Haida people

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
This article is about the people. For their government in Canada, see Council of the Haida Nation. For the Tribal-class ship of the Royal Canadian Navy, see HMCS Haida (G63).
 This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (October 2007)
Haida
Haida flag.png
Total population
c. 2,000[1]
Regions with significant populations
Canada
(British Columbia)

United States
(Alaska)
Languages

English, Haida

The Haida (English pronunciation: /ˈhaɪdə/, HY-duh) are an indigenous nation of the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America. Their main territory is the archipelago of Haida Gwaii in northern British Columbia, but many live across Dixon Entrance in Southeast Alaska.

The term "Haida Nation" refers both to the people as a whole and also to their government on Canadian territory, the Council of the Haida Nation; the government for those in the United States is the Central Council Tlingit Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska. The Haida language has sometimes been classified as one of the Na-Dene group, but is usually considered to be an isolate.[2]

Haida society continues to be very engaged in the production of a robust and highly stylized art form, a leading component of Northwest Coast art. While frequently expressed in large wooden carvings (totem poles), Chilkat weaving, or ornate jewelry, it is also moving quickly into works of popular expression such as Haida manga.

Contents

Location [edit]

Haida territories lie in both Canada and the United States, as do those of the Tlingit and Tsimshian peoples. Their heartland is the two large and many smaller islands known as Haida Gwaii, which means "land of the people" in Haida. This archipelago was surveyed in 1787 by Captain George Dixon of the British Navy. They were named the Queen Charlotte Islands by Captain Dixon after one of his ships, the Queen Charlotte, which was named after Queen Charlotte, wife of King George III of the United Kingdom. They lived in the deep, dense forest of British Columbia.They live near any body of water particularly an ocean with a beach. The temperature was moderate, allowing the Haida to fish all year.

Haida also live in Southeast Alaska, particularly on the southern half of Prince of Wales Island in communities such as Hydaburg, and in large cities elsewhere in the region such as Ketchikan. Haida also live in cities of British Columbia and the western United States.

History [edit]

Old Skidegate
See also: History of the west coast of North America

The Haida were known for their seamanship, their martial inclination and their practice of slavery. Canadian Museum of Civilization anthropologist Diamond Jenness has compared the tribe to Vikings.[3] The Haida also "created notions of wealth", and credits the Haida with the introduction of the totem pole and the bentwood box.[3]

Like other groups on the Northwest Coast, the Haida defended themselves with fortifications, including palisades, trapdoors and platforms. They took to water in large ocean-going canoes, large enough to accommodate as many as 60 paddlers, each created from a single Western Red cedar tree. The aggressive tribe were particularly feared in sea battles, although they did respect rules of engagement in their conflicts.[3] The Haida developed effective weapons for boat-based battle, including a special system of stone rings weighing 18 to 23 kilograms (40 to 51 lb) which could destroy an enemy's dugout canoe and be reused after the Haida pulled it back with the attached cedar bark rope. The Haida took captives from defeated enemies. Between 1780 and 1830, the Haida turned their aggression towards European and American traders. Among the half-dozen ships the tribe captured were the Eleanor and the Susan Sturgis. The tribe made use of the weapons they so acquired, utilizing cannons and canoe-mounted swivel guns.[3]

In 1856, an expedition in search of a route across Vancouver Island was at the mouth of the Qualicum River when they observed a large fleet of Haida canoes approaching and hid in the forest. They observed these attackers holding human heads. When they came to the mouth of the river, they came upon the charred remains of the village of the Qualicum people and the mutilated bodies of its inhabitants, with only one survivor, an elderly woman, hiding terrified inside a tree stump.[4] Also in 1856, the USS Massachusetts was sent from Seattle to nearby Port Gamble, where indigenous raiding parties made up of Haida (from territory claimed by the British) and Tongass (from territory claimed by the Russians) had been attacking and enslaving the Coast Salish people there. When the Haida and Tongass (sea lion tribe Tlingit) warriors refused to acknowledge American jurisdiction and to hand over those among them who had attacked the Puget Sound communities, a battle ensued in which 26 Native Americans and one government soldier were killed. In the aftermath of this, Colonel Isaac Ebey, a US military officer and the first settler on Whidbey Island, was shot and beheaded on 11 August 1857 by a small Haida fleet, in retaliation for the killing of a respected Haida citizen during similar raids the year before. British authorities demurred to pursue or confront any northern indigenous nations as they passed northward through waters over which the British nevertheless claimed sovereignty and Ebey's killers were never caught.[5][6]

Villages [edit]

Haida Heritage Centre at Kaay Llnagaay
Haida carver Saaduuts, 2007

Historical Haida villages were:[7]

Calendar [edit]

Lisa Telford, Haida basket weaver

The Haidas' calendar:

  • April/May- Gansgee 7laa kongaas
  • May/Early June- Wa.aay gwaalgee
  • June/July- Kong koaas
  • July/August- Sgaana gyaas
  • August/September- K'ijaas
  • September/October- K'alayaa Kongaas
  • October/November- K'eed adii
  • November/December- Jid Kongaas
  • December/January- Kong gyaangaas
  • January/February- Hlgiduum kongaas
  • February/March- Taan kongaas
  • March- Xiid gayaas
  • April- Wiid gyaas

Notable Haidas [edit]

Diane Douglas-Willard of Ketchikan, Alaska

Notable Haida in history [edit]

Anthropologists and scholars [edit]

This is an incomplete list of anthropologists and scholars who have done research on the Haida.

