven ᐅᖅᓱᖅᑑᖅ
Sanirajak Hall Beach ᓴᓂᕋᔭᒃ
Panniqtuuq Pangnirtung ᐸᓐᓂᖅᑑᖅ
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ᐃ ᓄ ᐃ Aᑦ Talurjuaq T alurjuaq T Taloyoak aloyoak ᑕᓗᕐᔪᐊᕐᒃ
a se
Sirmilik N.P.
Ikpiarjuk Arctic Bay ᐃᒃᐱᐊᕐᔪᒃ
O
On the importance of visiting Inuit Nunangat I think it’s really important that people who make decisions about these lands come to them. That’s the major reason why I pushed for Minister McKenna to visit the park — to meet the people who are affected by the decisions made by the Government of Canada in this place and to understand the connection that we have to the land. The way the Government of Canada has thought about protection, thought about its control over decision-making, CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
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that’s an outdated model and it’s one of colonialism. We’re thinking of the entire environment, and we are coming to conclusions based on a different worldview, but a more complete set of circumstances than those behind many of the decisions made on our behalf. We can contribute and we can give Canada a better chance at conservation or a better chance at protection or leadership in the sustainability of species. It isn’t that we’re up here wanting to kill every last animal on this land. It is the exact opposite. We want these species here forever. We see ourselves as part of the environment and the species we harvest as a part of us. We don’t divorce it.
On the success of the co-managed national park model Torngat Mountains National Park is a part of our land claim agreement. It also has an effective co-management body, and it’s just one of the most spectacular places on Earth. We’re using a management model that’s a partnership with Nunatsiavut, Nunavik [Inuit of Quebec], Inuit and Parks Canada to make the most of such a beautiful place.
‘I’m still pushing for relationships [with the federal government] to transfer into tangible outcomes and actions that we’ve been hoping for for decades.’
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The model so far is working. There could be improvements, especially in the administration of the park and how all the funding flows to create a visitor experience. It’s almost impossible for anyone to get here, including Inuit from Nunatsiavut or from Nunavik, so I think there’s a lot that we can do moving forward, such as trying to figure out what sustainability looks like in the administration of the park. We’ve got the governance down, we have protection, and we’re doing all sorts of research to understand the park ecosystems, but I think the last piece is building access for Inuit and better sustainability in the administration. First and foremost, this should be a place where we run programs, where we do research. We have an administrative structure for the park, and if we can run tourism out of here as well, that should be a bonus. This is really remote and really expensive to operate, and the price per night is very high.
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: ITK/ADAM SCOTTI; JACKIE DIVES; AARON KYLIE/CAN GEO; MATT ZAMBONIN/CAN GEO
SLUG TK
INUIT FUTURE
‘We see ourselves as part of the environment and the species that we harvest as a part of us. We don’t divorce it.’ access to the same level of services that most Canadians do. I imagine another project — another big Canadian project. There was a project of building a railroad out to the West and other massive investments that the Canadian government has made to build Canada. I don’t think Canada has built the necessary infrastructure in Inuit Nunangat. We still have one big project to go and that is around the Canadian Arctic. The understanding of how this country functions best is growing, as is the respect this country has for Inuit and for Inuit Nunangat; in this time of climate change and global pressures on Arctic sovereignty, we know more now about our socioeconomic status and how that affects things such as mental health and suicide. I think there are compelling reasons to create that reality, and that all Canadians would be sympathetic to our desire to create it. We have all these different amazing people who are showing what’s possible, and so we’ll be able to build our own communities and our own self-determination at the same time we are imagining a Canada in which we have the same level of opportunities, whether it’s broadband or runways or getting our communities off diesel. It’s going to take a long time, but I think Canadians are there with us.
Clockwise from opposite top: Obed and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at the Inuit-Crown Partnership Committee signing; preparing Arctic char at Saglek Fiord, Labrador; another view of the fiord; Obed speaks at The Royal Canadian Geographical Society’s 2017 Indigenous People’s Atlas of Canada project announcement.
Those are all considerations that we’ll be able to work through, and I know we can work with Parks Canada and with the Nunatsiavut government and Makivik Corporation [the legal representative body of Quebec Inuit] to make sure we keep improving on the model.
On the Inuit role in the world We’ve created a framework of rights. We also have a lot of work to do on social equity in that Inuit and Inuit Nunangat don’t have
On a shared North With this government, and I hope successive governments, there will be that sea change in attitude that federal funding spent on Indigenous people or on building our communities isn’t a donation, isn’t wasted money. These are funds that are necessary for a healthy Canada, and Canada gets back just as much as it puts in. We are contributing members of society and we want to continue to be that way. Look at Torngat Mountains National Park. We wanted a national park as Nunatsiavut Inuit. We wanted to share this with Canada. We pushed for it just as much as any other entity, and we didn’t have to. We could’ve made this into our Inuit lands, and we could’ve cordoned it off and tried to keep people out, but we see ourselves as Canadians. This land is ours, but also something we want to show the world as long as we do it in a way that’s respectful. I hope Canadians get excited about that, too — are appreciative of the fact that Inuit want to be Canadians. We want to share our land, we want to have this relationship. Read about environment and climate change minister Catherine McKenna’s tour of Nunatsiavut at cangeo.ca/nd17/torngats. CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
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The Métis
How to define the territory of a people barred from claiming land of their own? BY MICHEL HOGUE
A Métis family camping on Canada’s plains in 1872. The two-wheeled Red River cart was the primary mode of 19th-century westward expansion. 54
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T
HE STAKES MUST have seemed extraordinarily high. The Métis delegation assembled at the annual treaty payments at Fort Walsh, in Saskatchewan’s Cypress Hills in the summer of 1881, were among the thousands of Indigenous Peoples gathered who had witnessed the collapse of bison populations north of the 49th parallel. They had also experienced the presence of American Army patrols that, increasingly, stood between them and the animals they looked to hunt. While hunger stalked their camps, Métis leaders pressed Thomas Page Wadsworth, the official charged with administering the payments, to admit them into the numbered treaties that had been concluded in previous years with Prairie First Nations. When Wadsworth rejected their demands, the Métis returned with two leading Plains Cree Chiefs, Minahikosis (Little Pine) and Papewes (Lucky Man), who threatened to make Wadsworth “pay every native of the country” if he did not admit the Métis. Wadsworth confided to his superiors that
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he did “not care two straws for the Indians or their threats,” but he worried nonetheless that if he remained too firm he would “bring on trouble.” Trouble was averted, however, when reports reached Fort Walsh that bison could be found nearby. The Métis protest receded as families set off to hunt. Métis efforts to assert their rights to the West and to stake out a portion of it for their continued use ran headlong into an emerging government policy that
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
meant to differentiate Métis from First Nations and to remake Indigenous homelands for settlers. Métis leaders had made similar requests at previous treaty gatherings. Just three years earlier, in 1878, hundreds of Métis men assembled in the Cypress Hills petitioned the government for a reserve along the border and for the sorts of provisions included in the numbered treaties, including the financial support needed to establish schools, churches and farms. Officials
Charting a homeland Traditional Métis lands
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refused. The government’s position was clear: creating new homelands for settlers depended first on marginalizing the Métis in theirs.
