Example: KAN’S HIŁILE (MAKING IT RIGHT)
“an interactive, media-rich publication that explores the performative context of Kwakwaka’wakw customary dance traditions, as documented historically and as current cultural expressions. It brings together, for the first time, film footage, wax-cylinder recordings, interviews, and a manuscript on dances produced by Franziska Boas. These materials are shaped and informed by the cultural knowledge of Kwagu’ł contributors and complemented by essays on the editorial history of the film and contemporary commentary.”
Values
Repatriating and Renewing Connections
“This work renews connections in a social biography fragmented by the appropriation of artifacts and materials now held in places as disparate as the Seattle Art Museum, the American Philosophical Society Library in Philadelphia, Indiana University’s Archives of Traditional Music, and the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture.”
Collaboration
“Kathryn Bunn-Marcuse of the Burke Museum is collaborating with Coreen, Kaleb, and Tommy Child of Fort Rupert and other cultural consultants on the research, planning, and execution of the project.”
Revitalizing Indigenous Culture
“Community members explore how the return of archival material contributes to the assertion of hereditary privileges and fosters ongoing cultural education. This new presentation of the 1930 material does not reinscribe outdated approaches of salvage anthropology but underlines the continuing cultural practice of the current generation of Kwakwa̱ka̱ʼwakw.”
Publications
This project will be a born-digital book published by University of Washington Press in its new initiative for a digital infrastructure for Indigenous studies scholarship. It will be hosted on the Ravenspace platform, which “is dedicated to a model of publishing that embraces collaboration, respects Indigenous protocols, and uses digital tools in imaginative ways to make knowledge accessible and shareable across communities and generations.” As a university press publication, it will be peer reviewed, while community review is built into its creation process.
