Category: Book Review

Quick Note

Last week, I was asked to list my top ten books on the Geography of Canada. The results appear in a blog for GoGeomatics. You can link to this site from here. (see entry for November 13 on the right-hand side).

Meanwhile, I am expecting Alex Cole, Little Foot Yurts here tomorrow.
He has been coppicing the red maple for yurt poles, and he plans to reignite his charcoal kiln over the next two days.

Acknowledgements

Jon Murphy for his continued interest in things ‘geographic’. Alex Cole for his pursuit of traditional woodland skills. Instagram: @littlefootyurts
Edward inserted the image for me.

Last week, at Shelf Life Used Books in Kentville, I picked up Wandering Home by Bill McKibben. It is subtitled ‘a long walk across America’s most hopeful landscape. McKibben walked from Vermont to the Adirondacks in New York State, often accompanied by friends or colleagues. The book was originally published in 2005, as part of a series of small books about ‘writers taking walks’. In his afterword (2014) he describes the impact of Hurricane Irene in 2011.

“But the psychological effects linger: each season of weird weather makes it harder to maintain the idea that our local progress will be enough to forestall the press of global decline.”

McKibben is the founder of the environmental organization 350.org and was among the first to warn of the dangers of global warming. Other books include The End of Nature, Oil and Honey, Eaarth, and Deep Economy.

His efforts remind me of our effort to walk ‘The Road to Georgetown’. As we hear about changes to the Nova Scotia landscape through forest cutting, one approach is to walk, cycle or paddle through the interior of Nova Scotia, recording our observations along the way … ‘Wandering Home’ in the footsteps of McKibben.

Meanwhile, at home, we are busy picking up the apple drops in the orchard. We wait for the apples to grow larger on the trees. We also wait for the first batch of Hunter’s brandy at Ironworks Distillery. Interspersed, with walking Patrick’s retired Inuit sled dogs: Uqaliq (rabbit) and Siqsiq (ground squirrel).

This weekend, we are off to New Glasgow for Grandad John’s ninetieth birthday party.
Next week, it is time to check out Extinction Rebellion, Annapolis County.

Acknowledgements.

Heather Stewart, Edward Wedler and Bodhi who shared the Road to Georgetown.

Reference

Bill McKibben (2014) Wandering Home. St. Martin’s Griffin. New York.

On the ferry between Vancouver and Nanaimo, I noted The Nature of Canada in the gift shop. Subsequently, I picked up a copy at Munro’s Books in Victoria. It was categorized as a “Read Local BC Selection”; edited by Colin Coates and Graeme Wynn, published by UBC Press. Both Coates and Wynn are environmental historians.

The book included sixteen essays. Five authored or co-authored by Wynn, and one authored by Coates.

From Wynn:
Nature and Nation
Painting the Map Red
Eldorado North? (with Stephen Hornsby)
Nature we cannot see
Advocates and Activists (with Jennifer Bonnell)

From Coates:
Back to the Land

The book was purchased before my visit to Haida Gwaii; and only back in Nova Scotia did I have the time to reflect on its content.

What surprised me in this third reading was the distinction of Lessons from Haida Gwaii. Weiss, in Shaping the Future on Haida Gwaii, talks at length about care for the land. Davidson and Davidson, in Potlatch as Pedagogy, describe a very different relationship to the land.

Coates comments:

‘The hippies’ back-to-Nature dreams involved a certain degree of self-sufficiency which usually entailed small scale farming. In ways that they might not have appreciated – though many may have read Thoreau’s Walden (1854) for inspiration – agrarian independence had been a long-standing dream of many migrants to North America from the seventeenth century on.’

The one essay that did capture the indigenous perspective was Julie Cruikshank ‘Listening to Different Stories’.

“A story is different. It does not expand itself. It preserves and concentrates its energy and is capable of releasing it after a long time’ — quote from philosopher Walter Benjamin. The enchantment that pervades a universe inhabited by a community of beings in constant communication and exchange offers a hopeful (and possibly necessary) vision. It deserves more space in our modern world” p.97.

