Prompt: Each student will be assigned a section of the novel Green Grass Running Water (pages will be divided by the number of students). The task at hand is to first discover as many allusions as you can to historical references (people and events), literary references (characters and authors), mythical references (symbols and metaphors).

In my first blog, I said, “I expect that naming will become important [in relation to this course], as names have different associations, meanings, and symbolic value to different peoples”; and that is something King really hits on in GGRW.

I was assigned the section from when “Lionel pulled his foot out of the puddle” (121), to when Bursum says, ” That’s right” (129). Or, in other words, from when Lionel sees the Indians for the first time, to when Bursum shows Minnie The Map.

The four old Indians–Lone Ranger, Ishmael, Robinson Crusoe, and Hawkeye–are called by names of famous Western fictional figures, which may vaguely, in a satirical way, sound ‘Indian’; but their ‘real’ names according to Dr. Hovaugh’s file are Mr. Red, Mr. White, Mr. Black, and Mr. Blue, which correspond with The Medicine Wheel (Paterson 3.2), but may also be references to the film Resevoir Dogs (Flick 148). As you can see, King is already drawing connections, including one between the seemingly arbitrary names, or colour codes, of the four Indians, and the seemingly arbitrary lines drawn on a map.

I think this section is the beginning part of creating a parallel between the four old Indians, and The Map; one that shows them being introduced in the beginning of back to back segments–to Lionel and Minnie respectively.

Lionel first notices “the Indian with the mask,” and then “the Indian in the Hawaiian shirt with the red palm trees” (121). The mask is that of the Lone Ranger, who is based a hero in western books, radio serials, and movies that brings along a faithful Indian companion named Tonto. The character of Tonto is often seen as degrading to Native Americans, as he speaks in broken English, and while the writers claim his name means ‘wild one’ in Potowatomi, it definitely means ‘stupid’ in Spanish, so the name was changed to Toro (meaning ‘bull’) or Ponto for Spanish audiences. As King puts it, “That’s a stupid name” (71). Interestingly, Kemosabe–the name Tonto gives his boss–also has controversy surrounding it, with theories ranging from ‘white man’ to ‘a horse’s rear end.’

On the other hand, the Hawaiian shirt with the palm trees is a reference to the desert island Robinson Crusoe is stranded on. Robinson Crusoe is the eponymous character of Daniel Defoe’s most famous novel, and in it’s first edition, it was credited to him–leading many to believe he was a real person. However, he is based on the true story of Alexander Selkirk. Aided most of all by the Bible giving him spiritual strength needed to survive, he is also helped by Man Friday, a “savage” he saves from cannibals, and then converts to Christianity.

I think you’re seeing a pattern here. The original Lone Ranger, Robinson Crusoe, Ishmael, and Hawkeye all had “noble savages” as companions. Hawkeye had Chingachgook–an Indian converted to Christinity–and Ishmael had Queequeg–who’s coffin serves as his flotation device when the whale Moby Dick destroys the Pequod (Flick 141-43).

By making  Hawkeye, Ishmael, Lone Ranger, and Robinson Crusoe (non-Christian) Indians, King is “fixing” the worldview of the novel in the same way they want to–step by step.

“Start small and work your way up” (125).

Immediately following Lionel asking, “So [haha], where are you going to start?” we see Bill Bursum.

Bursum is based on two men famous for being hostile to Indians. Holm O. Bursum (1867-1953) was a senator who proposed the infamous 1922 Bursum Bill, which allowed any non-Indians to retain land they squatted on prior to 1902, at the expense of Pueblos in the area of New Mexico. Bursum Bill; Bill Bursum – get it? King takes that further by also connecting Bursum’s nickname Buffalo Bill to William F. Cody (1846-1917), whose Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West Show exploited Indians for entertainment (Flick 148). FYI, this is also the inspiration for Jame Gumb’s alias in Silence of the Lambs.

Bill Bursum’s Map has a connection to Fort Marian ledger art. According to Margary Fee, they represent different concepts of maps taken from different cultures, and since maps are a form of writing, that dismantles the distinction between orality and literacy (10). She says that while “The ledger art records the Plains Indians’ use of a horse as a military technology as well as the foundation for a whole way of life… Bursum’s map symbolizes the connections between television, advertising, media and conquest, and a way of life built on communications technology” (10). Therefore, it is telling that all of the westerns playing on the television screens assorted to look like a map of Canada and the United States end with the Cowboys winning and the Indians losing; and all of the stories told by Lone Ranger, Ishmael, Robinson Crusoe, and Hawkeye end with a Woman being sent to Fort Marion.

On judging his masterpiece, Bursum says, “It has no value. It is beyond value,” no doubt evoking “It’s priceless” from Mastercard ads (128). Then, he name drops The Prince by Machiavelli, saying “It’s all about advertising. If you’re going to succeed in this business, you better read it” (128). It’s clear that he likes its central axiom: “Power and control” (128).

Perhaps most tellingly, in response to Minnie saying, “I suppose its advertising value compensates for its lack of subtlety,” he says, “That’s right. It’s like being in church. Or at the movies” (129).

Works Cited:

Adams, Cecil. “In the old Lone Ranger series, what did ‘kemosabe’ mean?” The Straight Dope. 18 July 1997. Web. 10 July 2015.

Fee, Margary. “Introduction.” Canadian Literature 161/162 (1999): 9-11. Web. 3 July 2015.

Flick, Jane. “Reading Notes for Thomas King’s Green Grass Running Water.” Canadian Literature 161/162 (1999): 140-172. Web. 3 July 2015.

Franey, Evan. “Introduction.” Liminal Space between Story and Literature. UBC Blogs, 15 May 2015. Web. 10 July 2015.

Johnson, Carla. “The Bursum Bill.” History Blog. 6 Mar. 2011. Web. 10 July 2015.

Paterson, Erika. “Lesson 3.2.” ENGL 470A: Canadian Studies. UBC Blogs, May 2015. Web. 3 July 2015.

“Keeping History: Plains Indian Ledger Drawings.” American History. Smithsonian Institute, 2009. Web. 10 July 2015.

“Robinson Crusoe 1719 1st edition [image].” Wikipedia. 28 Jan. 2006. Web. 10 July 2015.

“The Prince.” Cliff’s Notes. N.d. Web. 10 July 2015.

“Tonto: Stupid or Wild One?” Truncated thoughts. 14 Aug. 2011. Web. 10 July 2015.

“Two Extraordinary Travellers.” BBC. BBC, 19 Sept. 2014. Web. 10 July 2015.

Prompt: Coyote Pedagogy is a term sometimes used to describe King’s writing strategies (Margery Fee and Jane Flick). Discuss your understanding of the role of Coyote in the novel.

To me, Coyote is ever-changing.

Therefore, he is almost like the center of the Medicine Wheel, what makes it spin.

In Green Grass Running Water, Thomas King uses the Medicine Wheel as a metaphor and organizing structure that kind of colours the narrative. Each section of the book represents one of four directions of the wheel: North is Blue, East is Red, South is White, and West is Black; with each direction corresponding with four states of the life cycle: birth, youth, parents, and elders; four seasons: spring, summer, fall, and winter; four elements: water, air, fire, and Mother Earth; and so forth. The cyclical nature of the Wheel is history repeating itself, stories being retold, life itself starting over (Paterson 3.2).

