Conceptualizing Native Place: Coast Salish Art and Geographies

In this program, we will explore historical and contemporary relationships of Coast Salish Native peoples to place, using art and geography in a cross-cultural comparative analysis, and as “common ground” for strengthening intercultural communication. The unique status of Indigenous nations can be better understood by highlighting the centrality of territory in Native identity, and the strong Indigenous connections to place. These connections can be seen in numerous fields: art and material culture, Native national sovereignty, attachment to aboriginal and treaty-ceded lands, the focus on traditional land use and protection of sacred sites, environmental protection, climate justice, sustainable planning, Indigenous migration and symbolic mobility (through community practices such as powwows and canoe journeys), particularly along the Salish Sea in coastal Washington and British Columbia.

All of these connections have been expressed artistically and geographically through traditional Indigenous cartographies, artistic "mapping" of ideas using contemporary art practices, digital graphic design, and modern mapmaking techniques. Examination of cross-cultural and cross-disciplinary ideas about land, place, environment, and relationship to human cultures offers the opportunity to develop new conceptualizations for the meaning of place, self, and community.

We will examine how conceptions of land are disseminated through art and objects of material culture, informing our examination with geographic studies and investigation into the sociopolitical uses of mapping. Students will discover differences and potential meeting points between Native and Western cultural systems, identify differences within and among diverse Tribes and First Nations, and develop an understanding of Indigenous peoples' ability to define and set their own social, cultural, and spatial boundaries and interpretations. Students will develop greater awareness of Indigenous cultures, but also of aspects of culture that may be determined and protected by Native peoples themselves.

Fall quarter will introduce students to historical geographies and worldviews of Pacific Northwest Indigenous nations, basic visual literacy skills in 3-D art (particularly carving) and , literacy in cartography, and design and production of artwork or maps in Adobe Illustrator. In winter quarter, students will develop specialized projects relevant to contemporary topics embedded in geographic areas of interest, to assemble 3-D art, graphics, artwork, maps, photographs, and ethnographic interviews into multimedia presentations.

In spring quarter students will work with one faculty on community-based projects in collaboration with Coast Salish tribes, particularly in Treaty of Medicine Creek territory (Squaxin Island, Nisqually, and Puyallup). To apply their learning, students may carry out in-program internships, volunteer work, or research support for tribal programs such as tribal canoe journey preparation, school curriculum, decolonizing place names, and tribal garden food sovereignty.

In general, program activities will involve guest lectures, images, and videos, workshops, readings and class discussions, map literacy, ethnographic interview skills, writing assignments, and presentations. Students are expected to use critical thinking skills in interpreting the readings, images, videos, and lectures. Through field trips to Native communities, and a comparative examination of museums by or about Native peoples, students will be asked to engage directly with the questions and contentions surrounding notions of place in Indigenous nations. Field trips will include day visits to the Squaxin Island and Burke museums, Nisqually and Puyallup tribes, and a week-long field trip to Vancouver Island.