Writing the Hamat'sa: Ethnography, Colonialism, and the Cannibal Dance

Writing the Hamat'sa: Ethnography, Colonialism, and the Cannibal Dance
ISBN-10
0774863803
ISBN-13
9780774863803
Category
Social Science
Pages
512
Language
English
Published
2021-07-15
Publisher
UBC Press
Author
Aaron Glass

Description

Long known as the Cannibal Dance, the Hamat̓sa is among the most important hereditary prerogatives of the Kwakwa̱ka̱ꞌwakw of British Columbia. Drawing on published texts, extensive archival research, and fieldwork, Writing the Hamat̓sa offers a critical survey of attempts to record, interpret, and prohibit the ceremony. Such textual mediation and Indigenous response over four centures helped transform the Hamat̓sa from a set of specific practices. into a generalized cultural icon. This meticulous work illuminates how Indigenous people contribute to, contest, and repurpose texts in the process of fashioning modern identities under settler colonialism.

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