SHI to host lecture on connecting language learners

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Sealaska Heritage Institute (SHI) will host a lecture about what a professor learned when she and her students spent a semester translating a century-old anthropological study on the Haida people.

The lecturer, Dr. Jasḵwaan Bedard, is an assistant professor in the Indigenous Languages Program at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia.

Through her lecture, “Connecting Haida Language Learners Across Borders Through Story,” Dr. Bedard will detail the discoveries she and her students made while transcribing a 1901 document titled “How the Kaigani Migrated to Alaska.”

During the fall semester, Dr. Bedard, who is Haida and specializes in X̱aad Kíl (Northern Alaskan Haida,) taught a course called X̱aad Kíl Gyáahlaangdang — Advanced Haida Language Storytelling. The course was offered to students learning X̱aad Kíl and focused on a story called “How the Kaigani Migrated to Alaska,” which was first recorded in 1901 by the American ethnologist John R. Swanton.

Swanton was part of the Jesup North Pacific expedition, an anthropological investigation that took place between 1897-1902 and aimed to investigate the relationships between Indigenous peoples on each side of the Bering Strait. Led by philanthropist Franz Boas, the expedition resulted in numerous ethnographic publications, including several by John R. Swanton. After spending a year with the Haida, Swanton phonetically transcribed two extensive compilations of Haida stories. Dr. Bedard and her students spent the semester translating “How the Kaigani Migrated to Alaska” from its original Americanist phonetic notation into X̱aad Kíl.

In her lecture, Dr. Bedard will explain how she developed the course material, detail the course’s outcomes and share the history of Canadian and American Haida, including the students’ new understandings of how the Haida migrated to Alaska. “Connecting Haida Language Learners Across Borders Through Story” will be held from noon-1 pm, Monday, Aug. 3 in the Clan House on the first level of Sealaska Heritage Institute, which is located at 105 Heritage Way in downtown Juneau. Her lecture will be live streamed and available to watch on SHI’s YouTube channel.

About the speaker

Dr. Bedard is a Haida educator and advocate who specializes in developing methodologies to strengthen Indigenous languages. Her dissertation, titled “X̱aad Kíhlga Tl’a Guusuugiigangsaang: A Haida Research Framework for Learning X̱aad Kíl,” aims to provide a pathway for Haida language learners by connecting them to mentors, laws and values. She has contributed to Haida language programming for nearly two decades and has taught language courses to folks of all levels since 2015.

An avid singer, Dr. Bedard also has a YouTube channel featuring her songs.

Sealaska Heritage Institute is a tribal organization founded in 1980 to perpetuate and enhance Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian cultures of Southeast Alaska. SHI also conducts scientific and public policy research that promotes Alaska Native arts, cultures, history and education statewide. The institute is governed by a Board of Trustees and guided by a Council of Traditional Scholars, a Native Artist Committee, a Southeast Regional Language Committee and an Education Committee.

Caption: Photo of Dr. Jasḵwaan Bedard. Note: News outlets are welcome to use this photo for coverage of this story. For a higher-res version, contact Kathy.dye@sealaskaheritage.com.