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themselves by hunting, fishing, trapping, trading, cultivating land or seeking wage labour across great distances and through territories that others occupied. Researchers from the University of Ottawa have shown how the multicultural nature of Plains Métis communities facilitated these movements. After years spent combing through parish
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A watercolour of a Métis bison hunt on Canada’s Prairies by Irish-Canadian artist Paul Kane (Opposite top). A Métis family in North Dakota in 1883 (opposite bottom).
invisible to the naked eye, these netFEDERAL EFFORTS TO remake the works defined community boundaries West involved reworking how and and territories. where Métis lived and how they interThese were clearly defined, yet peracted with their neighbours. Throughout meable, boundaries. In the 19th century, Métis what is now southwestcommunities forged Métis efforts to assert their rights to the West and e r n Ma n i t o b a , f o r mobile lives across a instance, the Métis famwide-ranging homestake out a portion for their continued use ran ilies who lived and land. While this encomheadlong into emerging government policies. hunted in the region passed much of the intermarried, travelled territory now described by the Métis National Council as part registers from across the northern Great and camped with the Cree, Assiniboine of the historic Métis homeland — that Plains, entering genealogical data from and Plains Ojibwa bands who also is, “the three Prairie provinces birth, marriage and death records, they called the region home. Most Métis (Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta), as have used software to give visual expres- families counted people from these well as parts of Ontario, British sion to the vast web of marital and other First Nations among their ancestors. Columbia, the Northwest Territories kin ties that connected Métis to each Continued intermarriage and interand the northern United States” — the other and to their First Nations kin and action among these groups maintained precise boundaries of that homeland neighbours. These networks and the such connections and allowed for joint have been defined as much by human relations they represented allowed fami- occupation of the region. Without such kin ties, movements lies to hunt, trade and move across the relations as by geography. In the plains and parklands of the ethnically mixed landscapes of the across territories could be more conWest, Métis families sustained West’s plains and parklands. Although tested. When Métis set out on bison CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
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hunting expeditions on the plains to the access to bison herds or to negotiate Clockwise from top left: An 1862 sketch south and west from the Red River political agreements with Dakota lead- of a Red River cart; an 1885 newspaper Valley in the 1840s and 1850s, they did ers that would help avoid bloodshed. lithograph of a First Nation family with While competition over dwindling “rebel half breeds”; a Métis York boat so conscious that their hunts were in territories occupied by the Dakotas and bison populations increased friction brigade at Cumberland House, Sask., 1912. other First Nations, who would seek to between different Plains peoples, the disrupt their expeditions. When brigade cooperation between Métis and Cree lands needed for settlement, officials members encountered danger, they leaders during the stand-off in the claimed that treating Métis the same as First Nations would arranged their carts in a cause them to remain “in circle, placing them side While Métis could join treaties as their present semi barbaby side with their trams rous state.” Like many turned outward, so as to individual members of First Nations bands, o t h e r o f fi c i a l s w h o provide a space for their they could not do so as a group. brushed aside efforts by lodges inside. Guards Métis to seek formal kept watch over these encampments through the night. Plains Cypress Hills in the 1880s shows the admission to treaties or to have specific Métis were left to use force to gain strength of those cross-community reserves set aside for them, Wadsworth political ties. Yet federal officials were insisted that, while Métis could join Michel Hogue teaches history at Carleton unwilling to acknowledge these ties treaties as individual members of University in Ottawa and is a member of and sought instead to implement poli- First Nations bands, they could not do Carleton’s Centre for Indigenous Research, cies that would distinguish between so as a group, nor would the governCulture, Language and Education. He is the members of these communities. ment set aside land for specific Métis author of Métis and the Medicine Line: Anxious to avoid commitments that reserves. Whether one was Métis or Creating a Border and Dividing a People. would cost the federal government over First Nations determined the shape of the long term or that would “tie up” the their entitlements to land. 58
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CLOCKWISE FROM BOTTOM LEFT: LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA, PA-017395; LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA, ACC. NO. 1963-97-1.11R:A; LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA, MIKAN 2933963
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The Capture of Batoche (above) depicts the 1885 battle that ended the Northwest Resistance in Saskatchewan and led to the hanging of Louis Riel (left, centre), shown here with councillors of his provisional government in Red River, Man., 1870.
Europe or Canada, who purchased the certificates and used them to locate land in the public domain, these pieces of paper offered an opportunity to secure land in the West. For most Métis, however, the distribution of scrip marked the demise of their hopes for a secure land base and the fracturing of their homelands. Frustrations over unresolved land claims drove Métis political organizing and, famously, led to the armed clashes with federal authorities in 1869, during the Louis Riel-led Red River Resistance, and 1885, when Métis efforts to have their land rights in Saskatchewan recognized culminated in bloodshed and the hanging of Riel. In the aftermath, the federal government addressed outstanding Métis 60
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title claims individually through scrip, rather than as a group through treaties. In theory, scrip certificates offered a way to extinguish Métis title claims by offering pieces of paper redeemable in land or money. In reality, much of the land found its way into the hands of speculators, both in Manitoba and across the south-central portions of the Prairie provinces. For the would-be farmers, especially those from
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
MÉTIS LEADERS IN the 20th century worked to piece together a land base and to assert their land rights despite the very real obstacles posed by the far-flung nature of Métis communities, restricted economic opportunities and endemic racism. In the 1930s, Métis leaders overcame these obstacles to secure a land base in a cluster of settlements — first in Alberta
TOP: LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA, ICON168173/MIKAN 2999644; BOTTOM: LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA, PA-012854
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SI TE
MÉTIS HOMELAND
Yet the unresolved nature of Métis rights to lands and resources across the 20th century reminds us of the long shadow cast by the 19th-century policies that sought to define and divide Indigenous Peoples. Since the Manitoba Act of 1870, the federal government had recognized Métis as an Aboriginal people but, as was made clear by officials in the Cypress Hills in 1881, bureaucrats were determined that this should not entail the same sorts of entitlements or
A group of Métis children and women from Fort Chipewyan, Alta., in the 1930s (above). Scrip certificates (below) for 160 or 240 dollars or acres were distributed to individual Métis in exchange for their Aboriginal title claims from the 1870s to the 1920s.