When something ends, something begins, and there is always transition. There is perpetual change even when some things stay the same.

In-betweenness is correlative of a cycle, and that’s exactly what Coyote is. The transience of his dancing in and out of stories is uncanny.

So even before I understood the symbol of the Medicine Wheel, my understanding of Coyote was that he presents the need for metacognition— the need for understanding or at least considering the abstract. Maybe that is an overly psychological way of viewing things, and it’s admittedly hard to define; but so is Coyote. Although “metacognition is often defined simply as ‘thinking about thinking,’ it actually denotes higher order thinking needed to engage in a task and actively learn while going through the process.

Not so daunting if you think about it – we do that every day.

“Meta” is an abstract concept, meaning “beyond,” and it may seem intimidating attached to just about anything, but it’s really just a four letter word. That’s kind of like Coyote–not really intimidating or anything just… tricky.

Hmm…

Coyote is like an animal that seems to be trying to tell you something, and you don’t really know what it is. So much of King’s storytelling is dialogic in nature, so you are participating as an audience, and may misunderstand–until you start making connections. By creating this intersection between orality and literacy, King forms many dialogues, and the reader needs to pick up the pieces spilling off the margins. Symbols aren’t overt, but appear obvious with certain knowledge. The challenge of understanding Coyote is an opportunity to learn something–but you may get tricked. The knowledge that Coyote is based on a Trickster divinity in Aboriginal storytelling kind of distinguishes it from a pet.

Yet, honestly, that’s what she reminded me of. When Lionel sees “a yellow dog” dancing outside Bursum’s (279), I thought of Jackie:

Oh so cute…

AHH, OMG!!!

Later, Lionel’s uncle Eli watches as a “scraggly dog dashed back and forth, chasing its tail, spinning in the rain, as if it were trying to dance” (289). This not only alters the perception that she may be an anthropomorphic being, not unlike Robinson’s Coyote, but adds a second piece of detail–scraggly vs yellow–which may change your image of Coyote for the second time in ten pages. Personally, I liked smooth and yellow more, because scraggly reminded me of a terrier that bit me.

Coyote is fluid, like water in the beginning when there was nothing.

Noteworthy is how she’s seen differently by Eli, who is Lionel’s elder–evoking the Medicine Wheel. Also, the four Indians can understand her, while the other’s cannot.

In a way, the four Indians are extensions of the Medicine Wheel, and Coyote is the crux. They are kind of fringe characters that are central to understanding the plot, establishing an inbetweenness, as well as being interconnected. In the beginning, Coyote dreams about a dog that wants to be named Coyote, settles for dog, before getting “everything mixed up… everything backward” and calling himself god (2).

“Looks like trouble to me,”
“Hmmm,” says Coyote. “You could be right.”
“That doesn’t look like a dog.”
“Hmmm,” says Coyote. “You could be right.”

Then, the weird looking dog insists on not being a “little god,” but a “big one!” and turns into GOD.

“Now you’ve done it.”
“Everything’s under control,” says Coyote. “Don’t panic… Sit down. Relax.
Watch some television” (2-3)

Upon reading that retrospectively, you think about the TVs around Bursum’s store, that Western playing on the map. You think about how the four Indians tell creation myths, and Coyote seemingly / dreamingly brings them to life. You also think about how the four Indians elude Dr. Joseph Hovaugh, who is “playing God” with a “garrison mentality,” representing both Jehovah, which his name sounds like phonetically, and Northrop Frye. In The Bush Garden, Frye writes that there is a “garrison mentality” existing within Canada that excludes settlers from being one with Nature, as the Natives are. Hovaugh plots maps of where they may have been, even crossing the Canadian border, and thinks he’s getting closer.

But he cannot see the “pattern”–escape from the closed-system of his cognition (Blanca 52-53).

“Coyote pedagogy requires training in illegal border-crossing,” as Jane Fleck and Margary Fee put it (131).

The four stories as told by the four Indians evoke four Eves–turns of the season of The Medicine Wheel–First Woman, Changing Woman, Thought Woman, and
Old Woman, but strictly show that they are not Christian stories. If you accept Coyote as a female, and include Babo, you got at least six women concerned with getting the story right. But I think everybody is trying to get life right.

I look at Coyote as being the threshold between reality and myth, story and literature. I look at the title of my blog site and think that’s about right.

I think of him or her as being the reality and pleasure principle. The creator saying, “Good comes with bad, but you just have to dance,” and the baby staring right back.

Works Cited

Blanca, Chester. “Green Grass, Running Water: Theorizing the World of the Novel.” Canadian Literature 161/162 (1999): 44-61. Web. 3 July 2015.

Fee, Margary and Flick, Jane. “Coyote Pedagogy: Knowing Where the Borders Are in Thomas King’s Green Grass, Running Water.” Canadian Literature 161/162 (1999): 131-139. Web. 3 July 2015.

Franey, Evan. “Angel Pic of Jackie.” Facebook. Evan Franey, 8 May 2007. Web. 3 July 2015.

Franey, Evan. “Devil Pic of Jackie.” Facebook. Evan Franey, 8 May 2007. Web. 3 July 2015.

Hug, Linda. “Coyote the Trickster [image]” trickster coyote’s daughter. Pinterest, n.d. Web. 3 July 2015.

Livingston, Jennifer A. “Metacognition: An Overview.” Cognitive Psychology. University at Buffalo, 1997. Web. 3 July 2015.

Paterson, Erika. “Lesson 3.2.” ENGL 470A: Canadian Studies. UBC Blogs, May 2015. Web. 3 July 2015.

Petkova, Veneta Georgieva. “How Thomas King Uses Coyote in his Novel Green Grass, Running Water.” Canadian Literature. Haskoli Islands, May 2011. Web. 1 July 2015.

Prompt: In this lesson I say that it should be clear that the discourse on nationalism is also about ethnicity and ideologies of “race.” If you trace the historical overview of nationalism in Canada in the CanLit guide, you will find many examples of state legislation and policies that excluded and discriminated against certain peoples based on ideas about racial inferiority and capacities to assimilate. – and in turn, state legislation and policies that worked to try to rectify early policies of exclusion and racial discrimination. As the guide points out, the nation is an imagined community, whereas the state is a “governed group of people.” For this blog assignment, I would like you to research and summarize one of the state or governing activities, such as The Royal Proclamation 1763, the Indian Act 1876, Immigration Act 1910, or the Multiculturalism Act 1989 – you choose the legislation or policy or commission you find most interesting. Write a blog about your findings and in your conclusion comment on whether or not your findings support Coleman’s argument about the project of white civility.

After looking at other peoples’ blogs, and considering my options, I have decided to focus on the Immigration Act of 1910 because I think the time period around World War I and II is very important to the rise of nationalism–particularly Canadian nationalism. Also, since others have focused on other policies, I think this would supplement them well.

Canada’s first Immigration Act (1869) attempted to prevent diseases from entering Canada, and this was around the discovery of bacterial infections (see also). In 1906, the Immigration Act tried to keep out the insane or criminally minded, as well as those previously charged for serious crimes (even if not convicted). The 1910 Immigration Act focused on the deportation and inadmissibility of unwanted immigrants.

