With recent movements such as Idle No More and anti-fracking protests led by First Nations peoples in New Brunswick, the voices of indigenous people across Canada are being heard louder and clearer than ever before.
In the exhibition now on at the H漫画 Art Gallery 鈥� 鈥淏eat Nation: Art, Hip Hop and Aboriginal Culture鈥� 鈥� indigenous peoples鈥� voices are expressed in a range of media, from film to sound to sculpture. We asked , associate professor in Dal鈥檚 Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology, to visit the exhibition and share his insights into indigenous cultures and indigenous-settler relations in Canada.
Assimilation and appropriation
For some time, researchers in disciplines such as sociology, anthropology and art history have been concerned with issues around appropriation of Aboriginal culture and cultural assimilation. Appropriation can occur when, for example, images and objects important to indigenous cultures are used out of context and without permission (such as a spiritually significant symbol 鈥渋nspiring鈥� the patterns on a multinational clothing retailer鈥檚 clothing line). Assimilation involves the absorption of one culture into another, usually dominant culture, with the assumption that something is lost in the process.
So what can be made of art that turns this around, and might seem both appropriation 鈥� with images and references taken from hip hop culture 鈥� and assimilation? Is something of Aboriginal culture 鈥渓ost鈥� as it merges with hip hop? Countering these notions, the curators of Beat Nation describe the works as 鈥渦nique hybrids.鈥� Dr. Noble takes it further: 鈥淭he artists are using [hip hop references] to their advantage. They are practicing their freedom.鈥�
Rolande Souliere鈥檚 "Frequent Stopping Part II," 2008-2012. (H漫画 Art Gallery photo)
Dr. Noble points to Rolande Souliere鈥檚 Frequent Stopping Part II聽 鈥� aluminum sheeting cut into various road-sign shapes and covered with configurations of blue, yellow, orange, green reflective tape 鈥� as an example. 鈥淭he artist is drawing upon practices many first peoples would call traditional, but it鈥檚 a blurring of traditional and contemporary. [Yet,] this is not modern art!鈥� he says. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e not modernizing, they鈥檙e indigenizing.鈥�
The concept of 鈥渋ndigenization鈥� comes from American anthropologist Marshall Sahlins, who helped revise 鈥渢he predominant story within anthropology [regarding] the inevitability鈥� of assimilation and modernization: 鈥淗e said, it鈥檚 not that [indigenous people are] simply modernized, assimilated 鈥� [rather,] they are 鈥榠ndigenizing鈥� modernity. That鈥檚 what I see here: the road signs are being indigenized, made the artist鈥檚 own; they鈥檙e a kind of intervention鈥� that 鈥渄oes culturally interruptive work, against the pressure of colonial imposition.鈥�
Dr. Noble is also drawn to a mixed-media piece by Maria Hupfield. Jingle Boots (2011) consists of a pair of grey felt boots festooned with silver 鈥渏ingles鈥� 鈥� usually used to adorn dresses worn at a powwow dance or Mawio鈥檓i 鈥� along with a looped video of the artist jumping in the boots. 鈥淎dding these tin jingles to clothing was a way of taking something useful from the colonists,鈥� says Dr. Noble. (Jingles, once made from deer hooves, were later made from the lids of chewing tobacco cans rolled into small cone shapes, pinched at one end and attached to fabric.)
He elaborates: 鈥淚n archival images of Plains Cree or Blackfoot, you鈥檒l see men 鈥� wearing the garb of the enemy, the rival, the colonizer, the settler: the cowboy hat, the buckled belt, the mounted police shirt.鈥� This is known as 鈥渃ounting coup,鈥� Dr. Noble adds. 鈥淚f you take their shirt and wear it, you鈥檙e actually taking on some of the rival鈥檚 power. But you鈥檙e also inviting them to answer back, to join into a good relationship with you.鈥�
Marie Hupfield's "Jingle Boots," 2011 (H漫画 Art Gallery photo)
Jingle Boots has a third component: a duct-taped "X" on the floor that invites viewers to mirror the artist鈥檚 jumps. By doing so, viewers participate in the creation and movement of culture, literally and figuratively, and take the same physical position as the artist.
Dr. Noble also brings up anthropologist Alfred Gell, who believed 鈥渁 [cultural] object is one expression in a whole network of histories and actions.鈥� Gell referred to the 鈥渁rt nexus鈥� (the social context that allows an artwork to promote agency), and Dr. Noble points out how Hupfield 鈥減ushes this nexus with her duct-tape dancing spot, inviting us to join the dance.鈥� Dr. Noble adds that 鈥渁rt, at its most effective, is about concentrating so much of those multiple networks in something that it actually bursts with a kind of agency,鈥� he says, holding one fist inside the other hand, then pushing it out as though from a shell.
鈥淚 see movement through history and through life,鈥� he says. 鈥淣ot just history in the usual sense, because these are all pieces of stories that are in motion, now, not in some lost past. Indigenous peoples are peoples in this moment, now, constantly engaging and reworking what they encounter, critical, yet inviting our participation.鈥�
Connections and communication
Beat Nation is part of an 鈥渆xpanding set of interventions,鈥� adds Dr. Noble. 鈥淲hen I look at the art, I have to look at Canadian history as colonial history, and then place this art as an intervention in that history.鈥�
There鈥檚 also a connection between his thoughts on Beat Nation and the , for which he brought Michael Asch from the University of Victoria, and John Borrows from the University of Minnesota to speak on the topic of 鈥淩econciliation: The Responsibility for Shared Futures.鈥�
鈥淸Dr. Borrows] talks about a respectful meeting between indigenous and non-indigenous peoples, about how we can communicate and co-generate new possibilities,鈥� explains Dr. Noble.
鈥淸Dr. Asch] speaks to the political question of how we can live here honourably with Indigenous peoples on their lands when they didn鈥檛 give them up,鈥� he says, referring to 19th-century treaties of land sharing. The work in Beat Nation connects to both speakers鈥� ideas: 鈥淚t鈥檚 saying to indigenous and non-indigenous peoples to start participating, start being critical and thinking about who we are, what our relations are,鈥� says Dr. Noble.
He鈥檒l do his part to spark such a dialogue this fall in , Retelling Canada Through Indigenous Settler-Relations. He hopes to 鈥渆ngage students in the knowledge that I鈥檝e been lucky to garner from many years of working with native peoples. I鈥檝e thought about how students can begin to recognize that the history they learned in school might not be credible. What are the other stories that should be told?鈥�
Beat Nation is at the (and the SMU Art Gallery, as well) until May 18.