restrictions connected with the legal status of “Indians” in Canada. The Supreme Court’s 2016 Daniels decision — that Métis and non-status Indians are indeed “Indians” under the Constitution — suggests that the kinds of racebased legal distinctions once drawn by the Crown must be revisited. The decision calls our attention back to the ways that Plains Métis communities ordered their lives prior to their encounters with the Canadian state. Indeed, the persistence of a sense of belonging rooted in kin and community, after more than a century of policies that sought to dismantle Métis communities and to enable the West’s resettlement, has allowed a sense of nationhood to survive amid this fractured landscape. For another perspective on the Métis homeland, by Métis scholar and Indigenous law expert Darren O’Toole of the University of Ottawa, visit cangeo.ca/nd17/homeland.
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TOP: CANADA. DEPT. OF MINES AND TECHNICAL SURVEYS/LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA, E011161384; BOTTOM: SASKATCHEWAN ARCHIVES BOARD GENERAL, E11/PUBLIC DOMAIN
and later in Saskatchewan — though most Métis in the Prairie provinces lived outside those settlements, in towns and cities and on unoccupied Crown lands or “road allowances,” which were ninemetre-wide scraps of land in corridors designated for highways. Even in the face of these disruptions, longstanding family networks continued to provide a larger sense of connection across these regions and to propel political organizing among communities.
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The
SURVIVORS Circle
Six members of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation’s Survivors Circle and one member of its Governing Circle share glimpses of their residential school experiences
F
ILLUSTRATIONS BY KERRY HODGSON
FOR MORE THAN 150 YEARS, Canada took Indigenous children from their families and forced them into residential schools. More than 150,000 children in all. Their hair was shorn. Their languages outlawed. Their families forbidden to visit. Discipline was unyielding. Abuse rampant. It was an effort to scrub the Indigenous from the child, to erase their cultures from the nation. In 2009, Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission began collecting evidence on what happened in those schools. When the commission completed its mandate in 2015, it gave birth to the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation. Housed at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, it’s the permanent home of the thousands of hours of testimony, millions of government and church records, photographs, art, artifacts and other materials the commission collected. To ensure the voices of those who endured residential schools would continue to be heard, the centre set up a Survivors Circle, which meets four times a year to advise the centre’s Governing Circle. All six members of the Survivors Circle and one member of the Governing Circle (Eugene Arcand) recounted some of their experiences to Canadian Geographic. As they spoke, all relived some of the trauma that has shaped their lives. They did it despite the pain, because they want other Canadians to know the truth. —Alanna Mitchell Editor’s note: This feature contains strong
Read more survivors’ stories by visiting the National
language and may not be suitable for all readers.
Centre for Truth and Reconciliation’s website at nctr.ca. CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
65
I was five and a half years old when I was taken from my grandparents’ home on Opitsaht Island in B.C. and sent to Christie Residential School. It was two miles from my home. I didn’t get back home until I was a teenager. My brother, who was four years older, and my sister, who was three years older, were at the same school. BARNEY WILLIAMS
Tla-o-qui-aht First Nations, British Columbia, 78
I
I WAS FIVE and a half when I was taken from my grandparents’ home on Opitsaht Island, B.C., and sent to Christie Residential School. It was two miles from my home. I didn’t get back home until I was a teenager. My brother, who was four years older, and my sister, who was three years older, were at the same school. My brother knew that I was being raped by one of the men who worked there. There was nothing he could do. It broke his heart. The first time I was raped, I was so injured that I had to go to the infirmary. They didn’t even send me to the hospital. They just dealt with it there. I was always afraid. I would hear footsteps in the hall and I 66
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
thought that pedophile was coming to get me. I was 75 when I finally conquered my fear of sleeping in the dark. I said: “OK. You’re safe. Nothing is going to happen.” I’m proud of the fact that I still speak my language [Tla-o-qui-aht] fluently. When I got to the school, they told us we couldn’t speak our own language. But we didn’t understand English. They had a wedge of wood. If we spoke our own language, they would shove it in our mouths and leave it there for seven or eight hours. No food. No water. That was our punishment. Things people would never think of. On November 14, I received an honorary doctorate from the University of Victoria.
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
Who would have thought that little boy, ripped from the arms of his granny, raped and beaten, would be getting an honorary doctorate? This is my time.
‘
I was 75 when
I finally conquered my fear of sleeping
’
in the dark.
I was taken from my family when I was 10 years old, in the fall. Autumn is always difficult for me, when all the leaves start to change. It’s this heartache. The worst thing is to be taken from your family. I thought I had done something wrong. The
SURVIVORS Circle
KUKDOOKAA TERRI BROWN
member of the Crow clan, Tahltan Nation, British Columbia, 63
I
I WAS TAKEN from my family when I was 10 years old, in the fall. Autumn is always difficult for me, when all the leaves start to change. It’s this heartache. The worst thing is to be taken from your family. I thought I had done something wrong. My brother [Harry Brown] and I were sent to separate schools. I was sent to Whitehorse, almost 500 kilometres away from our home in Lower Post, B.C. He was sent to Chooutla School in Carcross, Yukon. I get to school and I look around for him and he’s not there. He was two years older. We were very, very close. We’d never been apart. People thought
we were twins we were so much alike. He ran away three times to try to find me. But he didn’t know where he was going. He never recovered. He froze to death when he was 33. I say every time I tell the story that this is the last time, and then somebody else comes up and I say, “Maybe it will help someone else and maybe it will help me to get some of it out.” I want the world to be different for my children and grandchildren, and I want to make it a better place for everyone else who has suffered. It was genocide. We were not meant to survive all of this. I went on to
university. It was a pure miracle that I did anything with my life.