Or returning to Potlatch as Pedagogy:

“They lived the culture and it was common knowledge in my (Tsinii’s) time period. Like they knew the land, they knew the water, they knew the weather. I remember when Dad was looking at a tree, Tsinii said ‘There’s a tree at this….” and he would name the spot at Naden Harbour and describe the location. So they had a visual map of where the different trees were because their life relied on it. Being a canoe maker,(Tsinii) would know where the trees are. He would have a mental map.”

Acknowledgments

Heather, my travelling companion. Edward for his graphics contribution.

References

Colin Coates and Graeme Wynn. (eds.) 2019. The Nature of Canada. UBC Press.
Joseph Weiss. 2018. Shaping the Future on Haida Gwaii: Life beyond Settler Colonialism. UBC Press.
Sara Davidson and Robert Davidson. 2018. Potlatch as Pedagogy: Learning through Ceremony. Portage and Main Press.

At the Book Stop in Sitka Studio, Tlell, I picked up a copy of Potlatch as Pedagogy, co-authored by Sara and Robert Davidson. Robert is a Haida artist and his daughter Sara is an Indigenous educator. They have produced a remarkable collaboration.

“ This story is being shared to support us, as educators, to continue to move forward in honour of my father’s belief that the sharing of knowledge helps us grow.” p.6

“The Haida word for “teach” is sk’ad’ada and the base of the word “teach” is sk’ad’a which means “learn”. The connection between these two words reflects my own understanding of teaching – that it is impossible to teach without learning.” p.13.

There are nine sk’ad’a principles that teach us from where learning emerges, how learning occurs, and what learning honours.

1) Learning emerges from Strong Relationships
2) Learning emerges from Authentic Experience.
3) Learning emerges from Curiosity.
4) Learning occurs through Observations.
5) Learning occurs through Contribution.
6) Learning occurs Recognizing and Encouraging Strengths.
7) Learning honours the Power of the Mind.
8) Learning honours History and Story.
9) Learning honours Aspects of Spirituality and Protocol.

Chapter 3, ‘We were once silenced’, talks about the implications
of the Potlatch ban.

‘In the past, people lived by a strict code of laws that was defined by public opinion. Since there were no written documents, all changes to the existing order were made at feasts and potlatches, at a time when the public was present. If you accepted a chieftainship, or you raised a memorial pole, or you got married, all activities were recorded in this way.’ p.25

In the final Chapter 7, ‘Potlatch as Pedagogy’, Sara Davidson reflects:

“As I witnessed the gyaa isdlaa, I was able to understand for the first time how the Haida Potlatch was being used as a tool to relearn and reteach ceremony. My father has relearned ceremonial knowledge from the Elders in preparation for the pole raising, and he was now using the Potlatch as a means of sharing what he had learned about our ancestral knowledge with our community.” p.67.

In the remainder of the chapter, Sara Davidson recounts her father’s use of the nine sk’ad’a principles to teach us about Haida ancestral knowledge.

“Based on what I learned from my father about sk’ad’a and ceremony, I believe that our connection to our roots have merely been dormant, and as we honour and bring together the pieces of our ancient knowledge and our history, we will revive that connection once again.” p.74

So, here is the challenge, can we apply these nine sk’ad’a principles in our learning, elsewhere, in other parts of Canada?

Acknowledgements

To Heather and Edward fellow travellers, and other educators in both England and Canada.

Reference.

Sara Florence Davidson and Robert Davidson.2018. Potlatch as Pedagogy: Learning through Ceremony. Portage and Main Press.

POSTSCRIPT
Raising of the Totem Pole Potlatch …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9p64LWW85fA

When you are travelling it is hard to find time to read (except in the air). Thus it was impossible to provide a meaningful book review earlier. This is the first of my book reviews based on our visit to Haida Gwaii. Joseph Weiss, in his book Shaping the Future on Haida Gwaii: Life beyond Settler Colonialism, has written an excellent, thoughtful analysis of life beyond settler colonialism. In particular, the relationship between Haida and non-Haida in the future management of the island.

The book is divided into three parts: Pasts and Futures, Home, and Care. He starts with an introduction to Haida future-making in Old Massett, and the everyday temporalities of life in Haida Gwaii. This was particularly poignant since I had purchased the book in a gift shop in Old Massett.

Under Home, Weiss looks at the Haida departures and returns in the future perfect, followed by a chapter on ‘Of Hippies and Haida: fantasy, future-making and the allure of Haida Gwaii’.

