When I clicked on the website I noticed the green specks begin to pop up on my screen. It is a map of all  the reserves across Canada. I restart it a couple times, just so I could watch it load again, one by one. The end result is the image below. My reserve is on there too. Go to BC, go half way up the province, just slightly west of Prince George, and there you will find my home called Stellaquo.

Kevin Lee Burton is from the community of God’s Lake Narrows. The image above shows 3063 reserves in Canada, and with the name “reserves” comes the negative narrative attached to them. Canada’s reserve housing is in dire crisis. Indigenous peoples live in housing that has been described as worse than third world conditions, some with no running water or sewage systems. Sadly this is true, images have been plastered over the media time and time again showing the reserve houses, Kevin calls  “reserve aesthetic”.  As an “Indian” ( “Indian” under the Indian Act of 1876, in which the government holds land in trust for the Indians, called reserves) I can use my powers and sense when I am on a reserve. Okay, maybe not my powers, but with my eyes, I recognize a reserve house when I see one and this “reserve aesthetic” can be seen across Canada.

But, what the average Canadian doesn’t see when they drive through the “rez”, is the inside of the house. Burton is opening the door and letting visitors for the first time. Stephan Foster describes the use of the interactive media and it’s ability as such,  “The capabilities of new technologies to create opportunities for documentary as an art form to re-evaluate its aesthetic conventions and utilize more experimental approaches to narrative opens the door to other cultural approaches to narrative structures and inclusivity.” Burton demonstrates this balance perfectly and the photos used says a lot about our welcome into their homes. These are powerful images, yes we are in the houses, but we don’t get see everything in the house. We are limited in our experience, but still involved in the experience. As you the view images of his community, Burton has a sound track of casual conversation playing. An assortment of conversations that consist of bingo numbers being called out, a broad cast of announcements on a radio and music in the background. Foster says this use of the media gives access and establishes a relationship, “This relationship allows him to create an intimate and more fully rounded portrait of the community from an insider’s perspective. It also allows for greater inclusivity, even though the narration essentially is a first-person POV of the community.”

This is just a glimpse of God’s Lake Narrows, I really enjoyed sharing in this experience. I have to admit it made me miss home. Listening to the snow crunch, brought me back to my childhood memories of being home in the winter at Stellaquo. My reserve is right off of Highway 16 in Northern BC and we have traffic pass through it day and night. I wonder what they think of my reserve as they speed by it on the highway? Maybe they should be looking beyond the houses and look at the landscape.

I agree with Burton when he says, “Its time to repaint the picture”. When I think of Stellaquo, I think of the people there and the landscape. We are connected to the land, our name Stellaquo means “people of the cape”, our name says it all, we come from the land. So I will join Burton and add my own narrative of my home, my reserve and I will just leave it at that.

 

 

 

Musi to David Luggi of Stellakoh Photography for the use of his photos of Beautiful Stellaquo, British Columbia.

Images of God’s Lake Narrows were screen shots from the National Film Board of Canada website: taken Dec. 10 2015

www.godslake.nfb.ca

Stephen Foster, “Documentative”, in Coded Territories – Tracing Indigenous Pathways in New Media Art, University of Calgary Press. 2014