Recently, I
attended a potlatch on Haida Gwaii in which a respected activist, artist and
political leader stepped into the clan chieftainship of the Ravens of Skedans.
Although I have worked with Haida people since 1998 and made many trips to
Haida Gwaii, I had never before had the opportunity of attending a potlatch.
And while anthropology lecturers at Oxford have taught about “the potlatch” for
over a century, based on anthropological literature, none had ever been invited
to attend a potlatch as a witness. So I went to “honor the invitation,” as the
Haida say; I went to show respect for the man who has become Chief Gidansta and
his family; I went to renew relationships with many Haida people; and I went to
see the new version of the Great Box, the Great Box’s child, being used in a
potlatch, as it was originally meant to be used.
In
anthropological terms, a potlatch is an event involving a change in status or
identity: a wedding, a funeral, an adoption, becoming a chief. The host clan
invites, feasts and presents gifts to guests, who witness the business
conducted and not only provide collective support for it but are also responsible
afterwards to witness and affirm the identity of the person(s) at the centre of
the business. In my case, I affirm that Guujaaw is now Chief Gidansta, and I
was with about a thousand people who saw it done, so it’s true. The host clan’s
specific crests are displayed and affirmed, told through stories and dance and
song, reminding people which crests belong to that clan. A totem pole, also
with the clan’s specific crests, may be carved and raised to commemorate the
event. History is re-told in art and dance, and added to.
I had been
told that the Great Box’s child would feature in the potlatch in some way. As a
curator, I see masterpiece-level Haida art sitting on shelves, held motionless
in displays by elaborate supports, or wrapped in tissue paper in acid-free
boxes. I’ve learned that when such items are performed by Haida people—old masks
brought to the face and danced, ancient hats worn on the head, gambling sticks
used to gamble with—something very special happens. This was initially a source
of tension (as a curator, aren’t I supposed to keep things physically safe?),
but I’ve had excellent Haida teachers, and have learned to treasure these
magical moments when long-dormant treasures come to life. Those moments of
cultural renewal and continuity are precisely what the 1884 revisions to the
Indian Act that made the potlatch illegal, tried to kill. The historic Great
Box was removed from Haida Gwaii, along with nearly every other
masterpiece-level treasure, during the years of missionisation, assimilation policies,
and residential schools. That’s how most of those ancestral treasures that I
see sitting on shelves got to Oxford. Those rare, magical moments when items
are danced, when they move, when they are lovingly held by Haida people, affirm
that although hearts were often broken during those years, Haida culture was
not. If it went quiet, like the masks on shelves, it has been woken again and
is dancing.
What
happens when a long-absent masterpiece comes home? And what, I wondered, would
happen when it was used in a potlatch, mending part of the rupture in Haida
cultural history that the collection of the historic box, its removal from
Haida Gwaii, was part of?
The new box
sat in front of the chiefs’ table, beside the podium and near an ancient clan
box borrowed from the American Museum of Natural History in New York for the
occasion. It was flanked by coppers, witnessing and framing the events, placing
this potlatch within an ongoing history of potlatches by the host clan. Front
and center in the action, the Great Box’s riveting design was echoed by the
designs on the chief’s seat and the banner behind the chief’s table, taken from
sibling boxes identified by Gwaai and Jaalen Edenshaw as having been made by
the same artist. The meal was served to the chiefs by host clan members who
made their way around the box, carrying plates and coffee pots and water jugs.
People came up during lulls in the action and visited with chiefs, admired the
boxes, took pictures; occasionally someone came and spent a long time going
around every side of the box, mesmerized. At the pivotal moment in the ceremony,
the new box was used as it was meant to be: as a box of treasures, from which
the new chief’s regalia was unpacked by his family as they lovingly dressed him
during that moment of transformation.
It was
where the historic box was meant to be, if it had not been removed from Haida
Gwaii. The new box sat, powerful and beautiful, between chiefs and coppers and
dancers, hearing Haida language and song, watching the aunties visit, admiring
the excellent pies, smelling seafood. At one point, a toddler being given her
Haida name danced to her naming song in front of it, bouncing up and down in a
room filled with love and happiness. The Great Box took it all in. There was no
hole in the room where it should have been. The Great Box’s child has come
home.
The Great
Box Project through which the new box was made was funded, in part, by UK
research funding, for which I have to monitor the impact of research on the
public. Impact is defined as "the demonstrable contributions that excellent social and economic research makes to society and the economy, and its benefits to individuals, organisations and/or nations," which can include "influencing the development of policy, practice or service provision, shaping legislation, altering behaviour," and "capacity building through technical and personal skill development."
While I don’t have any difficulty with the
concept of accounting for the use of public funds, I do wonder how to describe
the impact of the Great Box’s return in such terms. Where does “mending
ruptures caused by colonial processes” fit in such discourse? How would we
measure it? How does bringing such a masterpiece home and using it as it was
intended to be used fit into such registers of language? How do we translate
the concepts of healing and cultural strength into “benefits to individuals,
organisations and/or nations”?
I am struggling to find the right
words. Whether I find them or not, my respect goes out to the Ravens of Skedans
and to Gidansta and his family for their generous hosting at this most
extraordinary feast, and to artists Gwaai and Jaalen Edenshaw for creating such
an extraordinary work. Haawa’a, haawa’a,
haawa’a.
|
The new Great Box being admired at the potlatch, March 2017. Photographer: Laura Peers. |
Impact is defined at: http://www.esrc.ac.uk/research/impact-toolkit/what-is-impact/