Like the sound of a drum: Aboriginal cultural politics in Denendeh and Nunavut

334 Pages·2006·7.13 MB·English

by  Kulchyski, Peter

LIKE THE SOUND OF A DRUM
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LIKE THE SOUND OF A DRUM
ABORIGINAL CULTURAL POLITICS IN
DENENDEH AND NUNAVUT
PETER KULCHYSKI
UNIVERSITY OF MANITOBA PRESS
© Peter Kulchyski, 2005
University of Manitoba Press
Winnipeg, Manitoba R3T 2N2 Canada
www.umanitoba.ca/uofmpress
Printed in Canada on acid-free paper by Friesens.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any
form or by any means, or stored in a database and retrieval system, without the prior
written permission of the University of Manitoba Press, or, in the case of photocopy-
ing or other reprographic copying, a licence from ACCESS COPYRIGHT (Canadian
Copyright Licensing Agency), 6 Adelaide Street East, Suite 900, Toronto, Ontario
M5C 1H6, www.accesscopyright.ca.
Cover Design: Doowah Design
Cover Photograph: Courtesy Peter Kulchyski
Text Design: Sharon Caseburg
Maps: Weldon Hiebert
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Kulchyski, Peter Keith, 1959-
Like the sound of a drum : Aboriginal cultural politics in Denendeh and
Nunavut / Peter Kulchyski.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-88755-178-5 (bound)
ISBN 0-88755-686-8 (pbk.)
1. Tinne Indians. 2. Inuit. 3. Politics and culture—Northwest
Territories. 4. Politics and culture—Nunavut. 5. Tinne Indians—Government
relations. 6. Inuit—Canada—Government relations. 7. Nunavut—Politics and
government. 8. Northwest Territories—Politics and government. I. Title.
E78.N79K84 2005 971.9'3004972 C2005-905621-5
This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Canadian Federation
for the Humanities and Social Sciences, through the Aid to Scholarly Publications Pro-
gramme, using funds provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council
of Canada.
The University of Manitoba Press gratefully acknowledges the financial support for its
publication program provided by the Government of Canada through the Book Pub-
lishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP); the Canada Council for the Arts;
the Manitoba Arts Council; and the Manitoba Department of Culture, Heritage and
Tourism.
CONTENTS
List of Illustrations / vi
Acknowledgements / vii
Introduction / 3
Part One: Names and Places
Chapter One: The Story Lines 731
Chapter Two: The Laws of the Land 7 77
Part Two: Concerning the Coming Community
Chapter Three: The Long Road from Fort Simpson to
LiidliKoe/119
Chapter Four: On the Ramparts at Fort Good Hope 7151
Chapter Five: A Certain Kind of Writing in Panniqtuuq 7 187
Part Three: Altered States
Chapter Six: An Essay Concerning Aboriginal Self-Government in
Denendeh and Nunavut 7229
Epilogue: Still Hunting Stories 7 275
Endnotes/281
Bibliography 7 2 89
Index 7 297
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Except where otherwise indicated, all photographs courtesy Peter
Kulchyski. Maps by Weldon Hiebert.
Map of Nunavut / xii
Map of Denendeh / xiii
Following page 116
The Sahtu region
Flats at Fort Simpson
Treaty day
Yellowknife
Folk on the Rocks festival
Deline on Sahtu
Dene Summer Games (photo: E. Fajber)
Tea boiling (photo: E. Fajber)
Fort Good Hope band office
Fort Good Hope
Drying fish (photo: E. Fajber)
The Ramparts
The Ramparts
Colville Lake
Colville Lake
Graveyard
Airstrip
Panniqtuuq
Pangnirtung Inuit Co-op
Pangnirtung radio station
View from Panniqtuuq
Pangnirtung Fiord
Seal hunt
Near Avataqtu
Pangnirtung Pass
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thank you. Merci. Nia:wehn. Chi meegwetch. Masi cho. Qoyanamii paa-
luk. A hunter and artist of my acquaintance, Jaco Ishulutak, teaches me that
what some cultures don't practise can be as revealing about their character
as what they do. Traditionally, Inuit rarely said qoyanamii. They didn't
have to. The occasional smile of gratitude was enough to acknowledge
something that never had to be said. The formal politeness of acknowl-
edgement, so insisted upon by Qallunaat/non-Inuit, had no place in Inuit
social relations because the bonds between people were too close.
But then, I have also heard those words of gratitude used with great rev-
erence in many different languages, including Aboriginal languages. The
thanksgiving address is one of the most powerful and beautiful moments of
Haudenosaunee peoples. It reminds us that giving thanks itself can be an
art form. So I will begin with some words of deep gratitude to those from
whom I have learned, my teachers:
My first teachers were my brothers: Tim, my first, best, and closest
friend, who taught love of knowledge, reading and ethics, Greg who taught
humility and the gentle way, and Wayne who taught rebellion. My mother,
Gladys Simard, taught me to fight against all odds to live the good life. My
sister L'Annie taught me about courage, my sister Kelly determination.
My father John taught me about laughter and dignity, and showed me
too clearly the path of self-destruction. All have taught me that material
vill LIKE THE SOUND OF A DRUM