See also [edit]

Further reading [edit]

  • Blackman, Margaret B. (1982; rev. ed., 1992) During My Time: Florence Edenshaw Davidson, a Haida Woman. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
  • Boelscher, Marianne (1988) The Curtain Within: Haida Social and Mythical Discourse. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.
  • Bringhurst, Robert (2000) A Story as Sharp as a Knife: The Classical Haida Mythtellers and Their World. Douglas & McIntyre.
  • Donald, Leland (1997) Aboriginal Slavery on the Northwest Coast of North America. University of California Press.
  • Andersen, Doris (1974) Slave of the Haida. Macmillan Co. of Canada.
  • Kushner, Howard (1975) Conflict on the Northwest Coast: American-Russian Rivalry in the Pacific Northwest. Greenwood Press.
  • Nora Marks Dauenhauer, Richard Dauenhauer, Lydia T. Black (2008) "Anooshi Lingit Aani Ka/Russians in Tlingit America: The Battles of Sitka, 1802 And 1804." University of Washington Press.
  • Fisher, Robin (1992) "Contact and Conflict: Indian-European Relations in British Columbia, 1774-1890." UBC Press.
  • Geduhn, Thomas (1993) "Eigene und fremde Verhaltensmuster in der Territorialgeschichte der Haida." (Mundus Reihe Ethnologie, Band 71.) Bonn: Holos Verlag.
  • Harris, Christie (1966) Raven's Cry. New York: Atheneum.
  • Harrison, Charles (1925) Ancient Warriors of the North Pacific - The Haidas, Their Laws, Customs and Legends. H.F. & G. Witherby.
  • Huteson, Pamela (2007) "Transformation Masks" Surrey, B.C. Canada: Hancock House Publishers LTD. ISBN- 13 978-0-88839-635-8 and ISBN- 10 0-88839-635-X
  • Kan, Sergei (1993) SYMBOLIC IMMORTALITY; The Tlingit Potlatch of the Nineteenth Century Smithsonian.
  • Snyder, Gary (1979) He Who Hunted Birds in His Father's Village. San Francisco: Grey Fox Press.
  • Stearns, Mary Lee (1981) Haida Culture in Custody: The Masset Band. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
  • The Hydah mission, Queen Charlotte's Islands : an account of the mission and people, with a descriptive letter, Rev. Charles Harrison, publ. Church Missionary Society/Seeley, Jackson & Halliday, London, England, 1884.
  • Yahgulanaas, Michael Nicoll (2008) "Flight of the Hummingbird" Vancouver; Greystone Books.

Notes [edit]

  1. ^ Ethnologue. (2005). "Language Family Trees: Na-Dene, Haida." In Gordon, Raymond G., Jr. (ed.), Ethnologue: Languages of the World, 15th ed. Dallas, TX: SIL International. Online (2007). Retrieved on 2007-06-01. Follow links for ethnic population figures, as follows: Northern Haida—1,700 (1,100 in Canada, 600 in US); Southern Haida—500 (all in Canada).
  2. ^ Schoonmaker, Peter K.; Bettina Von Hagen, Edward C. Wolf (1997). The Rain Forests of Home: Profile Of A North American Bioregion. Island Press. p. 257. ISBN 1-55963-480-4. 
  3. ^ a b c d "Warfare". Canadian Museum of Civilization. Retrieved 2009-03-17. 
  4. ^ Elms p 20, citing William Wyford Walkem, Stories of Early British Columbia, "Adam Horne's trip across Vancouver Island" (Vancouver, BC: Published by News Advertiser, 1914) p 41.
  5. ^ Beth Gibson, Beheaded Pioneer, Laura Arksey, Columbia, Washington State Historical Society, Tacoma, Spring, 1988.
  6. ^ Bancroft says they were Stikines, a Tlingit subgroup, and makes no mention of the Haida. History of Washington, Idaho, and Montana : 1845-1889, p.137 Hubert Howe Bancroft (1890) This enormous source, photocopied, including p.137, is more easily accessible online at [1], if desired. Retrieved 2012-2-21.
  7. ^ http://www.civilization.ca/cmc/exhibitions/aborig/haida/havindxe.shtml Canadian Museum of Civilization webpage on Haida villages
  8. ^ "FirstVoices: Hlg̱aagilda X̱aayda Kil : words". Retrieved 2012-07-08. 
  9. ^ Parks Canada website

References [edit]

  • Macnair, Peter L.; Hoover, Alan L.; Neary, Kevin (1981) The Legacy – Continuing Traditions of Canadian Northwest Coast Indian Art

External links [edit]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Haida people
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Haida_people&oldid=549891423"