Decisions were made based on any evidence deemed credible or trustworthy, and bypassed courts as the executive branch of government had all of the authority. Those “unsuited to the climate and requirements of Canada” were prohibited. Immigrants were required to have a minimum of $25 upon their arrival, but those of Asiatic origin were required to have $200 before even being allowed entry.

Looking at the timeline, you see a pattern from bacterial infections to mental illness to race, coinciding with WWI. Enemy “aliens” were kept in internment camps or deported. The reverberations of the 1910 act continued afterwards, as 1919 prohibited undesirable races and nationalities.

The thinking was that people of British origin deserved to be here.

In 1923, Canada drew up the Chinese Exclusion Act to close the Chinese out and let the European in, and tax those Chinese already living in the country.

After the shell shock of the First World War, and the start of the Great Depression, the Americans went into isolationism, but the Canadians were still very much a British outfit; Loyalists like those Americans who remained loyal during the American Revolution, forming a “fictive ethnicity” where one is Christian, Anglophone and white, as Coleman says it in his White Civility: The Literary Project of English Canada (7).

It wasn’t until 1947 that Canadian citizenship was official–prior to that, we were all considered British subjects. Canadians cheered about Vimy Ridge, but it wasn’t until WWII that they got their due. At the same time, we allowed Chinese people to reunite with their immediate relatives in Canada.

However, priority was still given to British, French, and American people. Asians without close relatives living in Canada were discriminated against, along with homosexuals, prostitutes, and mentally handicapped people. Also, Japanese Canadians were put in internment camps in response to Pearl Harbor, and still received harsh treatment.

Discrimination on the basis of race or country of origin was finally dropped by 1962, but the Canadian government did not apologize for the Chinese Exclusion Act or Japanese Internment Camps until 2006 and 1988 respectively. Meanwhile, Aboriginals were not able to vote without relinquishing Indian status until 1960, and did not receive an apology until 2008.

Whether those apologies were genuine is up for debate, but they were definitely overdue.

From what I have found, there is a great deal that justifies Coleman’s argument that Canada is an ‘imagined community’ based on a “fictive ethnicity” that emphasizes “a British model of civility,” occupying British whiteness into a place of privilege (7). However, I think that with war, any positive progress is halted, while negative energy is exacerbated. Three Day Road is one of my favourite books, and it depicts two Native hunters becoming expert snipers, and gaining the respect of those fighting alongside them. Therefore, they are accepted by whites in a way they never were before. But with the reality of war, and the animosity arising from it, any unity is short-lived. One returns home, and it is just as isolating as it was when they left.

Also, as a Psychology major, I am disappointed by how mental illness was linked to criminality, because the vast majority of mentally ill people are not violent. It’s like how people jumped to the conclusion that the Charleston shooter is mentally ill, as if they’re deflecting blame on mentally ill people in general.

We often think about eugenics and relate it the Nazi’s Final Solution, but Canada used forced sterilizations in British Columbia and Alberta in an attempt to curb the spread of mental illness.

Works Cited

CanLit Guides. “Reading and Writing in Canada, A Classroom Guide to Nationalism.” Canadian Literature. 4 Apr. 2013. Web. 27 Jun. 2015.

Coleman, Daniel. White Civility: The Literary Project of English Canada. Toronto: U of Toronto P, 2006. Print.

Kathryn. “How and When Were Bacteria Discovered?” Types of Bacteria. 12 Oct. 2014. Web. 30 Apr. 2015.

“Apology to Japanese Canadians- September 22, 1988.” Youtube. PrObamaAntiTeaParty, 5 Sept. 2010. Web. 30 Jun. 2015.

“Canada apologizes for residential school systems.” Youtube. Canuck Poltics, 12 Jun. 2008. Web. 30 Jun. 2015.

“Canadian nationalism.” Canada History. N.d. Web. 30 Jun. 2015.

“Dr Snow’s Cholera Dot Map of London” from The History Channel’s Mankind the Story of All of Us. Youtube. 5 Jan. 2013. Web. 29 Jun. 2015.

“Three Day Road.” Amazon. N.d. Web. 30 Jun. 2015.

“Immigration Act, 1910.” Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21. N.d. Web. 29 Jun. 2015.

“Immigration Acts (1866-2001).” Canada in the Making. N.d. Web. 29 Jun. 2015.

“Chinese Exclusion Act.” Road to Justice. N.d. Web. 29 Jun. 2015.

“American Isolationism in the 1930s.” Office of the Historian. N.d. Web. 30 Jun. 2015.

“Japanese Internment.” CBClearning. N.d. Web. 29 Jun. 2015.

“PM offers apology for the Chinese Head Tax.” Youtube. Prime Minister of Canada, 21 Mar. 2013. Web. 30 Jun. 2015.

“Facts About Mental Health and Violence.” Mental Health Reporting. N.d. Web. 30 Jun. 2015.

“Eugenics.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. N.d. Web. 29 Jun. 2015.

Prompt: In his article, “Godzilla vs. Post-Colonial,” King discusses Robinson’s collection of stories. King explains that while the stories are written in English, “the patterns, metaphors, structures as well as the themes and characters come primarily from oral literature.” More than this, Robinson, he says “develops what we might want to call an oral syntax that defeats reader’s efforts to read the stories silently to themselves, a syntax that encourages readers to read aloud” and in so doing, “recreating at once the storyteller and the performance” (186). Read “Coyote Makes a Deal with King of England”, in Living by Stories. Read it silently, read it out loud, read it to a friend, and have a friend read it to you. See if you can discover how this oral syntax works to shape meaning for the story by shaping your reading and listening of the story. Write a blog about this reading/listening experience that provides references to the story.

First off, I want to point to the disgusting quote by Harper that Erika Paterson brought up in her lesson:

We also have no history of colonialism. So we have all of the things that many people admire about the great powers but none of the things that threaten or bother them.
     —Stephen Harper, speaking at G20 news conference in Pittsburgh, September 2009. David Ljunggren. “Every G20 Nation wants to be Canada, insists PM”. Reuters News Online. 25 Sept 2009.

Suggesting something as ridiculous as this needs a willful ignorance about the history of this country. Or, more likely, it is rewriting history where we are Chapter 1 of this place, rather than Chapter 15, as Asch suggests. In his article “Canadian Sovereignty and Universal History,” Asch uses two quotes from Thomas King as the base of his argument, one is the “If this is your land, where are your stories?” line by the Gitxsan elder that we are already familiar with, and the other is that, to the Gitxsan, we (settlers and their descendants) “came up as Chapter 15 of the story… a little too early perhaps” (29-30). So, it is as if Harper responded to the Gitxsan elder with ‘one hell of a story.’

In the context of his speech, which was delighting in the idea that Canada deserved no blame for the economic crisis, it is a subtle insult; a mean trick; sleight of the backhand slap.

I want to share this video with you:

It was shown at the Bill Reid Gallery recently, in a Beau Dick exhibition (the artist at the end is Beau Dick). Although it is a response to the Enbridge pipeline controversy, it also makes me think of how Canadian lakes are being turned into mine dumps. There is a caricature of Harper – it is quite hilarious.

