Broadspirit, 43

Passion for Native / First Nation people & culture I study Kwakwaka'wakw culture. My passion for Northwest Coast culture and history began in the third grade, when I was first exposed to the Lelooska Foundation in Ariel, Wa. Sadly, I had no native friends or families in my childhood, and my friends and families did not share my passion. As I grew, I studied the flat designs, crests, creation stories, mythologies, artwork diet and lifestyles, nonetheless. In 2008, a WSU course in Native American history broadened my knowledge, and at that same time I began studying the history of Celilo Falls, as well as Wishram culture, Chinook, and Tillamook-Nehalem culture and history. I began to understand how their histories were erased by genocide, and began reading books specific to this. Soon after, I began rearching Salishan speaking groups, their histories and cultures. Somewhere along the way I discovered the Haidi and the neighboring Northwest Coast groups. At this time, I had been carving my first totem pole, having carefully studied the similarities and differences among these groups in terms of art and innovation. I returned to the Lelooska Foundation, in 2012, and met with the now chief, Tsungani, after a living history performance, regarding a woodcarving apprenticeship. What I learned from our talk is that understanding the crests and flats and carving masks, totem poles or boxes is only a portion of the larger story; you must also learn the choregraphy, the music, the purpose of displaying masks. In one hour Chief Tsungani taught me more about wholly understanding ritual and artifact than I had learned in all of my cultural anthropology and archaeology courses. And equally as important, is the lesson that "making anything is pointless unless it is done the right way," so it is my next journey to begin creating my own woodcarving tools traditionally. Learning songs and dances. Soon, the medicine wheel. I came to this site looking for a way to meet others with similar passions, learn more & hopefully to make frie