3] In order to address this question you will need to refer to Sparke’s article, “A Map that Roared and an Original Atlas: Canada, Cartography, and the Narration of Nation.” You can easily find this article online. Read the section titled: “Contrapuntal Cartographies” (468 – 470). Write a blog that explains Sparke’s analysis of what Judge McEachern might have meant by this statement: “We’ll call this the map that roared.”
4] In the last lesson I ask some of you, “what is your first response to Robinson’s story about the white and black twins in context with our course theme of investigating intersections where story and literature meet.” I asked, what do you make of this “stolen piece of paper”? Now that we have contextualized that story with some historical narratives and explored ideas about questions of authenticity and the necessity to “get the story right” – how have your insights into that story changed?

 

While my blog post is primarily a response to questions 3, I have decided to include question 4 because , I believe, there is a relationship between the two.

 

Sparke’s use of the term “contrapuntal” in describing the idea of subversive  maps  is immensely instrumental (no pun intended) in understanding his way of looking at the land claim trials of Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en territory in the 1960s (Sparke, 468). According to the Mirriam Webster dictionary, contrapuntal refers to music that is either polyphonic (many melodies [or voices] woven together) or marked by counterpoint. On the most literal level, Sparke was noting that maps, when they offer historical accounting that predates settlement by Europeans and speak to multiple layers of our national past, have the potential to draw the reader to think differently about “colonial frontiers and national knowledge itself.” (468). Within the analogy, these different histories ,which are given place on the subversive map, are like distinct voices that sing together to produce the rich, harmonious polyphony sound of the territory or , put in another way, functioning as a counterpoint to an otherwise singular, flat melody.

With this in mind, Sparke offers two reading (or three) of Judge McEachern’s response to a subversive, polyphonic map handed to him by Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en at the start of their land claim trial.  The first two explanations of McEachern statement, “We’ll call this the map that roared” are pessimistic. Sparke argues that the Judge was actually mocking the creators of the map by referencing a movie entitled “the Mouse that Roared” or the common expression “Paper Tigers”, which refers to a people who appear to pose a threat but are actually powerless (468). The third possible reading is to see it as reflecting actual power in this act of resistance which, although ineffective in the trial, lay the foundation for growing subversion amongst Indigenous peoples.

A cynic, hearing of this story and the ultimate verdict handed down by the judge ,where he completely dismissed the claims of the Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en in a four-hundred page document, would, without hesitation,  write off the Judge’s remarks as a cruel scoff at Indigenous land claims  (like those found in Sparkes first two explanations)(470). Yet, I believe, that Sparke tells this story because he ultimately sees that the comments  suggest something deeper in the judge’s reaction to the map. However sarcastic the comment was, he still took the time to  respond to the map and chose to use the verb “roar” to describe it. Sparke seems to insinuate that , perhaps unconsciously, the map did capture, in a language  “the Canadian court might understand”  a legitimate and threatening claim to the land the judge was now calling home (470).

I think this last point, that the map had spoken in the language of the European mind,  is a key stress here and features prominently in Sparke’s next chapter and relates intimately, I believe, with Robinson’s story of the “stolen paper” (Robinson 10). In its essence, lies the idea that  Europeans could not, would not, and did not  listen to Indigenous territorial claims (or voices) until they were formatted in a way that conformed to their standards (and even then only nominally). In McEachern’ example it was the written map but, as Sparke goes on to demonstrate, this forced conformity is found throughout the court system itself. From the architecture of the space, to geographic  location, to the language and dynamics of the process, this was a sham mockery of justice that ,in reality , “served as a an apparatus of state power” (Sparke 472).

 

However, this system of forced conformity was not just a way to deny claims and pervert justice, it was also a devastating mechanism for cultural assimilation. European concepts like the courts, maps and written language are not benign examples of technological advancement. As Keith Thor Carlson reminds us, the imposition of a literacy was a colonial weapon capable of  “facilitating profound cognitive  change” (Carlson 43). Which brings us to Robinson’s story of the stolen papers. Without the time to dissect this completely, it would seem to me that Robinson’s story is highlighting this power of the written word but with added nuance and complexity. In the story of the twins, the younger brother steals the document which represents literacy and , as the story goes, derives power (and domination) from its concealment until eventually Coyote needs to travel to England and writes a book with the King. As we see, the movement is always one directional. Coyote must go to them, must write in their language, in their format. The Indigenous people come slowly to learn the written language of the settlers , and even, at times,  manage to subvert it  with polyphonic melodies, but is real relationship possible when only one side will take a step forward?

 

Works Cited and Linked

Carlson, Keith Thor. “Orality and Literacy: The ‘Black and White’ of Salish History.” Orality & Literacy: Reflectins Across Disciplines. Ed. Carlson, Kristina Fagna, & Natalia Khamemko-Frieson. Toronto: Uof Toronto P, 2011.

Robinson, Harry. “Coyote Makes a Deal with the King Of England.” Living by Stories: a Journey of Landscape and Memory. Ed. Wendy Wickwire. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 2005.

Sparke, Mathew. “A Map that Roared and an Original Atlas: Canada, Cartography, and the Narration of Nation.” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 88.3 (1998): 463- 495. Web. 04 April 2013.

Williams, Victoria. “What is Counterpoint?”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UbDunxm598  (Accessed February 19, 2019).

Facing History and Ourselves. “Until There Is Not a Single Indian in Canada”  https://www.facinghistory.org/stolen-lives-indigenous-peoples-canada-and-indian-residential-schools/historical-background/until-there-not-single-indian-canada  (Accessed February 19, 2019).

 

Image

“Roaring Japanese tiger hand-drawn illustration”. Raw Pixel https://www.rawpixel.com/image/449896/roaring-japanese-tiger-hand-drawn-illustration (Accessed February 19, 2019). Image