Harper’s insistence of placing the settlement of Europeans into Canada as the beginning of this place is in itself a trick; for then he is able to say ‘we never colonized other countries, (because we colonized our own).’ With that in mind, let’s read an excerpt of King’s “Godzilla vs. Post-Colonial”:

“When I made that rather simplistic comparison between pre-colonial and post-colonial, I left out one of the players, rather like talking about pre-pubescence and post-pubescence without mentioning puberty. My apologies. It was a trick to make you think I was going to say something profound, when, in fact, I was going to make the rather simplistic observation that in the case of pre- and post-colonial, the pivot around which we move is puberty and colonialism. But here, I’m lying again. Another trick, I’m afraid, for in puberty’s case, the precedent, the root, and the antecedent are, at least, all part of a whole, whereas in the case of colonialism–within a discussion of Native literature–the term has little to do with the literature itself. It is both separate from and antithetical to what came before and what came after.” (184)

Here, he uses playful language to make a significant point: The trick of time makes an assumption of chronology dangerous. This goes hand-in-hand with Lutz’ statement that “we are still in that contact zone,” and Paterson’s statement that “we may not be able to listen to the Indigenous stories of the past, but we can learn to listen today” (4). The assumption by Lutz that some of us tackled last week is tempered by his earlier statement that “not only are settler populations and indigenous people still meeting in zones of mutual incomprehension… they are also still creating and telling new contact stories and challenging the old ones” in the aptly titled “First Contact, Over and Over Again” (4). Using the terms “pre-colonial,” “colonial,” and “post-colonial” is unsuitable, because it is hard–or pointless–to delineate what begins and ends.

What those terms suggest is that there is a “time of attrition” vs. a “time of progress,” which is wrong. As King says, “Ironically, while the term itself–post-colonial–strives to find new centres, it remains, in the end, a hostage to nationalism” (185).

King prefers the terms “tribal,” “polemical,” “associational,” and “interfusional” to describe Native literature. The latter is pertinent, as it’s the fusion of the oral and the written, and he points to Harry Robinson as the best example.

Upon reading King, I did not know that his almost-oral way of writing is largely influenced by Robinson. So much of his writing seemed like a speech, delivered in the spur of the moment. However, I found the Coyote sections of Green Grass Running Water very jarring. I had no idea that Coyote was the trickster figure, or divinity–“Father”–of Indigenous storytelling, although that soon became apparent. These pages became magical, especially when I read out loud.

So, when I read Robinson’s “Coyote Makes a Deal with the King of England,” I jumped straight to performance. It reminded me of story-signing, for speaking is slowed down to allow for the fluidity of sign language. I must admit, I groaned when I saw how long it was; nonetheless, the many punctuated pauses allowed for the ease of breath, as well as the use of gesture. It eschewed literary grammar to uphold oral syntax, because who cares about grammar when you have the magic of storytelling?

While reading, there was the pervading sense of “this is Coyote’s time, his moment.” This reminded me of switching from the past to present tense to create urgency, one of my favourite tricks in writing dialogue. Robinson is not only the master of blending orality and literacy, but manipulating time–when the Indians suddenly appear in the King’s chamber, he does not need to say “all of a sudden” to do that.

After performing for my friend, she read the King’s lines and imitated Harper. It was hilarious.

Works Cited

Asch, Michael. “Canadian Sovereingty and Universal History.” Stored Communities: Narratives of Contact and Arrivial in Constituting Political Community. Ed. Rebecca Johnson, and Jeremmy Webber Hester Lessard. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Print, 2011. 29-39. Print.

Franey, Evan. “(Spiritual) Assumption(s).” Liminal Space between Story and Literature. UBC Blogs, 13 Jun. 2015. Web. 20 Jun. 2015.

King, Thomas. “Godzilla vs. Post Colonial.” Unhomely States: Theorizing English-Canadian Postcolonialism. Mississauga, ON: Broadview, 2004. 183-190. Print.

Milewski, Terry. “Lakes across Canada face being turned into mine dump sites.” CBC News. 16 Jun. 2008. Web. 19 Jun. 2015.

Leung, Marlene. “Pipeline primer: What you need to know about Northern Gateway.” CTV News. 17 Jun. 2014. Web. 19 Jun. 2015.

Lutz, John. “Myth Understandings: First Contact, Over and Over Again.” Myth and Memory: Rethinking Stories of Indigenous-European Conflict. Ed. Lutz. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2007. 1-15. Web. 13 Jun. 2015.

Paterson, Erika. “Lesson 2.3.” ENGL 470A: Canadian Studies. UBC Blogs, 2015. Web. 19 Jun. 2015.

Stephen Harper, speaking at G20 news conference in Pittsburgh, September 2009. David Ljunggren. “Every G20 Nation Wants to be Canada, Insists PM.” Reuters News Online. 25 Sept. 2009. Web. 20 Jun. 2015.

“Meet Beau Dick ‘Maker of Monsters’.” Youtube. LaTiesha Fazakas, 12 Jul. 2012. Web. 19 Jun. 2015.

“Haida 3: Save Our Waters” by KINNIE STARR feat. Ja$e El Nino. Youtube. Amanda Strong, 1 Dec. 2014. Web. 19 Jun. 2015.

Prompt: We began this unit by discussing assumptions and differences that we carry into our class. In “First Contact as Spiritual Performance,” Lutz makes an assumption about his readers (Lutz, “First Contact” 32). He asks us to begin with the assumption that comprehending the performances of the Indigenous participants is “one of the most obvious difficulties.” He explains that this is so because “one must of necessity enter a world that is distant in time and alien in culture, attempting to perceive indigenous performance through their eyes as well as those of the Europeans.” Here, Lutz is assuming either that his readers belong to the European tradition, or he is assuming that it is more difficult for a European to understand Indigenous performances – than the other way around. What do you make of this reading? Am I being fair when I point to this assumption? If so, is Lutz being fair when he makes this assumption?

I found the Lutz readings very interesting. They challenged my beliefs, and supplemented some of what I already knew (or thought I knew) about “first contact.” He makes a few assumptions–including the one above–but that is a natural fallacy of the human condition. In stating that “one of necessary enter a world that is distant in time and alien in culture, attempting to perceive indigenous performance through their eyes as well as those of the Europeans,” he is not necessarily assuming that the reader is European in heritage, as he acknowledges that people have different worldviews, especially in different times, or even over time. 

However, he does seem to assume that it was exceedingly more difficult for Europeans to understand the greeting performances of Indigenous people than it was for the other way around. Nonetheless, in the context of his argument, that is a pretty intriguing assumption to make. He’s challenging us to be mindful of our own assumptions–be aware of our imagination. As he points out, “The hidden, and so more rarely engaged challenge, is to step outside and see one’s own culture as alien and to discern the mythic in the performances of one’s own histories” (32).