‘
The worst thing is to be taken
from your family. I thought I had done
’
something wrong. CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
67
The beginning of my life was really wonderful, until the day the police knocked on the door and took us away. There were 15 children in my family. My mom and all my siblings were sent to residential schools. I was five or six when I was taken to Gordon’s School in Punnichy, Saskatchewan, where I stayed for seven years, and then to‘ St. Phillip’s in Kamsack for another TED QUEWEZANCE
Keeseekoose First Nation, Saskatchewan, 64
T
THE BEGINNING of my life was really wonderful, until the day the police knocked on the door and took us away. There were 15 children in my family. My mom and all my siblings were sent to residential schools. I was five or six when I was taken to Gordon’s School in Punnichy, Saskatchewan, where I stayed for seven years, and then to St. Phillip’s in Kamsack for another four. I was sexually abused and physically abused for all those years. I never knew who I was or where I came from. I went into alcohol. I went into drugs. I tried to commit suicide. Reconciliation starts with the individual. I had to reconcile with myself. I had 68
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to forgive myself. I had professional help. People make choices. The choice I made was to go forward. I got married when I was 21 and have five beautiful daughters, married to wonderful men. I have 15 grandchildren and five great-grandchildren. My family is intact. We all meet four times a year. It’s one of the rules of the family. In spring when the leaves come out, in fall when the leaves go, at Christmas and in summer for the sun dance. When there’s a rift in the family, we call a meeting. My daughters are still angry. They say: “Why did they do that to Dad?” Truth-telling, that’s the biggest thing in my life. And our traditional ways, our
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
ceremonies, our customs. Without them, I wouldn’t be sitting here.
I never knew
who I was or where
I came from. I went
into alcohol. I went into drugs. I tried to
’
commit suicide.
I was five years old when they took me to Île-à-la-Crosse residential school in Saskatchewan. I was there for two or three years before they sent me to Montreal Lake school, north of Prince Albert. All eight of the children in my family went to those schools. We came from a very isolated community on the shores of Smoothstone Lake in Saskatchewan. ‘ The
SURVIVORS Circle
HELENE JOHNSON
Métis Nation, Archerwill, Saskatchewan, 62
I
I WAS FIVE when they took me to Île-à-la-Crosse residential school in Saskatchewan. I was there for two or three years before they sent me to Montreal Lake school, north of Prince Albert. All eight of the children in my family went to those schools. We came from a very isolated community on the shores of Smoothstone Lake in Saskatchewan. I have very little memory of being in that first school. I don’t know why. I really get triggered when I see pictures of nuns in old habits, those Grey Nun habits. Montreal Lake, I’ve got a lot of memories from there. I was in there when my mother passed away. I was maybe 13?
I cut all my ties with my siblings after I left the schools. I didn’t speak with them for years. It just didn’t seem important. Now, in the last 15 years or so, we’ve reconnected. My sister had moved to Nova Scotia. She had breast cancer. My sister-in-law phoned me and we went to visit her. I hadn’t seen her for 30 years. Every aspect of my life has been affected. Even this conversation has caused me anxiety. It gets very difficult at times. It’s one step at a time. I’ve sat on committees for 20 years. I’ve seen managers of institutions talk about residential schools and say, “Get over it.” But somewhere along the line,
those same managers have begun to understand. They have more compassion. I smile every time I see them.
I cut all my ties
with my siblings after I left the schools. I didn’t speak with them for years. CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
69
’
I had not turned four when I was taken to Elkhorn residential school in Manitoba. It was 500 kilometres from my home on the Opaskwayak Cree Nation. I was taken there on a bus. Adults were not with us. We were all sick. We had never been on a bus. I had been in my community with my family — loving, kind and good people who gave us our values of caring,‘ loving, sharing, being respectful of DORIS YOUNG
Opaskwayak Cree Nation, Manitoba, age withheld
I
I HAD NOT TURNED four when I was taken to Elkhorn residential school in Manitoba. It was 500 kilometres from my home on the Opaskwayak Cree Nation. I was taken there on a bus. Adults were not with us. We were all sick. We had never been on a bus. I had been in my community with my family — loving, kind and good people who gave us our values of caring, loving, sharing, being respectful of one another and feeling safety. When I got to the residential school, my hair was cut off right away and put in the garbage. The clothes made by my mother and my aunts, my moccasins, were confiscated. I was in residential 70
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
schools for 13 years. All 15 children in my family were in residential schools. I saw things that were not human. Children strapped in front of us. It was like a Nazi concentration camp. They threw us in harm’s way. I was always afraid. To tell the Canadian public about it is very hard, but it’s something that needs to be done. They don’t want to face what Canadian society did to Aboriginal Canadians. My hope is that every time I talk to a non-Aboriginal person that you will be able to offer some kind of solution, too, and say what you would be willing to do to be a reconciliating person. You’ve asked us to give you this knowledge and
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
go back into these places it’s very hard to be. Now you have a responsibility. What are you going to do about it?
I saw things that
were not human.
It was like a Nazi
concentration camp. I was always afraid.
’
We were living at our outpost camp near Naujaat fishing, ready to move to the land to do some caribou hunting, when a boat came with a Roman Catholic priest and a government agent. They came to pick me up and forced me to go to Sir Joseph Bernier residential school in Chesterfield Inlet. I was 11. I was wearing sealskin boots. I was in residential schoo ‘ ls for six years. The
SURVIVORS Circle
PIITA IRNIQ Naujaat, Nunavut, 70
W
WE WERE LIVING at our outpost camp near Naujaat, fishing, ready to move to the land to do some caribou hunting, when a boat came with a Roman Catholic priest and a government agent. They came to pick me up and forced me to go to Sir Joseph Bernier residential school in Chesterfield Inlet. I was 11. I was wearing sealskin boots. I was in residential schools for six years. It was a very traumatic experience. I had been trained to be a very good hunter and trapper and fisherman, a true-natured Inuk. I left a little Eskimo boy and the same day I became a little white boy. We were sexually abused. We had a loss of
culture, loss of language, loss of tradition, loss of Inuit skills. In 1987, I was an elected member of the Northwest Territories legislative assembly and my now late friend Marius Tungilik asked me to take a look at getting the government to establish a public inquiry into residential schools. I took it on immediately. I wanted to see the Roman Catholic Church apologize, the government apologize. I was the first person to come forward and ask for that. Finally, finally, we are moving in the right direction. But residential schools are not only Indigenous history. It is Canadian history. All Canadians must practise
inuuqatigiittiarniq, which means living with each other in peace and harmony. I’ve been promoting it for 10 years.
