Monday Oct 17;

Hello 470

We are coming to the end of Unit 2 and this means it is almost time to decide which of your three blogs you would like me to read for evaluation. You need to select your three favourite blog assignments and post the urls on our Face Book page please. You should have those links to me by Friday the 21st, which is when I will begin the evaluation process. Be sure to have all your comments completed by that time as well.

I have once again enjoyed a week of reading through your responses and dialogues and once again, here is a small selection of some intriguing, insightful and well expressed answers and thoughts for my questions. Thank you and enjoy.

Sparke and others, such as Don Monet through his artwork above, also provide an alternative analysis to this statement, as the concept of a roaring map also evokes ideas of resistance (Sparke 468) and potentially new stories being told loudly and clearly. To expand, by its “roaring refusal of the orientation systems, the trap lines, the property lines, the electricity lines, the pipelines, the logging roads, the clear-cuts, and all the other accoutrements of Canadian colonialism on native land” (Sparke 468), this map challenged assumptions of map objectivity and plotted another story of the land, one that had gone mostly unrecognized by mainstream colonial maps. In this way, the maps that the Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en worked to create and brought to the courtroom, not only challenged the Canadian legal “game” (Sparke 471), but, like Thomas King’s contrast of creation stories, showed that another “story” could be used to narrate a place that had had another story imposed on it.

However, maps tell stories (Fotiadis 6) and mapping is now also being used to offer alternative perspectives, stories, and understandings of place, and different kinds of maps, such as story and oral maps, are also contributing to these re-imagined mappings. For example, while some may argue that the maps created by the Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en for the 1987 court case did not result in the reaching the desired objective, these maps still helped to articulate their “claim to their territories in a way the judge might understand” (Sparke 472) and provided a powerful alternative to the barren seeming colonial maps, presenting “a landscape rich with the historical geographies of Wet’suwet’en and Gitxsan names and meanings” (Sparke 474). Another example of this re-imaging of maps is the Mapping Indigenous LA project which is using storymaps to “uncover and highlight the multiple layers of indigenous Los Angeles” while making “the rich Indigenous identities and histories that are often hidden … yet deeply embedded in the history of Los Angeles” more visible (“About Our Project”). Among other things, these maps are helping to re-story the landscape and bring forward the layers and presences on the land that often remain hidden in Western cartography. Creating Connections

I’m particularly curious about how art serves as this outlet in expressing and paving a movement for certain paths, and how there may also be drawbacks when it comes to a mutual understanding, a reconciliation of sorts. While art can provoke questions and start movements, “when metaphor invades decolonization, it kills the very possibility of decolonization; it recenters whiteness, it resettles theory, it extends innocence to the settler, it entertains a settler future” (Tuck, 3). While Robinson’s metaphor does not entertain any certain future, are there dangers to character implications, and does this do more hurting than helping the situation at hand? Tuck claims that an “easy adoption of decolonization as a metaphor…is a premature attempt at reconciliation” (9). I wonder how much walking on eggshells needs to be properly done to establish similar goals and an equal perspective, without being misleading of details, assumptions, or biases. I think I can understand how metaphors themselves cannot serve as part of the bigger picture, but can only point to specific points. For instance, Robinson’s story overall, points to the establishment of the colonizers as unfair. Insights

I wanted to learn more about the symbolism of Coyote and I came across a short film called Meet Coyote, an Aboriginal “Legend.” Coyote is described as many things including: a base, a legend that governs a perception of the world, a trickster, a healer, a fixer, and a being that created a safe place for humans and animals to coexist. Listening to different stories of Coyote and learning about the tradition and spirituality behind him was an exceptional experience for me. Spoken Word to Written Word

This similarity is initially seen in the unifying aspect of Harry’s (the storyteller’s) two characters being twins, binding the two figures with the sacredness of kinship. A blood bond exists between twins, Here the storyteller highlights the common humanity that persists (but so often in silence) during first contact. It is also a moment of humility as both twin’s perceptions originate simultaneously with their tasks for creating the world. The younger twin, the thief, can be dismissed as evil or can be accepted as a part of all heritage as even the Aboriginals feuded and stole lands. This initial unity, I think, may be the most powerful moral message taken from the short, summarized version of the story. 2:4 Twins in This Canadian Land

During Wickwire’s introduction, we feel how much power Robinson assigned to his stories. As he alludes, ‘whites’ will always miss the true meaning behind First Stories, as we need to organise these accounts and describe them on paper. As Robinson says, ‘For Indians, power was located in their hearts and heads; for whites, it was located on paper” (16). Due to this difference, we are unable to comprehend the total meaning of First Stories. Assignment 2.4 – Question 2

Thomas King presents two creation stories in the either/or scenario, suggesting that one is more believable over the other. He sets up the dichotomy of the collaboration-focused ‘The Earth Diver’ and the hierarchical ‘Genesis’ tales, operating under the idea that one must choose which story to believe in to make his point.

King presents his readers with this choice to illustrate the fundamental difference between European and Native cultures:due to the nature of oral storytelling, Indigenous stories are generally more subjective and adaptable, with an emphasis on collaboration, while European stories are based almost entirely on this hierarchical structure, reflecting and justifying their societal values. He also uses the correspondingly anticipated voice to tell each of the creation myths, the storyteller voice for ‘The Earth Diver’ and the authoritative voice for ‘Genesis.’ These different voices accentuate the oral tradition and rationalistic values of the respective cultures. 2:4 CREATIONS AND HIERARCHIES

I think that King has created these dichotomies for us to examine the two creation stories because he wants to emphasize the importance of telling and the importance of the audience. He gives us this option of the more story-like creation story with Charm, or the story of Genesis which is told with authority. He is asking us to contrast the ways in which these particular stories are told, in an effort to help the reader understand how stories can vary depending on several factors. This analysis that he gives us pairs up these two opposing believes and asks the reader to think about ‘what makes them different?’ and ‘how are they similar?’ maybe even ‘whyare they different?’ Are they different because they are told differently or are we listening to them differently? Are we understanding these stories in a particular light because of our own upbringing and understanding? I believe that King is trying to show us the possibilities of change within a story – and in the telling of it. King’s Dichotomies | Assignment 2:4