Although saying, “Native people lived in a world where there was no firm divide between the natural and the spirit world” seems to gloss things over, he qualifies that by saying, “a closer look at the Europeans shows that their rational behaviour was determined in part, by their non-rational spiritual beliefs” (32). In his notes, he clarifies his use of the word ‘spiritual’:

“Admittedly, the word ‘spiritual’ fits imperfectly, since the distinction between the spiritual and non-spiritual world probably did not exist in indigenous thinking, nor would it have for many Europeans at the time; it is an approximation, referring to the more ‘immaterial’ features of their world views” (n. 180).

Keep in mind, Lutz is not trying to undersell the strangeness of the Europeans to Indigenous people; but rather, emphasize that ‘spirituality’ contours the lens one looks at the world through.

In “Myth Understandings: First Contact, Over and Over Again,” Lutz points out that when “comparing indigenous and explorer accounts… we are asked to evaluate written versus oral traditions and then even more challenging, to decide between explanations based on different notions of what is real and what is imaginary” (2).

In other words, they are stories, told by people with different cultural lenses. But while the Indigenous may not have distinguished nature from spirit, the Europeans confused religion, science, and conquest.

The idea of divinity, or spirituality, is something that has been assumed in many cultures over time, going all the way back to pre-History. However, Abrahamic religions like Christianity are rather unique in assuming that there is One Almighty God that rules over everything, rather than individual deities or spirits that preside in different places. Therefore, Indigenous superstition was compared to “mythology” —the religions they replaced. Thus, it was considered “primitive,” according to “rational thought,” or Spencer’s “scientific knowledge” (for more on Spencer, see my second blog).

Colombus’ account of the “Indies” was largely coloured by his readings of Marco Polo, and Classical discussions of “the Other” by Pliny, Homer, and Herodotus (2). He may well have believed Raleigh’s Discovery of Guiana, if he lived during that time. Travel-books were all the rage in the 17th century, and they were marked by an outlandish fascination with the exotic–a winking “I was here, and you weren’t.”

Lutz argues “that the ‘rational European stories’ that pass for realist accounts, are in fact as rooted in a European mythology as others are in an indigenous ‘myth world'” (6). He illustrates that while different Indigenous groups became disillusioned with their original assumptions about the Europeans, even if they never quite distinguished imagination from reality, European nations stayed firm in their belief that they were superior. So, it is wrong to assume that he meant the Indigenous people were at fault when he said understanding their performances was “one of the most obvious difficulties” (32). Both participated in first contact, and the stories that arose, but “whether or not indigenous people thought of the Europeans as gods, European observers were hoping to see themselves in that role” (32).

If they were made in “God’s image,” the Natives were something “inferior.”

Now that is an assumption.

Works Cited:

Franey, Evan. “Examining the Intersection Between Orality and Literacy.” Liminal Space between Story and Literature. UBC Blogs, 22 May 2015. Web. 13 Jun. 2015.

Lutz, John. “First Contact as a Spiritual Performance: Encounters on the North American West Coast.” Myth and Memory: Rethinking Stories of Indigenous-European Contact. Ed. Lutz. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2007. 30-45. Web. 13 Jun. 2015.

Lutz, John. “Myth Understandings: First Contact, Over and Over Again.” Myth and Memory: Rethinking Stories of Indigenous-European Conflict. Ed. Lutz. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2007. 1-15. Web. 13 Jun. 2015.

Narr, Karl J. “Prehistoric religion.” Encyclopaedia Britannica. Encyclopaedia Britannica, n.d. Web. 13 Jun. 2015.

Raliegh, Walter. “The Discovery of Guiana” [full title: The discovery of the large, rich, and beautiful Empire of Guiana, with a relation of the great and golden city of Manoa (which the Spaniards call El Dorado)]. Gutenberg. Project Gutenberg, 7 Feb. 2013. Web. 13 Jun. 2015.

I had a hard time trying to distill single lines into a list, because the way I related to these stories was through the writer’s elaboration. They way they built thoughts upon thoughts—intersecting ideas like a spider does silk, creating a web of memories—struck a chord with me.

“My home was within the pages of a good fantasy book, or the home I created with my sister in our doll and toy imagining. My imaginary world was a home of sorts. I cannot say I have ever had a sense of that in reality…

Despite this lack of homeyness I experienced growing up, the ocean was always a place that I go to feel ‘home’. From an early age, my grandparents cottage on a cliff overlooking Ganges Harbour on Salt Spring Island was my home… The sadness would be there always, but the water, with its renewing waves, had a cleansing effect. During the confusion and drama of adolescence, I ran to the beach five blocks from my house in Tsawwassen. I knew that the beach was a sign of something bigger than myself.”

— Hannah Vaartnou, .home is in your heart.

“To cope with my homesickness my dreams quickly became my home and acted as a temporary salvation. I dreamed about the pink house and my grandmother’s farm in Zimbabwe. I would wake up thinking I was back on the farm visiting the elephants, and in the canoe that we would take down the crocodile infested river. Over time with making new friends, the memories in my dreams slowly started to become part of the present… The same sense of adventurousness I felt canoeing down the river in Zimbabwe was replicated in the forests of Bowen Island were I would participate in thrilling games of hide and seek…  I began to realize that I could have more than one home. After all, it is a fluid concept that can be recreated through nostalgia and collective memory. Places are always connected, because ‘there’ is what creates ‘here’.” 

— Sarah Steer, “Wherever I go I carry ‘home’ on my back”

“My first home was in a friendly neighbourhood next to all of my childhood friends. It was a great home with a big backyard, a trampoline and friendly neighbours, but eventually we moved. This was frightening for me as a child; moving my entire life into an unfamiliar place with unexplored corners was absolutely devastating. Yet, like my mom explained to me, this new house would soon become my home and it would feel just as warm and welcoming as the house before. The backyard was smaller, but it was big enough to fit our trampoline.”

— Hailey Froehler, The Ambiguity of “Home”

I have a trampoline in my story too, except it was a friend’s not mine. I found it hard to articulate how special it was–in oral storytelling, you can just change your tone. I loved wrestling and spending my days there. A trampoline is a kind of a bouncy doormat that says ‘All Kids Welcome.’

For Hailey, her trampoline was something that helped the transition into her new home; some piece of memory that represented her resting place, at the same time as excitement and play. For me, my friend’s trampoline was something new–something that beckoned, “Hey, don’t you want to jump off the roof onto me?”–but now I feel at home whenever I see a trampoline.

The idea of home is more important than home in a way. “Home” is a way of organizing our memories. Someone can recreate memories to fit in their new homes, or use memorabilia to remind of their old homes. According to the Psychologist Gordon Bower, memories are organized into nodes–an activation of one node may set off a bunch of other nodes, like when one memory spurs another memory, or even when a smell evokes something from the past. That can be your mother’s cooking, the ocean, a canoe, or a trampoline. Nodes are organized into hierarchical trees, depending on how many associations one has. “Home” is always powerful–near the center of one’s life–it can mean so many things, and draw so many connections.

A web of memories.

As Sarah says: “Places are always connected, because ‘there’ is what creates ‘here.’

The ambiguity of home lies in the impossibility to fully define it. Is it “there,” or is it “here”? Is it a tangible place, or a feeling within you?

