FIRST NATIONS HERITAGE:
TRANSMISSION, CONSERVATION AND CREATION
Conference of the project
Design et culture matérielle :
développement communautaire et cultures autochtones
First Nations Garden of the Montréal Botanical Garden
October, 17-18, 2008
PROPOSAL SUBMISSION
OBJECTIVES AND CONTEXT
The main goal of this conference is to examine First Nations
heritage, its usage and development within new partnership researches
between community and university researchers of the last 10 years.
In the globalisation era, First Nations heritage is a strategic
domain changing with identity definition, and the emergence of new
political and cultural claims. Like many societies, social use of the
past results in cultural realisations being instrumentalized. What is
at stake for the Natives seems to lead to a particular situation. The
interest about objects of material culture and their integration to
Western colonialist museums is being transformed when Native
communities experiment their own appropriation of these tools. From
now on, the alienation and lost of power on the greatest cultural
realisations is changing. There is seeking of balance between
transmission, conservation and creation. Running down the static and
ahistorical representation of their culture, many Native communities
establish a new link between tradition and evolution. This phenomenon
is evident in the redefinition of the artisans' role, which for a
long time have been relegated to a minimal recognition about everyday
objects and decorative arts, today more and more recognized as
tradition and savoir-faire holders, and also as creative artists,
important actors of transformation. Other examples are the emergence
of a contemporary artistic expression, and the control over
representation institutions, such as museums.
During the last years we saw, within First Nations, a remarkable
evolution in their definition of heritage based on their own life and
world conception. The relations between Native communities who want
to control their own destiny and those who considered themselves as
experts, holders and protectors of the heritage, for most of them
according to colonial historical practices, are changing. A mutual
respect and recognition of competences could emerge.
Considering that decision makers put more importance upon economic
development, it is important to ask questions about the place of
culture in First Nations community development. Fundamental issues
are at stake: which culture and which development, which goals, how,
for whom, by whom and why?
Based on advances in university-community researches, the conference
will explore three themes: (1) the artisans and artists role in
cultural transmission; (2) the importance of the cultural resource as
a mean of sustainable development; (3) material culture and Natives
museums: new paradigm of conservation/creation.
THEMES DEVELOPMENT
The artisans and artists role in cultural transmission
With he cultural generational break-up and the lost of territory, it
became almost impossible for First Nations to traditionally transmit
their culture. The Natives who received the knowledge and savoir-
faire from their mothers, grand-mothers, fathers, grand-fathers got
today the status of artisans holding great talent to produce
traditional objects, this talent being valorized by their community
and the world tourist market. For most of these artisans, the
creation of new forms using ancestral savoir-faire can mean to betray
their mission of cultural ambassador. However, the new products can
keep intact their cultural references. Artisans and artists who
develop their creative potential strengthen their personal identity
by integrating the present and the past, and at the same time
contribute to the development of cultural identity by introducing new
symbolic language which express their own contemporary culture. The
conference aims at understanding, based on innovative examples, the
role of Native artisans and artists in cultural transmission, their
influence in the creation of a new image of the "Indian" outside the
fantasized culture created by the others, even if some crossbreeding
is essential to maintain culture alive.
The importance of the cultural resource as a mean of sustainable
development
With the willingness of community self-development, a lot of pressure
comes from everywhere. Economic influences are very present and often
empty community development project of their significant substance.
To distant communities the touristic model is offered as the only
lifeline. A lot of them have a museum in their project or already
opened. Then there is a dialogue of the deaf between the defender of
economic development, mainly interested to respond to the interests
of possible outside visitors, and the defender of cultural
development, mainly interested in satisfying community members. With
this conference, we wand to understand, based on recent examples, the
mechanisms opposing or gathering these dynamics.
Material culture and Natives museums: new paradigm of conservation/
creation
Due to colonization and assimilation, Natives had, and often still
have, negative perception of museums, concept that came with
colonizers, which represent Native cultures in their own way. Being
from traditional culture, based on participation, First Nations
peoples had been rapidly immerged into modern culture, based on
consumption. In community museology where people, not objects, are at
the heart of the vision, the essential role of the community to
define, use and perpetuate its own culture is recognized. With this
approach, the door is open to think about what is at stake with
culture and its transmission, the links with the territory, its
history, the different ways people are related to it at the present
time, and about heritage. What matters for First Nations, even
regarding objects, is immaterial heritage; the key signification
resides in the cultural intention and the first use of the object
(including daily use objects and ritual objects). The Elder who is
telling a legend at night in the tent, during a stay in the
territory, is doing education, not only cognitive education, but also
perceptive and sensorial education, which is akin to the Quebec
tradition holders, as conceived in the domain of alive and immaterial
heritage. Active tradition holders, being more than witnesses, are
holding an identity culture, being impregnated with the sense and not
with an interpretation of the sense. This vision offers, instead of
the intellectual knowledge of the object, an invitation to consider
the community collection, where people would collect themselves what
is important for their culture and where those cultural elements
would be preserved in the family home. This conference is proposing
to re-examine notions, concepts, methods which could open ways to new
paradigm in museology, conservation, heritage, transmission, and the
conditions needed to favour contribution which could structure the
revival of cultural transmission.
We invite community and university researchers, and students from all
disciplines of graduate studies, to send us a proposal.
DEADLINE : March 30th, 2008. Please send your proposal (Word file) by
email to France Tardif : ftardif514@hotmail.com
The proposal must include :
Your name
Your affiliation country
Your affiliation (university, institution, etc.)
Your curriculum vitae including your recent publications and those
related to the conference
The title of your communication
A summary of your communication (maximum 150 words)
NOTE : We are presently working on a grant application to SSHRC for
the conference. We have a lot more chance to get the grant if we can
produce an important list of participants interested to make a
presentation. Your proposals will surely enhance the quality of the
conference. If we don't get the grant, the conference will be held
the same, even if the means are lesser. We will inform all the
authors of proposal when will know if we have the grand from SSHRC,
in June 2008.
Scientific committee
Élise Dubuc, professor, Département d'histoire de l'art et d'études
cinématographiques, Université de Montréal; committee director
Pierre de Coninck, professor, École de design industriel, Faculté de
l'aménagement, Université de Montréal
Élisabeth Kaine, professor, Département des arts et lettres,
Université du Québec à Chicoutimi
Diane Laurier, professor, Département des arts et lettres, Université
du Québec à Chicoutimi
We are thanking very much all authors for their proposal.
Julia Harrison
jharrison@trentu.ca