I left a little
Eskimo boy and the same day I became a little white boy. CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
71
’
It’s important that people know what’s happened to us. We are so far behind in attempting to rearrange the status quo to more of an equal level. For me personally, that is part of any discussion about the impact of residential schools and the intergenerational dysfunctions and social ills that affect my community. There’s a reason for it. It’s not because we’re drunks. It’s‘ not EUGENE ARCAND
I
Cree from the Muskeg Lake First Nation, Saskatchewan, 65 (member of the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation’s Governing Circle)
IT’S IMPORTANT that people know what’s happened to us. We are so far behind in attempting to rearrange the status quo to more of an equal level. For me personally, that is part of any discussion about the impact of residential schools and the intergenerational dysfunctions and social ills that affect my community. There’s a reason for it. It’s not because we’re drunks. It’s not because we’re lazy. It’s not because we’re dumb and stupid. There are other colonial reasons that have to be exposed about why the First Peoples of this country are at the bottom of the social ladder in all aspects. 72
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
It’s important for people to know that this is not about me, about us in the Survivors Circle and the Governing Circle. It’s about many of us who never got the chance to share the story, and who have never made it home and are in unmarked graves across the country. It’s about many of us who are trying to take corrective measures and are reprogramming ourselves from colonial thinking to Indigenous thinking. There are not many of us left that will share that experience. But if those of us who tell our experiences didn’t do what we do, the stereotype would continue, and this whole sad history would be
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
erased. Our descendants would never have the chance to figure out why they have an identity crisis.
It’s important that
people know what’s
’
happened to us.
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COMMENT Your feedback
I
September/October was another enjoyable issue of the magazine. The wildlife theme remains a winner for me. I also applaud your focus on Canada’s North. There is a wonderful future there for Canada! Dick Hubbard Mississauga, Ont. Epic expedition On September 6, explorer Adam Shoalts completed his four-month, Royal Canadian Geographical Society sponsored Trans-Canadian Arctic Expedition. Canadian Geographic sat down with Shoalts in his first interview since he returned (cangeo.ca/best17/shoalts). Here is a selection of reader feedback on that interview.
CONTACT US 1155 Lola Street, Suite 200, Ottawa, Ont. K1K 4C1 canadiangeographic.ca
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Comments may be edited for length and clarity. 74
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
All I can say is wow! I look forward to reading more of Adam’s stories from his journey. And I agree with him in hoping that Canada’s next 150 years are met with an increased awareness and dedication to protection, conservation and true environmental stewardship. Rhonda McMahon Guelph, Ont. Awesome and inspiring accomplishment, Adam. Bravo for demonstrating the importance of protecting the North. I look forward to reading your new book when it comes out. Jason White Toronto
Goose grief I was pleased to read the article, “Search for the Blue Goose” in the September/October issue. Reading any reminders of the work accomplished by J. Dewey Soper is important. However, I was disappointed that no mention was made of my biography of Dewey Soper entitled Arctic Naturalist: The Life of J. Dewey Soper published by Dundurn Press in 2010. Anthony Dalton, Fellow of the RCGS Mayne Island, B.C. This is indeed an amazing map [above], but is it time to consider renaming this sanctuary? The article talks about honouring Indigenous issues and reconciliation. Soper was given a map by the local people who guided him to the area after three years searching for it on his own and getting nowhere. Why is the sanctuary still named after him? Pamela Holmes Whitehorse
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
A lament for Bear 148 In April 2015, Canadian Geographic published a story by Leslie Anthony about Bear 148 [above], a tagged young female grizzly who roamed Banff National Park in close proximity to people. On September 24, Bear 148 was killed by a hunter near McBride, B.C. Anthony subsequently wrote an online story about her death (cangeo.ca/article/lament-bear-148). Here is a selection of reader feedback on it. Great article, Leslie. You articulated the problem well. Hopefully soon we will find a way to coexist with the other animals who share this magnificent planet. Debra March Stratford, Ont. Of course there are efforts that can prevent this from happening, however there is no political will to make those efforts stick. How in the world is a hunter given permission to kill a collared research bear? Aren’t there any legal repercussions for destroying a bear that has taken the wildlife officers time and money to plan, trap and relocate, and whose tracking stats help them determine how wildlife moves? Emma Hanson Edmonton Correction: The image of a pair of bald eagles on page 63 of the September/October issue (“The bald eagles of Besnard Lake”) shows the birds sitting in an eastern white pine, the nearest of which occurs in southeast Manitoba. All other images are of Besnard Lake, Sask., proper.
THIS PAGE, LEFT: BLUE GOOSE BREEDING GROUNDS, 1929, DEPARTMENT OF INDIAN AND NORTHERN AFFAIRS CANADA FONDS, LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA, E010864223-V8; RIGHT: ALEX TAYLOR/PARKS CANADA. OPPOSITE PAGE, LEFT: CANADIAN MUSEUM OF HISTORY, X-B:17, S91-2020; RIGHT: CHRISTINA JENNESS/CANADIAN MUSEUM OF NATURE
Rave reviews I’ve gone through my copy of the September/ October issue and it is, by far, the best annual wildlife issue ever. The article written by Michela Rosano and the wonderful pictures by Michelle Valberg of the ice grizzlies of northern Yukon was simply amazing to read and contemplate. The story by Niki Wilson about the historic return of the plains bison (“Back where they belong”) was also great. In fact, I could say the same for all of the articles in this issue. Keep up the good work! Maureen Bedard Saint-Gabriel-de-Valcartier, Que.
W H A T’S T H I S ?
Recognize this mystery object and how it relates to Canadian geography and history?
LAST ISSUE’S OBJECT: Sea snail shell Visit cangeo.ca/whatsthis for a hint, to enter your guess and for a chance to win one of three copies of the Best Wildlife Photography 2018 special issue.* Follow us on (@CanGeo) for more hints. The deadline is December 27, 2017. The correct answer will appear in the January/February 2018 issue. *Three winners will be randomly selected from all correct responses. Canadian Geographic and the Canadian Heritage Information Network have partnered to showcase important artifacts from Canadian history and geography. Each object comes from one of the museums in CHIN’s national network.
