The K’wak’wakawakw

By Gloria Faith Hunt

Origins• The Kwakwaka'wakw believe that

our ancestors (‘na’mima) came in the forms of animals by way of land, sea or underground. When these ancestral animals arrived at the given spot, it would discard its animal appearance and become human.

Origins(continued)

• Some animals that are in our origin myths are the Thunderbird, his brother Kulus, the seagull, orca, grizzly bear or chief ghost. Some ancestors have human origins and are said to come from distant places.

Where Do The Kwakwakawakw Live?

• We are an Indigenous group of First Nations peoples, numbering about 5,500, who live in British Columbia on northern Vancouver Island and the adjoining mainland and islands.

What does Kwakwakawakw mean?

•Kwakwaka'wakw translates as "Those who speak Kwak'wala",

ColonizationContact With the Europeans

• The first documented contact was with Captain George Vancouver in 1792 which developed as a result of direct contact with European settlers along the West Coast of Canada.

Contact with the Europeans(continued)

• This drastically reduced the Indigenous Kwakwaka'wakw population during the late nineteenth-early twentieth century. Kwakwaka’wakw population dropped by 75% between 1830-1880

Residential Schools• A rare account of native schooling,

authored by two founders of residential schools for aboriginal children, is a detailed chronicle of the Methodist Mission on the Canadian northwest coast from the 1870s to the turn of the century. Many people who went to these schools were beaten and have now died or are seriously ill.

Cultural revitalization

• Restoring our ties to our land, culture, and rights, we have undertaken much in bringing back our customs, beliefs, and language.

Cultural Revitalization(continued)

• Potlatchs occur more frequently as we reconnect to our birthright and language programs, classes, and social events utilize the community to restore the language.

Mythology

• We believed in many spirits and mythological beings. It was believed that every living thing had a spirit and had to be respected.

The Potlatch• A modern potlatch generally

lasts one-two days and is accompanied by a feast and dances depicting ancient stories. Each of our families own dances which were given to us by the Creator and passed down through generations. 

The Potlatch(continued)• One of the most important gifts of the

potlatch is T'lina,(eulachon grease). Families travel to a sacred location every spring to catch dzaxwan and make T'lina.Other common gifts at a potlatch include jewelry, appliances, and money.

• "When one's heart is glad, he gives away gifts. Our Creator gave it to us, to be our way of doing things, to be our way of rejoicing, we who are Indian. The potlatch was given to us to be our way of expressing joy" –Granny Axu

Language• Kwak'wala is a branch of the

Wakashan linguistic family and it has five dialects. Today less 4% of Kwakwaka'wakw speak our native language, but we have created initiatives to revive it through language instruction in primary schools and Kwak'wala literacy programs for children and adults.

Clothing• Kwakwakawakw clothing was

mostly based on cedar, fur, and feathers; cedar hats, capes, and skirts, sometimes trimmed with animal fur and feathers. The men during summer wore no clothing at all except tattoos and jewellery.

Clothing(continued)• In the winter, they usually rubbed fat

on themselves in order to keep warm. In battle the men wore red cedar armour and helmets, along with breech clouts made from cedar. During ceremonies they wore circles of cedar bark on their ankles as well as cedar breech clouts. The women wore skirts of softened cedar, and a cedar or wool blanket on top during the winter

Music

• Our music is the ancient art of the indigenous or aboriginal Kwakwaka'wakw people. Our music is an ancient art form, stretching back thousands of years. The music is used primarily for ceremony and ritual, and is based around percussive instrumentation, especially , log, box, and hide drums, as well as rattles and whistles.

Music(continued)

• The four-day Klasila festival is an important cultural display of song and dance; it occurs just before the advent of the tseka, or winter.

Art• Kwakwaka'wakw art consist of a

diverse range of crafts, including totems, masks, textiles, and jewellery of carved objects. Cedar was the preferred medium for sculpting and carving projects as it was readily available in the native Kwakwaka'wakw regions. Totems were carved with bold cuts, a relative degree of realism, and an emphatic use of paints.

Art(continued)

• Masks make up a large portion of our art, as masks are important in the portrayal of the characters central to our dance ceremonies. Woven textiles included the chilkat blanket, dance aprons, and button cloaks; each patterned with tribal designs. The Kwakwaka'wakw used a variety of objects for jewellery, including ivory, bone, abalone shell, copper, silver and more.

Food

• Fish, particularly salmon, have always been an important food source for us. Other food sources are berries, meat (mostly deer and elk), seafood (clams, cockles, halibut, eulachon, crab, prawns, herring, herring eggs, etc.

Housing&Shelter• We built our houses from cedar planks.

The houses were very large, some up to 100 feet. The houses could hold about 50 people, usually families from the same clan. At the entrance, there was usually a totem pole carved with different animals, mythological figures and family crests.

Transportation

• Kwakwaka'wakw transportation similar to that of other coastal people. Being an ocean and coastal people, the main way of travel was by canoe.

Transportation(continued)

• Cedar dugout canoes, made from one log, would be carved for use by individuals, families, and tribes. Sizes varied from ocean-going canoes for long sea-worth travel in trade missions, to smaller local canoes for inter-village travel.