deprivation, however bitter its sting and enduring its scars, does not have
to lead to a loss of integrity or the death of spirit.
In San Antonio School in Bissett, Manitoba, my friends Michelle Petznic
and Barbara Kirten were gifted classmates. My teacher John Jack, as well as
offering as many lessons as he could pack into a one-room school, taught
about the value of school to the building of community.
At the government-run residential school Frontier Collegiate in Cran-
berry Portage, Manitoba, my friends James Kemp, Andrea Long, Rudy
Subedar, and Christine Magnussen (now Bennett) were intellectual peers
of the first order. I was befriended by many teachers including Sig Ericson,
Peter Falk, Gwen Reimer, Jim Davies, and, especially, one of my first great
mentors, now an elected politician, Gerard Jennissen.
While at the University of Winnipeg I traded ideas and enthusiasms
with Lori Turner, Kim Sawchuk, Fernanda Ferreira, Anne Moore, Janine
Tschuncky, K. George Godwin, and especially my extraordinary friend
Janet Sarson. I studied geography with Miriam Lo-Lim and Paul Evans,
history with Robert Wagner, English with Paul Swayze, sociology with
Paul Stevenson, and came to love the study of politics and political theory
through the inspiration provided by a second mentor, Arthur Kroker.
At York University I studied social and political theory with Ato Sekyi-
Otu, Edgar Dosman, John O'Neill, Neal Wood, Ellen Meiksens Wood;
admittedly a mixed bunch, all of whom made important contributions to
my world view and in whose shadows I have been grateful to stand. My
peers there, and close friends, included Gail Faurschau, Michael Dartnell,
Lorraine Gautier, Laurel Whitney, Frances Abele, Michael Kutner, Rich
Wellen, Deborah Lee Simmons, Mark Fortier, and that luminous, viva-
cious, and generous intellect, Shannon Bell. Many of these have gone on
to make outstanding intellectual contributions to Canadian academic life.
In my years there I engaged in union activism from which I learned many
invaluable life lessons. My sisters and brothers in the Canadian Union
of Educational Workers included my dear friends Gill Teiman, Leslie
Saunders, Pat Rogers, Kevin Moroney, Bruce Curtis, Larry Lyons, Brian
Robinson, Charles Doyon, Margaret Little. Julia Emberley had a determi-
nate influence on me in these years and belongs in a category of her own,
in more ways than one! So, too, Elizabeth Fajber, whose help and insights
impressed themselves on the best parts of my character.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ix
In a place of her own in my heart and mind also belongs a person who
transcends the categories of mentor and friend, deserving a paragraph for
herself and for whom no words of praise will suffice, Himani Bannerji.
Over years of engagement as a scholar with gainful employment, I
have benefited from conversation with a range of friends and brilliant col-
leagues in and out of Native Studies. Among those out of Native Stud-
ies, I will mention Bruce Hodgins, Jonathon Bordo, John Wadland, Julia
Harrison, Joan Sangster, Robert Campbell, Deborah Berrill, as well as
a courageous group of principled scholars including John Fekete, David
Morrison, George Nader, Sean Kane, and the insightful inspirational
intellect, Andrew Wernick, whose friendship I prize beyond measure.
Michael Berrill and I once tried to prove that friendship could go beyond
politics. Our experiment failed. An early draft of this work was carved in
1993-94 out of the currents that swirl around Cornell University: my col-
leagues in the A.D. White Society for the Humanities that year included
Martin Bernal, Richard Burton, Ruth Vanita, Mark Perlman; I am grate-
ful for the encouragement of Susan Buck-Morss, who read portions of
an earlier draft of this manuscript, and Jonathon Culler. It was a singular
pleasure to befriend and work with Kathryn Shandley. Finally, though he
will not detect his influence as strongly in this work, the then Director of
the Society, Dominick LaCapra, will find traces of his insights throughout
my—admittedly meagre—scholarly productions: this is the best tribute
I can offer such a careful and ambitious thinker. Elizabeth Povinelli and
George Wenzel provided helpful comments on an earlier draft. I have also
been a grateful recipient of the friendship of Gerald Maclean and Donna
Landry.
Frank Tough (whom I've studied under and with at Frontier, the Uni-
versity of Winnipeg, York University, and at the University of Saskatche-
wan!) deserves mention first of those inside of Native Studies, since I have
worked with him longest. In my year at the University of Saskatchewan I
had the pleasure to teach beside him as well as James Waldram and Win-
ona Stevenson. At Trent University I owe Marlene Brant Castellano innu-
merable thanks for support and inspiration. There I had the great pleasure
of teaching beside Rodney Bobiwash, Don McCaskill, Paul Bourgeois,
Shirley Williams, Edna Manitawabi, Tom Jewiss, Colleen Youngs, and,
also among the most insightful, honourable and courageous of scholars
I know, John Milloy. At the University of Manitoba the motley crew I