This shell of a Tachyrhynchus erosus, a species of sea snail commonly referred to as an eroded turretsnail, is part of the Canadian Museum of Nature’s Invertebrates Collection. It was collected in Gaspé Bay, Que., in 1867 by J.F. Whiteaves, a British paleontologist and zoologist who fell in love with Canada’s rich nature and biodiversity. With files from the Canadian Museum of Nature. Learn more about this artifact and others by visiting nature.ca. Explore more stories from Canada’s past through cangeo.ca/whatsthis.
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NEWSSTANDS AND ONLINE
VISIT CANGEO.CA/SIP
WANT MORE? Check out our past wildlife issues online
YOUR SOCIETY NEWS FROM THE ROYAL CANADIAN GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY
Singer Gordon Lightfoot (second from left) was awarded the RCGS’s Gold Medal.
2017 RCGS MEDALLISTS
A
former prime minister of Canada and a past U.S. president, a legendary singer-songwriter and a renowned Arctic archeologist are among those awarded Society medals this year. All were recognized at the RCGS’s annual College of Fellows Dinner on Nov. 16 at the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Que.
Gold Medal (achievements in geography) David Attenborough Award-winning broadcaster and writer, the voice and face of BBC’s natural history programming Gordon Lightfoot Singer-songwriter, prolific Canadian cultural ambassador with more than 20 bestselling albums John Turner Canada’s 17th Prime Minister; served for decades as a public servant and has travelled extensively in the Arctic Massey Medal (outstanding career achievement in Canadian geography) David Morrison Arctic archeologist; led development of the Canadian Museum of History’s new Canadian History Hall Sir Christopher Ondaatje Medal for Exploration Pat and Baiba Morrow Mountaineers, photojournalists and filmmakers; Pat 76
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
was the first climber in history to reach the Seven Summits Wade Davis Anthropologist, “plant explorer” and prolific author; has studied Indigenous cultures around the globe Martin Bergmann Medal (excellence in Arctic leadership and science) Martin Fortier Executive director of the Université Laval’s transdisciplinary research program Sentinel North Lawrence J. Burpee Medal (outstanding achievement that enhances the Society’s ability to make Canada better known) Jimmy Carter Former president of the United States, vastly expanded the national parks system; ongoing work with Habitat for Humanity Andrew Prossin Founder and managing director of One Ocean Expeditions, exclusive cruise partner of the RCGS Camsell Medal (outstanding volunteer service to the RCGS) Jody Decker Professor emeritus of geography, Wilfrid Laurier University; past RCGS governor Phil Howarth Professor emeritus of geography, University of Waterloo; past RCGS governor
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
Capt. Joseph-Elzéar Bernier Medal (exemplary deed or activity that aids the Society in fulfilling its mandate) Phyllis Arnold A leading publisher of innovative educational resources; past RCGS governor Shelagh and Jon Grant Shelagh, an educator, historian and author, and Jon, a business leader, are longstanding supporters of Can Geo Education Bob Ramsay President of communication firm Ramsay Inc., founder of the RamsayTalks lecture series and RamsayTravel expeditions company Mike Robinson Royal Scottish Geographical Society CEO, relocated and reinvigorated the society, strengthening ties with other geographical organizations Geographic Literacy Award Beth Dye Educator and administrator with nearly 30 years’ experience, has founded and fostered geography initiatives nationwide; past RCGS governor Innovation in Geography Teaching Award Paula Huddy-Zubkowski Teacher at Calgary’s St. Joseph Elementary and Junior High School; applies innovative, multidisciplinary approach to curriculum
Shoalts drags his canoe against the current on the Hare Indian River, N.W.T., in mid-June, seeking a route into Great Bear Lake.
EXPLORER ADAM SHOALTS COMPLETES HIS TRANS-CANADIAN ARCTIC EXPEDITION
LEFT: NEIL EVER OSBORNE/CAN GEO; RIGHT: ADAM SHOALTS
A
fter 4,000 kilometres of trekking over muskeg and canoe- the south. For nearly four months, their Facebook updates ing up and down countless icy rivers and lakes, sustain- marked him as paddling upstream against the mighty ing himself on more than 1,100 protein bars and two bush Mackenzie River, reaching the Dene hamlet of Fort Good plane-delivered food crates, Adam Shoalts reached Baker Hope, N.W.T. (the last community he would encounter until Lake, Nunavut, and the end of the epic Trans-Canadian Arctic Baker Lake, Nunavut, 86 days later), and stranded on an island and waiting for ice to break on Great Bear Lake. By the Expedition on Sep. 6, 2017. It all started in Old Crow, northern Yukon, in mid-May. Shoalts end of his long pilgrimage, winter weather was already returning to the North. faced east and set out from the small “My constant mantra was ‘winter Gwich’in town on a solo expedition ‘There’s no way of knowing is coming, winter is coming, winter that saw him weaving north and when the weather is going to turn is coming,’ ” says Shoalts. “I had to south of the Arctic Circle across remind myself of that a lot. I’ve done Canada’s northern mainland and too nasty to keep going. expeditions in the Arctic before, I’ve three territories — making strenuous I was racing as fast as I could go.’ been through snowstorms in July ascents of the Mackenzie, Hare and August, and there’s no way of Indian, Dease and Coppermine rivers. Pragmatic as ever about what might seem to most a highly knowing when the weather is going to turn too nasty to keep unpragmatic undertaking, the explorer was more concerned going. I was racing as fast as I could go.” Shoalts’s RCGS-sponsored Trans-Canadian Arctic with the prospect of unrelenting Arctic winds than potential Expedition was a monumental, meticulously-planned yet grizzly and polar bear encounters. As he told Canadian Geographic the day before his departure, inherently dangerous migration over a cross-section of the “The way I’m managing this whole 4,000-kilometre route is Canadian North that few will ever see — and perhaps no one breaking it up into smaller trips. Mentally, that’s how I think ever again in one sustained journey. —Nick Walker about it. Physically, it’s all one continuous journey.” Communications were sporadic, characterized by one- or two-week stretches of silence and irregular satellite phone To read the exclusive post-expedition interview with Shoalts and to see updates made to his family and communication supports in more images from his route, visit cangeo.ca/best17/shoalts. CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
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E D U C AT I O N
CPAC AND THE RCGS LAUNCH ROUTE 338 DEMOCRACY PROJECT
I
f you’ve ever cast a ballot in a federal election, marched in a protest, written a letter to your Member of Parliament, added your name to a petition or even just debated a hot topic around the dinner table, you’ve participated in — and benefited from — Canadian democracy. With the mid-September launch of a new educational tool called Route 338, the Cable Public Affairs Channel, aims to help all Canadians understand the political process and make their voices heard. “Democracy is precious but fragile, even in mature democracies like Canada,” says Catherine Cano, president and general manager of CPAC. “CPAC Route 338 is a vital resource because the earlier we study and learn about our democracy, the better
left: RCGS CEO John Geiger, Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly (middle) and CPAC president Catherine Cano at the Route 338 launch. above: The Route 338 Giant Floor Map.
