Contesting Knowledge: Museums and Indigenous Perspectives

6. West Side Stories: The Blending of Voice and Representation through a Shared Curatorial Practice

156 6 West Side Stories The Blending of Voice and Representation through a Shared Curatorial Practice brenda macdougall and m. teresa carlson On May 26, 2007, after months of research, consultation, and negotiation , an exhibit entitled West Side Stories: The Metis of Northwestern Saskatchewan, depicting the social, cultural, political, and economic life of eighteen subarctic Metis communities (see map 2) opened at the Diefenbaker Canada Centre (dcc) in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.1 The idea for West Side Stories emerged from a need to communicate and disseminate some of the results gathered from a large, interuniversity research project , “Otipimsuak—the Free People: Métis Land and Society in Northwest Saskatchewan,” which is currently funded through the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada’s (sshrc) Community University Research Alliance (cura) program.2 The nature of the collaboration that went into the development of West Side Stories challenges the manner in which Aboriginal communities, museums, and academic scholarship can forge collaborative relationships. Conceived by three cocurators from the University of Saskatchewan—Teresa Carlson, acting director of the dcc; Brenda Macdougall, Department of Native Studies; and Keith Carlson, Department of History—the purpose for designing the exhibit was to locate an alternative means of communicating research findings to a mixed audience of nonacademics, youths, scholars, and Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal individuals in a way that was both informative and visually appealing. It was especially important to represent the more intangible aspects of cultural heritage, such as the voice, values, language, and 2. Saskatchewan, Canada. Map by Elise Pietroniro, GIServices, Department of Geography , University of Saskatchewan. Projection: utm Zone 13n, nad1983. Source: National Atlas of Canada. Vector level: 2,000,000, Natural Resources Canada. Courtesy Brenda Macdougall. 158 macdougall and carlson traditions of an Indigenous people—those aspects of life that are rarely given prominence within museum exhibitions, which are typically more artifact-centered in design. The resulting exhibit relied heavily upon text panels to showcase the research findings, which were augmented by photographic and artifact displays, as well as thematic reproductions. The emphasis upon text rather than visuals within an exhibit was unusual and set West Side Stories apart from more traditional museological practice. What emerged through the process of negotiating our shared curatorial practice was an active assertion of ownership, governance, and voice by each stakeholder as represented by the people of northwestern Saskatchewan , scholars from the University of Saskatchewan, and the dcc—something that was permitted only by the equitable sharing of both power and responsibility. The sshrc’s cura program is predicated upon collaboration between university and communities with shared research interests and goals. The “Otipimsuak” project is engaged in documenting the history of Metis communities of northwestern Saskatchewan and is engaged in capacitybuilding projects by training local people in various aspects of the research program.3 By the time the exhibit was conceived in early 2006, much of the cura’s research effort had focused on traditional land-use studies, on analysis of the political and legislative processes by which the Metis were alienated from their lands, and on the overall economic history of the region—the areas typical of Aboriginal research in recent years. Although research focused on the economic, legal, and political history of the region was significant, the communities also wanted the stories about their relationships to one another, to their spirituality, and to the landscape to have a place in the project, providing a more intimate and human portrait of Metis life in both historical and contemporary terms. These stories became the foundation of the West Side Stories exhibit. The collaboration to document this particular area of research by the Metis communities of northwestern Saskatchewan, scholars from the University of Saskatchewan, and the staff of the dcc represents a new methodology for telling the story of a people in a way that reflects their cultural values, beliefs, and sensibilities. One of the most compelling reasons for mounting the West Side Stories exhibit was revealed early in the research project, challenging the existing paradigm in which Metis history is captured. Within the larger West Side Stories 159 research enterprise, which focuses on political, legal, and economic topics , little effort had been made to reflect the social and cultural history of the Metis community, including concepts about their ethnogenesis as a people of the subarctic. But these origins are in fact part of what differentiates them from the Metis of the south, demarcated by the...