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WHY STORYTELLING IS SACRED

The story of how an Inupiaq elder’s father taught him and his brother to hunt caribou by “mimicking a giant bird about to take off” crouched within a large herd is the stuff of grand filmic moments (Barnhardt, 2005). This oral transfer mode/tradition of information sharing is at the core of Indigenous ways of knowing. This story of trickery may not have been meant for a wider audience but as it is now shared anecdotally through a published journal, it is available for all who come across it.

 

Film representations of Indigenous cultures take away from the traditional medium of storytelling. This introduces the potential for some key concerns for the sharing of Indigenous culture based knowledge through film. Film storytelling has the potential to give away secrets and may also give away interpretations or even perpetuate stereotypes. With a further critical lens, one could also ask, what were the women doing during the caribou hunt and wherein lies the evidence and telling of their parallel story?

PRESERVATION

To provide more background on this concern for transfer, Miranda Wright explores her Koyukon, Athabascan roots and the somewhat elusive intentions behind their burial traditions. When she sought traditional reasoning or background, she had often been told by male and female elders “it’s just our way” (Wright, 2010). After self-motivated inquiry and work in translation with her grandmother, she discovered that the shroud of silence covering many of the traditional ways was in fact an effort to keep them internal and sacred. They were to be shared only in the Koyukon language for fear of misappropriation and perhaps even theft when used properly. “The stories that were shared with the people of another language were not told properly. Often they were referred to as children’s tales or dismissed as folklore” (Wright, 2010). Therefore, to avoid this, silence was a method of preservation.

MAXIMIZE INPUTS

Now, sadly impacted by theft of land and loss of language resulting from residential school erasure of Indigenous language usage and reduced intergenerational transfer, North American Indigenous and other Indigenous communities are forced to break the silence in order to not lose languages and traditional knowledge. “Current approaches to language revitalization involve attempts to maximize input: A ‘healthy’ language is one that is supported at home, at school, in the community, on the job, and in the media” (Hinton, 2016). So what was likely a secret hunting tactic with embedded cultural land based knowledge shared orally within family members is now a documentary screened in your classroom or even a major blockbuster motion picture! Filmmaking has become a means for Indigenous youth, women and men to achieve self-determination and "visual sovereignty" (Fatzinger, 2016).

HONOUR THE SOURCE

This dramatic shift in the storytelling medium for Indigenous ways of knowing, being and doing comes with a responsibility for the filmmaker to honour the sacredness of the subject matter and for the viewer to honour the filmmakers. Within this, the responsibility to equitably represent and show male/female, two-spirited and other marginalized viewpoints  is also key.  It is known that there are many versions of Indigenous genesis narratives and this signifies that there is not simply one way that a story was or can be told. Recognizing the multiple truths (pluralism) of Indigenous world-building  can promote sharing as well as create stewardship.   When screening Indigenous films in classrooms, positioning one's self and then yielding personal views is important. Then introduce the film's  director and their background as part of a larger mosaic. With choosing and using Indigenous sources comes great Kuleana (responsibility). 

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