our chance to have a society that is curious, knowledgeable and engaged.” The multimedia project includes a website where visitors can explore an interactive map with profiles of all 338 federal electoral districts and their current MPs. CPAC also partnered with the RCGS to create the Route 338 Giant Floor Map that will tour schools across the country, a downloadable “tiled” version of the map and 11 free, curriculum-linked lesson plans to help students in Grades 1-12 learn the different levels of government, the functions of each and much more. The Route 338 Giant Floor Map was unveiled as part of a celebration of CPAC’s 25th anniversary. Canadian Heritage minister Mélanie Joly and dozens of MPs and
staff attended to congratulate CPAC on their quarter-century of providing comprehensive, non-partisan coverage of activities in the House of Commons and delighted in finding (and posing creatively with) their own ridings on the map. “Not only can you walk across Canada in a few seconds, but for kids to be able to see how the country is divided and get an explanation of why and where they fit in is very valuable,” said Speaker of the House Geoff Regan, who is also an RCGS Fellow. “I love it and think it’s a great, great teaching tool.” —Alexandra Pope Find out more about the Route 338 project by visiting route338.ca.
EDUCATION UPDATES
CANADIAN STUDENTS TO COMPETE IN 2018 INTERNATIONAL GEOGRAPHY OLYMPIAD For the first time ever, four senior geography students will be selected through a Canadian Geography Olympiad to represent their nation at the International Geography Olympiad, to be held in Quebec City in August 2018. There, top 16- to 19-year-old students from around the world will showcase their talents in an exciting four-day competition. While the annual Can Geo Challenge has drawn thousands of Grade 4 to 10s to compete for the title of top geography student since the 1990s, Canada has never fielded a senior team for the international competition. The Olympiad’s purpose is to test students’ knowledge and understanding of geographic skills and concepts, but also to stimulate active interest in geographical and environmental studies among young people, and at the global level facilitate interactions 78
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
between students from different countries, thereby contributing (even if in a small way) to the understanding between nations.
CLASSROOM ENERGY DIET CHALLENGE REGISTRATION CLOSES JANUARY 2018 Canadian teachers have until Jan. 28, 2018, to sign up their classrooms for the CEDC’s 25 energy-themed challenges and the chance to win any of 100 prizes worth a total of $40,000. For more information and to register, visit energydiet.canadiangeographic.ca. —N.W. For Canadian Geographic Education updates, including when and how to register for the Canadian Geography Olympiad and competition details, follow @CanGeoEdu.
LEFT: ALEXANDRA POPE/CAN GEO; RIGHT: CHRIS BRACKLEY/CAN GEO. OPPOSITE: LINDSAY RALPH/CAN GEO
YO U R S O C I E T Y
Y O UR S OCI ETY | FEL L OWS FEATURED FELLOW: NELLIE KUSUGAK
The Royal Canadian Geographical Society Founded in 1929, the Society is a non-profit educational organization. Its object is to advance geographical knowledge and, in particular, to stimulate awareness of the significance of geography in Canada’s development, well-being and culture. Primary fields of interest include our people, resources, environment, heritage and the evolution of our country. In short, the aim is to make Canada better known to Canadians and to the world. Canadian Geographic, the Society’s magazine, is dedicated to reporting on all aspects of Canada’s geography — physical, biological, historical, cultural and economic — and on major issues of concern to Canada in which geographical dimensions play a significant role.
PATRON
His Excellency the Right Honourable David Johnston C.C., C.M.M., C.O.M., C.D. Governor General of Canada
Nellie Kusugak, Nunavut’s fifth commissioner, has made Inuit language and culture a principal focus.
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ellie Kusugak has been Commissioner of Nunavut since 2015. Prior to serving in this role, and before that as the territory’s deputy commissioner (20102015), she was for 20 years a teacher in both English and Inuktitut, working in traditional and cultural education at both grade school and college levels. She continues to be a champion of Inuktitut and Inuk culture across Canada’s North.
On working to strengthen Inuit language and culture Years ago, I started to realize that our language was not being spoken, that for many it was becoming less and less an everyday language. English has a way of creeping into our lives, and we are so immersed in it that it seems to have become an easier language to speak. I became a classroom assistant and trained to become a teacher, and that was the beginning of the passion. I wanted to instil in other Inuit that you should be really, really proud of who you are and where you come from, to be awed by being here today as it is only because of our ancestors who survived. They had tenacity and the perseverance to move forward and stay alive. That’s where my drive comes from. On the need to keep Inuktitut alive Not everyone has grown up speaking Inuktitut, so never feel like you are not Inuk just because you cannot speak your language. There is always time to learn. If you cannot speak the language, pay attention and try the best that you can, even if people make fun of you. Learn as much as you can about your culture — if you haven’t already done so — and again, never forget who your ancestors were. My mother always said, “Take what is best from Inuit society and what is best from Western culture, and use both of them for the benefit and betterment of people.”
VICE-PATRON Sir Christopher Ondaatje, O.C., C.B.E. HONORARY PRESIDENT
Alex Trebek, O.C. HONORARY VICE-PRESIDENTS
Roberta Bondar, O.C., O.Ont. Pierre Camu, O.C. Arthur E. Collin Wade Davis, C.M. Gisèle Jacob Louie Kamookak, O.Nu. Denis A. St-Onge, O.C. EXPLORER-IN-RESIDENCE
Jill Heinerth
PRESIDENT
Gavin Fitch, Q.C., Calgary VICE-PRESIDENTS Wendy Cecil, C.M., Toronto Connie Wyatt Anderson, The Pas, Man. SECRETARY
Joseph Frey, C.D., Toronto TREASURER
Keith Exelby, Ottawa IMMEDIATE PAST PRESIDENT
Paul Ruest, Winnipeg COUNSEL
Andrew Pritchard, Ottawa GOVERNORS
Jean C. Andrey, Waterloo, Ont. Glenn Blackwood, St. John’s James Boxall, Halifax John Hovland, Toronto Claire Kennedy, Toronto David Mitchell, Calgary Lynn Moorman, Calgary John Pollack, Bonnington, B.C. Paul VanZant, Amaranth, Ont.