The thing I love about Chamberlin’s If This is your Land, Where are your Stories? is the close relationship he draws between home, stories, and dreaming. As he illustrates, the Odyssey is predicated on a ten year dream of “home,” and makes for an amazing story. In a way, the journey is more essential than the destination, and many First Nations long for home in the same way, weaving stories in remembrance. If you think about it, so many stories revolve around the same dream.

Hannah and Sarah both talk about using their imagination to inspire a sense of home. Yet, they used tangible things that informed their sense of belonging.

Both Salt Spring and Tsawwassen are very dear to me, and I felt like I’ve been cleansed in those beaches like Hannah. So, Sarah’s story naturally reminded me of canoeing there. When I was young I was very imaginative, and I’d imagine being Robin Hood in the woods, or being chased by serpents in the canoe. While Hannah used dolls, I used action figures. But personally, I preferred dressing up. Whether, I was Batman or James Bond, I wanted to meet my match–especially if he was evil. One Halloween I knocked on a door, and when it opened up I saw Captain Hook, who looked at my costume and said, “Finally!” I was Robin Hood, but it was close enough. I didn’t say “Trick or Treat,” I just drew my sword for a duel. However, I was oblivious. In my dreaming, I did not realize others antagonized me. Those things become apparent when you grow up; you just have to take the good with the bad. When I was 19, my grandma died of brain cancer in Salt Spring, and my grandpa died of lung cancer in Tsawwassen. But those places are still home.

Nonetheless, you must be allowed to dream.

A starved dream, that just makes me think of Tess of the D’Urbervilles –

“She was kneeling in the window-bench, her face close to the casement, where an outer pane of rain-water was sliding down the inner pane of glass. Her eyes rested on the web of a spider, probably starved long ago, which had been mistakenly placed in a corner where no flies ever came, and shivered in the slight draught through the casement.”

Works Cited:

Bower, Gordon. “Orginizational Factors in Memory.” Cognitive Psychology 1 (1970): 18-46. Web. 08 Jun. 2015.

Froehler, Hailey. “The Ambiguity of Home.” English 470A- Oh Canada, Exploring Canadian Literature and Storytelling. Blogs.ubc, 05 Jun. 2015. Web. 08 Jun. 2015.

Hardy, Thomas. “Tess of the D’Urbervilles (1891): Chapter LI.” Victorian London. N.p., n.d. Web. 08 Jun. 2015.

Steer, Sarah. “Wherever I go, I carry “home” on my back.” English 470A | Canadian Studies. Blogs.ubc, 05 Jun. 2015. Web. 08 Jun. 2015.

Vaartnou, Hannah. “.home is in your heart.” Hannah and Canada. Blogs.ubc, o5 Jun. 2015. Web. 08 Jun. 2015.

2000 was a big year for me. It was one of the first real turning points in my life, and it included a transition away from my home of almost 10 years. Right around the turn of the century, our house was being renovated, so we lived with my aunt’s family in Boundary Bay.

Boundary Bay is between Point Roberts and Tsawwassen, and its beautiful beach lets in crescent pools of water that you can walk over for miles.

It’s hard to believe it was only six months. When you are younger time goes by so slowly. I guess that’s why home is so important in the formative years, but I felt at home there. I quickly became best friends with a neighbour two houses from us. He had a trampoline, and a great dane cross that jumped from that trampoline over the fence, or from the roof to the trampoline.

For the first time in my life, it was complete freedom. I came and went between the two houses, and no one kept tabs on me. In the summer we went to the beach, and in the fall we dealt a small trade in mighty mite fire crackers.

We would always sneak through the border (a hedge) to Point Roberts on missions for candy, and stand over it joking we were half American half Canadian. There was a house that had Canadian flags on one window, and American on the other. It served as a reminder that there are borders—a difference between home and homeland; but I knew the First Nations lived without borders, and found that interesting about them.

Being away from home, the idea of home became more abstract to me.

As a deaf boy my vocabulary was improving every day, and it seemed like that ran parallel to my experience of culture. I was going to Sexsmith Elementary School, which had a special class for the hard-of-hearing. I was one of the only white students in the school, which was mostly made up of Asians – part Vietnamese, Chinese and Filipino, and half Indian. But, while I noticed the uniqueness of our cultures, I noticed the larger difference between the hearing and the deaf.

Sexsmith was a long way from my own neighbourhood, but I was pretty much only one in that small group of hard-of-hearing students that was able to interact with the hearing kids.

I remember going to assemblies for cultural events like Chinese New Year and Diwali—there were fireworks in the gym, which I loved. The school did a good job valuing the diversity of the student body, and everyone was respectful. Nonetheless, on the playground, we congregated according to ethnicity. When we played soccer the Indians formed an exclusive fighting force so it was often me, Kevin (who was Chinese), my best friend Gevan (who was white), and Nelson (the lone Indian who would play on our side) against them. So basically: It was twelve of them, led by someone who was popular for giving everyone yogurt and hustling lunchables under the table, versus a trifecta of Evans—Evan, Gevan, and Kevin—with Nelson, our fellow outcast. However, the games went on forever; they decided when games ended, so they always ‘won.’

We were all kind of connected by popular culture, so we traded Pokemon cards in the hallway, or emulated our favourite wrestlers in the carpeted area.

I’ll layeth the smack down on your candy ass, jabroni.

Every day, I would get up at five in the morning to drive into the city to school. We would beat rush hour, and I would get dropped off at Gevan’s an hour before class. After daycare, I would go back there. I felt at home at his place, just like I did at my aunt’s or my best friend’s in Boundary Bay.

I kind of throw around the word “best friend,” but I think anyone who’s important to your idea of “home” is your best friend. Whether story signing or verbally, I always felt at home telling stories–having friends to share stories with is special.

In the year 2000, my teacher-of-the-deaf told me to go to normal classes full time, but that I was always welcome. Last year, I told her that was really important to me and my sense of belonging, and she cried. It just goes to show that stories can diverge, parallel, and intersect.

Works Cited

Taylor, Steve. “Why Does Time Seem to Pass at Different Speeds?” Psychology Today. Psychology Today Magazine, 03 Jul. 2011. Web. 05 Jun. 2015.

“Boundary Bay.” Boundary Bay Weather. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Jun 2015.

“The Rock makes fun of Triple H [still]”. Youtube. 27 Jan. 2009. Web. 05 Jun. 2015.

A long time ago, before civilization, before agriculture, before evil, before history, some young witches were having a sleepover. These were from a tribe of the earliest witches, and they wanted to find the most terrifying thing–to scare the bejeezus out of some wizards. As competition breeds innovation, they decided to have a contest. They gathered their materials, and brought them to a nearby cave. At the foot of it, they settled down; partly because they were too nervous to enter, but also because beautiful paintings from inside seemed to jump out in the starlight.

Thus, the contest began. “Bubble, bubble, soil and rubble,” one sang while stirring a potion, “Leaves swirl and cauldron bub—“

“Oh my goodness! What are you doing? It’s not going to be scary,” said another right by her ear.

“Shut up! I’m invoking the sublimate of the world. Doesn’t it scare you sometimes?” she replied.

“Yeah, but it’s more exhilarating,” countered the other, eyes narrowing.  “You don’t even have a fire going.”

“I’m carbonating it!”

Everyone stared. All of a sudden, more arrived, dragging dead animals to the fore. Progress, they hoped.