The third section addresses Care and Governance and the role of the Old Massett Village Council (OMVC) and the Council of Haida Nation (CHN). Again, this resonates, in contrast, to here in rural Nova Scotia.

Weiss concludes with a discussion of ‘unsettling futures’.

To give a sense of the quality of the writing, I have included three quotations from the book.

‘Thinking about the future enables Haida people to address dilemmas of the present, to suggest solutions to issues that seem intractable at the moment. These are not just the problems of indigenous people; rather, we have seen that many rural communities face challenges of mobility and migration, that questions of political accountability resonate across (neo)liberal democracies, and that environmental struggles seek to protect the planet itself’ p.191

The relationship of a nation within a nation is an interesting one. Especially on Haida Gwaii with its unique ‘island geography’. Consider the CHN constitution:

‘The Haida Nation is the rightful heir to Haida Gwaii. Our culture is born of respect; and intimacy with the land and sea and air around us. Like the forests, the roots of our people are intertwined such that the greatest troubles cannot overcome us. We owe our existence to Haida Gwaii’ p.175

Finally, on the back cover, Weiss writes:

‘Indigenous peoples are not in any sense ‘out of time’ in our contemporary world. Shaping the Future on Haida Gwaii shows how Indigenous peoples in Canada not only continue to have a future, but are at work building many different futures – for themselves and for their non-indigenous neighbours.’

Acknowledgements

Heather shared the journey. John Broadhead explained some of the current initiatives at the Gowgaia Institute. Edward added graphics.

Reference

Joseph Weiss. 2018. Shaping the Future on Haida Gwaii: Life beyond settler colonialism.UBC Press.

Tim Dee’s collection of thirty-one writings on Places and People is organized in alphabetical order. It includes contributions from Hugh Brody, Richard Holmes and Richard Mabey. Most of the places are found in the British Isles and are as diverse as the personalities of the authors. Nick Davies, Professor of Behavioural Ecology describes the life of the cuckoo in Wicken Fen. Marina Warner talks about the medieval shrine at Binsey in Oxford; its link to Gerald Manley Hopkins and Lewis Carrol’s Alice in Wonderland. The final contribution by Ken Warpole describes the role of public parks in the British landscape.

This reminds me of the parks near London: Richmond Park and Bushy Park.

He concludes:
“Inequality is on the rise, and London’s socially mixed communities are under continuing pressure from ‘the invisible hand’ of the housing market to segment even further into discrete enclaves of wealth and lifestyle. Yet parks remain among the last places in the city where all users are equal and preferential terms of access or treatment cannot be purchased or parlayed”

One essay by David Matless, ‘Seaview: the anthroposcenic’ struck a personal chord. (Anthroposcenic: landscape emblematic of processes marking the Anthropocene).

Page 187.
“Holidays at East Runton; forty years ago, with predictions of a new ice age, and in newer hotting times. A beach mile from Cromer, rock pools and sand, the wave-cut platform and forest bed. A minute from door to paddle, cliff’s topping to North Sea summer icing; always a chill.”

I remember too Summer holidays in a caravan at East Runton on the Norfolk Coast; an escape from the suburbs of South-west London. Likely over sixty years ago.

Today, I think of the time at Rathtrevor Beach with our grandchildren, escaping from the Greater Vancouver mainland to the coast of Vancouver Island.

Will these memories stay with the next generation, sixty years from now?

As we walk the trails of Walnut Grove BC,  we seek the shade of cedar filled ravines. Will they offer the same respite for the next generation. Playing a similar role to the public parks in the British landscape?

Acknowledgements

To Heather, Laurel, Nic, Marcus and Owen all great travel companions.
Edward for his graphic contribution.

References

Tim Dee (Ed.) 2018. GroundWork: Writings on Places and People. Vintage Press.
Hugh Brody. A Story of Arctic Maps. p.44-53.
Richard Holmes. An Elemental Education. p.117-131
Richard Mabey. A Wood over One’s Head. p.140-147.
Nick Davies. From the Old Tower Hide on Wicken Fen. P.77-83.
Marina Warner. Binsey. P.249-259.
Ken Warpole. The Echoing Green. p.260-269.
David Matless. Seaview: the Anthroposcenic. p.185-188.