VICE-PRESIDENT, FINANCE AND ADMINISTRATION VICE-PRESIDENT, EVENTS EXECUTIVE ASSISTANT
On how her role is viewed in the North There has only been a Commissioner of Nunavut since 1999. Some people, especially the younger population, are still not sure what being a commissioner entails, so every time I’m invited to visit a school or I go to a community to give out Commissioner Awards, I talk about my role. Much like a province’s lieutenant governor, it is to act as a symbol of the territory, representing and supporting the values its citizens are governed by. The struggle truly is to educate people on that. —Interview by Andrew Lovesey
John G. Geiger
CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER
CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER AND PUBLISHER
DIRECTOR OF EDUCATION
COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER ARCHIVIST
Catherine Frame
Carole Saad
Sandra Smith
DIRECTOR OF ADVANCEMENT
EDUCATION PROGRAM COORDINATORS
Gilles Gagnier
Jason Muscant Ellen Curtis
Sara Black, Andrea Buchholz Deborah Chapman
Wendy Simpson-Lewis
1155 Lola Street, Suite 200, Ottawa, ON K1K 4C1 (613) 745-4629 rcgs@rcgs.org rcgs.org
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
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Thick-billed Murres (Guillemots) diving offshore Nunavut
TALLURUTIUP IMANGA What is Talluruptiup Imanga? In the future, it will be Canada’s largest marine conservation area, located offshore Nunavut. Working together has sustained people of the North for generations. The designation of this diverse marine area is a testament to that spirit of collaboration. Today we congratulate the Qikiqtani Inuit Association, the Governments of Canada and Nunavut, and all organizations that contributed to the recently announced final boundary agreement for the area. Shell’s contribution of 860,000 hectares of offshore rights to the Nature Conservancy of Canada last year helped enable conservation of this wider marine protected area.
Explore more: www.shell.ca/conservation
next issue JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2018
Battle Island Lighthouse, off the north shore of Lake Superior (top). The Itijjagiaq Trail (above) runs between Iqaluit and Kimmirut on southern Baffin Island, Nunavut.
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“While the railway facilitated Canada’s economic ambitions, the Great Trail celebrates its natural splendour,” wrote Fraser Los in The Story of Canada in 150 Objects, the special issue published in early 2017 by Canadian Geographic and The Walrus in recognition of the nation’s sesquicentennial. The comparison of the monumental transcontinental railway built more than a century ago and the world’s longest recreational trail network, originally known as the Trans Canada Trail when the initiative was launched 25 years ago, is apt. Completely connected from coast to coast to coast this past August, the 24,000-kilometre Great Trail, which encompasses greenways, waterways and roadways through urban, rural and wilderness landscapes, links Canadians not only to each other but also to the country’s geography, history and cultures. In honour of the network’s milestone anniversary and its completion, the January/ February 2018 issue will celebrate the diversity of both its trails and its users. From east to west: writer Karen Pinchin and photographer Nick Hawkins explore the terrestrial-marine ecosystem connectivity embodied by the trails along the coast of the Bay of Fundy in New Brunswick; writer Ossie Michelin and photographer David Kilabuk trace the history and culture of Nunavut’s wilderness Itijjagiaq Trail; writer Dianne Whelan and photographers Gary and Joanie McGuffin pay homage to Ontario’s Lake Superior Water Trail in a stunning photo essay; writer Tim Querengesser and photographer Amber Bracken describe the urban Edmonton River Valley Trail through a series of mini-profiles of its diverse users; and writer Suzanne Morphet and photographer Robin O’Neill capture the essence of the grand railway history and dramatic landscapes of British Columbia’s Cowichan Valley Trail. There’s much more, too. Combined, it’s a tribute to the trails that literally connect us all. Subscribe or renew today at canadiangeographic.ca/subscribe or by calling 1-800-267-0824. The January/February 2018 issue hits newsstands January 8. CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC
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TOP: GARY AND JOANIE MCGUFFIN; BOTTOM: DAVID KILABUK
Canadian Geographic celebrates The Great Trail
our country REVEALING CANADA
The Cree singer-songwriter explains what makes Saskatchewan’s Qu’Appelle Valley so special to her
What’s your favourite Canadian place? Tell us on Twitter (@CanGeo) using the hashtag #ShareCanGeo. Or share it with us on Facebook (facebook.com/cangeo). 82
CANADIAN GEOGRAPHIC NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2017
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I’m originally from Saskatchewan, but I didn’t grow up there, didn’t have a consciousness of it until I was reunited with family in the Qu’Appelle Valley. My favourite season in the valley is summer because it’s so very beautiful. I remember sunsets that were blue and purple and red, and a landscape golden with mustard and wheat. To have all that flat prairie and then see those rolling hills with those spectacular colours has always given me not only a sense of home and family but also of holiness. I’ve always been interested in people’s relationship to the creator, and when my dad and I would talk about that, he would always start by saying, “We’ll go to a clean spot,” which we’d do, then we’d pray and then we’d talk. But it wasn’t like some stiff movie-Indian thing — it was always this precious, gentle, almost feminine feel for the mind behind all nature. There’s so little that has been properly described to non-Indian people about our relationship to the land through a sense of the sacred, and that was something I always loved discussing with the people who had been raised with teepees and buckboards, the people who were old when I was young, as we sat surrounded by coulees where there was sweetgrass growing. I’ve written quite a few songs about this area, but I think “Soldier Blue” has lyrics apropos to my dad’s idea of going to a clean spot to enjoy the connection with nature: Yes this is my country Young and growing free and flowing sea to sea Yes this is my country Ripe and bearing miracles in every pond and tree —As told to Harry Wilson
MARK STEPHENSON/CAN GEO
Buffy Sainte-Marie
KOVYRINA/SHUTTERSTOCK
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