“What is this?” said the frustrated witch, whose love for potions got her jittery.

“We thought that we could jump into some animal skins and scare ‘em,” said the leader of the group that just came in. He looked puzzled as to why they weren’t excited. Saber-tooth tigers and bears are scary, right?

“I don’t want to get into bloody pulp and fur,” said the cynical witch who narrows her eyes.

“We’ll line ‘em, of course.”

“So we’re going dress as animals that they hunt… with wands?” said the first witch, growing more frustrated by the minute. The wizards had irked her – she had to get them back. Meanwhile, the cynical witch’s eyes widened – she started to like her.

“This is going nowhere!” cried the witch who threw the party.

“Not SO fast! I will conjure a spell of my own creation!” cried someone out of nowhere, holding her wand high—and majestically, chanting, “Witches of the blair, bring terror in the air.” She thrust the wand downwards, and BANG! Sparks flew, a fire roared, and soot blew into the sky!

It was kind of scary. But any fear gave way to enjoyment of the heat—it was getting chilly—or concern for the little girl—face painted with charcoal. The first witch saw the opportunity to bring her cauldron towards the fire. Bringing out cobalt goblets, she poured out some of her brew for everyone. “Tastes like tea,” said someone, surprised.

“The best kind of potion,” she replied. She was having a caffeine crash. Now, hands around her warm goblet, she could hear each bubble pop. It felt so serene.

“What the heck was that?” Everyone turned. It was the mother whose lair they were supposed to be sleeping at. She would have said “Hell,” but that did not exist then. Remember, this was a time before evil. There was no murder. No rape. No alcohol. Everyone looked to their cups, as if embarrassed. “You know that’s going to keep you up all night, right?” said the astute witch, recognizing the smell. “Ahh… gimme some. Now, what are you doing?”

They explained that they were trying to find the scariest thing, so they could spook the wizards. A glaze went over her eyes, as if clairvoyant, but they thought it was just the fire.

“I’ll tell you what’s scary. A story,” and without warning, she launched into one:

One day, a little girl was running by a lake. She had light brown skin, and dark black hair. When the grass underneath turned to a stone-beach, she jumped from rock to rock to the shore. She picked up a smooth flat rock, and threw it in the water; she laughed as it skipped twice. Then, she looked around, and saw a blonde man in the shade. His pale white skin seemed to penetrate the darkness he was in. She picked up another stone, and seeing that he was watching, turned back around and threw it as high she could, watching with glee as it came down. It burst through the surface, leaving behind ripples that spread far and wide, and the way it sank sparked her curiosity. Looking over her shoulder, smiling, she decided to pick a whole bunch of little stones and throw them in. The pebbles came down with a woosh, and little droplets splashed in the air. From the corner of her eye, she saw a turtle swim into view. It had a rock on its back, and it looked like a globe. What was a minute seemed like an hour, as time almost stopped. Each time the globe turned around unsteadily, she felt a rush. But the orb never fell off the turtle’s back, and the turtle never swam away. All of a sudden, the man appeared beside her, and skipped a rock towards the turtle. It hit the turtle’s shell and—startled—the turtle let the world fall. Laughing, the man looked at the girl who was crying. She felt like her own child was drowning. He picked her up—

A sob broke the mother’s concentration. Looking around, she saw a stunned audience…

“I think I get it,” said someone after awhile. “In the future, we’re judged based on our skin. That girl was light brown, and he was white. That rock represented her world—but also her home—that he took from her.”

Everyone looked at each other. Sure enough, they had different colour skin, but they had thought that made them distinct, not different. The fire illuminated their skin, but its warmth was gone. It was a strange fire, going without tinder.

“Not us,” said the mother confidently, “mere humans. We know that skin is only skin deep, what’s underneath is the same.”

“What about men and women?” another asked.

“They will not be equal. Men will have more power, but too much.”

“Sometimes wizards beat us at games. I never thought they’d hurt us,” said a witch, looking at her tea going flat.

“Not us,” said the mother, growing less sure.

“What about us?” a small voice said.

“We’re burned at the stake.” Glaze went over her eyes.

“Stop! Please make it stop!” cried her daughter.

But… it was too late. For once a story is told, it cannot be called back. Once told, it is loose in the world.

I told the story to my mom, who predictably interrupted to offer criticism. I told her to shut up, and pretend she was a child listening to a story. Once I got going, she was lost in the tale, laughing and falling into deep thought whenever I wanted her too. I felt so much power as a storyteller. Being able to change the dialogue to make it more visual the second go-around was nice. I found that I could start with ‘she said’ before rather than after, to make things more clear. Then, after I was done, she offered more criticism…

We talked about the transition from the story to the stunned audience. She said it was like she was the child–stopped from screaming–which I found really interesting. I cut off the story to leave it open to interpretation, because it could be that the girl was kidnapped, or thrown in the lake to drown, but it could also be that he picked her up to comfort her. The muffled scream was an element I didn’t even consider.

Lacking listeners, I told the story to my best friend over the phone. I could hear her breathing the whole time, too nervous to laugh ’cause she wanted me to keep going. After I finished, she said, “I have one question: If evil didn’t exist, how could fear?”

Works Cited:

 Linder, Douglas. “A Brief History of Witchcraft Persecutions before Salem.” Famous Trials: Salem Witchcraft Trials. University of Missori-Kansas City, 2005. Web. 28 May 2015.

“Double, Double, Toil and Trouble: Annotations for the Witches’ Chants (4.1.1-47 [of Macbeth]).” Shakespeare-Online. Amanda Mabillard, 18 May 2014. Web. 28 May 2015.

“Mature cataract.” Flickr. Bob Griffen, 2006. Web. 28 May 2015.

“The Ojibwe Creation Story of Turtle Island.” Native Drums. Department of Canadian Heritage, n.d. Web. 29 May 2015.

Prompt: Explain why the notion that cultures can be distinguished as either “oral culture” or “written culture” (19) is a mistaken understanding as to how culture works, according to Chamberlin and your reading of Courtney MacNeil’s article “Orality.”

Memory is rhetorical. That is why a speech can be so powerful, whether it is spoken by a politician, priest, or activist. Being able to practice, and then change words on a whim according to the audience, is the driving force behind any great speech. Someone may say, “How are they coming up with all this now?” They are not.

Considering the intersection between an impassioned sermon, and the holy books on a preacher’s mind, it is hard to believe the ‘binary’ between orality and literacy. The former is often considered primitive compared to the latter, because it denotes an inability to read or write. In other words, the written word is “absolutely necessary for the development not only of science but also of history, philosophy, explicative understanding of literature and of any art, and indeed of language itself,” whereas oral tradition is the marker of “tribal man” (Ong 15; McLuhan 26).This false dichotomy espoused by the Toronto School of Communication is what Foley calls the “Great Divide” (Macneil).

As the perceived difference between orality and literature is framed as ‘the key to evolutionary progress,’ it is fitting to note another ‘Great Divide’–the one between science and religion. From the inception of the Scientific Revolution, science was deemed blasphemous by religious folk. Galileo was imprisoned for his advocacy of a heliocentric universe – with the sun at the center. However, the thing that shook the world the most was probably Darwin’s On the Origin of Species. Upon hearing about Darwin’s theories, the wife of the Bishop of Worchester said, “Descended from apes! My dear, let us hope that is not true, but if it is, let us pray that it does not become generally known” (Soma).

