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magazine / apr10
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April 2010 issue |
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EDITOR’S NOTEBOOK
Passages in time
The archipelago of Haida Gwaii has been profiled in this magazine, by my count, at least five times in
the past three decades. In each case, we signalled a benchmark in how the Haida people — who thrived, suffered,
survived and are thriving again — have regained control over their lives and lands.
Near the southernmost tip of the archipelago, in a sheltered cove on the lee side of SGang Gwaay, which means Red Cod
Island, lies the once smallpox-ridden, now abandoned village site of SGang Gwaay Llnagaay. Here stands the largest remaining
group of original Haida totem and memorial poles, each a genealogical tribute, like a family crest honouring the dead.
The successful proposal by the British Columbia government to include SGang Gwaay on the United Nations Educational,
Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage List was covered in a 1981 CG feature story.
The passing years have seen the increased assertion, recognition and sustaining of Haida culture and territory. Some
1,470 square kilometres, roughly 15 percent of the archipelago, was formalized in 1988 as the Gwaii Haanas National Park
Reserve and Haida Heritage Site, a protected region co-managed by the Council of the Haida Nation and the Government of
Canada. With the national park reserve came more funding for archaeology and site preservation. Some of the SGang Gwaay
poles were shored up, but all have been deliberately left to decay naturally in the coastal rain forest climate, as per Haida
tradition. CG reported on this in 1996.
A culture’s art is a clear indication of its strength and stability, and the carved and painted artworks of the Haida —
totem poles, sculptures, masks and bentwood boxes — are no exception. At the core of this art and culture are
the old-growth western red cedars that punctuate Haida Gwaii’s forest-draped isles. Decades of industrial-strength logging have
reduced the supply of these straight, knotless trees, some more than a metre in diameter and four centuries old, to clumps
of rare remainders. The Haida Nation assigned a squad of forest guardians to survey, catalogue and ensure a 1,000-year
supply of the monumental trees. Those cedar warriors were
portrayed by CG in 2007.
One of the most poignant transformations of a Haida Gwaii cedar is the Loo Taas (“wave-eater”), a canoe like no other.
Carved from a single log by renowned Haida artist Bill Reid, the 15-metre canoe is a cultural icon: launched during Expo
86, then paddled 950 kilometres back to Haida Gwaii; taken up the Seine River in France in a celebration of aboriginal art
in 1989; used to carry Reid’s ashes to his burial site in 1998;
and now a fixture at the annual Skidegate Days summer festival,
which was featured in CG in 2008.
The Haida have long carved out their existence from the riches of the forest, the intertidal seashore and the ocean,
and they view land and sea as inseparable. In this issue’s cover story, we celebrate two more benchmarks:
the formal creation of the jointly managed Gwaii Haanas National Marine Conservation Area Reserve, which expands
the protected area to 5,000 square kilometres, from mountaintop to sea bottom; and a change in the official name of
the archipelago — formerly the Queen Charlotte Islands, henceforth, Haida Gwaii.
— Eric Harris
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