Nonetheless, it was not necessarily his belief that we descended from apes that was the most insulting (although that was certainly up there) but that he insisted evolution was a “blind process,” and therefore divorced from God’s plan–according to other interpretations. “Survival of the fittest” was coined not by Darwin, but by Herbert Spencer, who assumed there was an end goal… which sounded a lot like upper class Europeans (Soma). This is important to know, because it reinforced the ethnocentrism used to justify colonialism.

There are other big, well-known conceptualized binaries–mind vs. body; nature vs. nurture–which are often resolved in a not-so-exciting way: “They are both right, you cannot consider one without the other.” It is like the one Chamberlin draws on: “civilized” vs. “barbaric”; Us vs. Them; Somebodies vs. Nobodies. The Greeks called Persians “barbaric” because they didn’t speak Greek, but they both had language (9-12). Not ‘people’ under law, the Gitskan were told that their land was being claimed, and countered: “If this is your land, where are your stories?” (1).

Beowulf is the most famous Old English epic poem, and it celebrates the power of storytelling as much as it does the feats of its titular character. The only existing manuscript is very Christian; before then, it was memorized by bards and recited, and was probably entirely pagan. Whether the pagan or Christian predominates is an interesting discussion in of itself, but suffice to say, both are needed to understand the story.

Chamberlin often references the Odyssey and Iliad, and this is well-taken, because it wasn’t until the 20th century that it was recognized as a part of oral tradition. It was just assumed that they were written by Homer. But in order to have as much knowledge of Mycenean culture as he did, Homer relied on oral tradition rather than Linear B tablets, a script that went out-of-date hundreds of years before his time. Like Beowulf, they use stanza, repetition, dramatic pauses, and rhythmic meter to aid memorization and the power of oration. That power is palpable in one’s inner voice.

“Hector, tamer of horses…”

As Chamberlin says, “speech and writing are so entangled with each other in our various forms and performance of language that we are like Penelope, weaving them together during the day and unweaving them at night” (151 qf. Paterson). This reminds me of two words–tulku and tjukurrpa; ‘song’ and ‘dreaming’–not known, but understood by those strangers (13-14). Dreams may be just random pieces of memory, but one thing is clear: Each and every night we tell ourselves stories; we weave at day, unweave at night.

Works Cited:

Chamberlin, Edward J. If This Is Your Land, Where Are Your Stories? Finding Common Ground. Toronto: Vintage Ground. 2004. Print.

Chamberlin, Edward J. “A New History of Reading: Hunting, Tracking, and Reading.” For the Geography of a Soul: Emerging Perspectives on Kamau Braithwaite. Ed. Timothy J. Reiss., 145-164. Trenton: Africa World Press, 2001. 151 qf. Erika Paterson’s “Lesson 1:2.”  2015. Web. 22 May 2015.

 Macneil, Courtney. “Orality.” The Chicago School of Media Theory. Uchicagoedublogs. 2007. Web. 22 May 2015.

McLuhan, Marshall. “Playboy Interview,” 26 qf. Courtney Macneil’s “Orality.” 2007. Web. 22 May 2015.

Ong, Walter J. Orality and Literacy, 15 qf. Courtney Macneil’s “Orality.” 2007. Web. 22 May 2015.

Soma, Kiran. “Human Behavior 2.” University of British Columbia. West Mall, Vancouver, BC. 1 Apr. 2015. Lecture.

“Minoans and Myceneans: Overview of Greek History.” UCSB.edu. Web. 22 May 2015.

Tietjen, Mary C. Wilson. “God, Fate, and the Hero of ‘Beowulf’.” The Journal of English and Germanic Philology 74.2. (1975): 159-171. Web. 22 May 2015.

Last summer, I went to Uganda, as part of my Psychology in Developing Countries course and through International Service Learning. I worked at Good Samaritan School for the Deaf, which meant so much to me, because I was born profoundly deaf. I could not hear until I got a cochlear implant – a truly miraculous piece of technology unavailable to them. Upon my first day there, I was greeted by a few students and one teacher–all deaf–who wanted to give me a sign name. Receiving a sign name is very interesting–they scrutinize you, and brainstorm ideas, often honing in on your most distinct–or embarrassing–features. I became uncomfortably aware that they could use my cochlear implant, an emblem of my own deafness, which exacerbated my realization that I had all but forgotten sign language. However, they settled on my prominent Adam’s apple – just a tap on it. That remains a part of my identity; just like a “normal” name, it becomes part of you.

To give you an idea of sign names, and how happy these children are, here is a video I made:

My partner and I visited 11 families, with the Head Master of the school serving as a translator. Unfortunately, only a few had sufficiently learned sign language. Many of the students live at the school almost all year round, making it harder for the parents to practice. Some did not even bother, saying that they are busy and that their child can speak enough Luganda–which was surprising: We only saw them signing, showing that it is an identity they chose for themselves. Nonetheless, each and every family member got excited, overjoyed, when we asked their sign names.

However, if their parents only knew Luganda, why were the students only taught English? I was reminded by how First Nations children were forced into residential schools. I was reminded by how my parents were going to enroll me in Jericho Hill, and found out it was shut down for endemic abuse. While school is supposed to create bright futures, it has been exploited for oppression, sexual abuse, and forced assimilation. Africans and Indigenous Canadians share a similar colonial history, where a rich oral tradition is superseded by the need to read and write English, disrupting ties between generations.

This blog is for English 470A: Canadian Studies, or what Instructor Erika Paterson likes to call, ‘Oh Canada: Our Home and Native Land?’ I wanted to begin with my unexpected, visceral reminder of “home” to welcome readers to my blog. In this course, we will be talking about the power of stories, and the intersection of story and literature for First Nations peoples.

In many ways, the power of storytelling is like one tale being told by different people: It is bound to change; with stories being put to print, the “magic is gone.” Rote memorization being encouraged by education systems does not help either. Nonetheless, literature being put in libraries is akin to stories being passed down generation to generation. There is power in mastering the language of your ancestors’ oppressors, and inserting your own native style, as writers like Tomson Highway, Joseph Boyden, and Thomas King have.

I expect that naming will become important, as names have different associations, meanings, and symbolic value to different peoples.

Works Cited:

McLintock, Barbara. “Reading the Signs of Sexual Abuse.” The Tyee. The Tyee, 13 Apr. 2015. Web. 15 May 2015.

Franey, Evan. “Good Samaritan School for the Deaf.” Youtube. Evan Franey, 28 Oct. 2014. Web. 15 May 2015.

“International Service Learning.” Student Services. UBC, 2015. Web. 15 May 2015.

 “Good Samaritan School for the Deaf.” WordPress. Good Samaritan, n.d. Web. 15 May 2015.

“Cochlear Implants.” National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD). National Institute of Health, Aug. 2014. Web. 15 May 2015.

“A history of residential schools in Canada.” CBCnews. CBC, 07 Jan. 2014. Web. 15 May 2015.