6

Merged Objects

The introduction to this book opens with an instruction from Salish teachings to view weavings as merged objects. It is a reminder that robes are of this world and of the spirit realm and that they bind together animal and human aspects of the mountain goat, the hunter, the weaver, and the wearer. This interview with Salish weaver Joy Joseph-McCullough identifies community as another important element of the merged object. Traditional weaving has become a vibrant thread that not only runs through the lives of many Salish individuals but also links them to their Native and non-Native neighbors. It has strengthened bonds between family members, between the Elders and their culture, and between individuals living on the local reserves. Through weaving, Ancestral customs have been taught and reaffirmed.

A Weaver’s Voice

My name is Joy Joseph-McCullough. I’m from Squamish Nation and come from the village that we’re on right now, which is Skwxwu7mesh. My brother carries the eighteenth-generation chieftainship for this village. This is my home.1

In the year 2000 I received the name Siyaltemaat. The name is a chieftainship name that comes from the Newman family in Cheakamus. In our nation, a name sometimes needs to be adjusted. I have been told by an Elder to adjust my name to Sealh’chavet. The name I carry comes from the Mountain Goat Clan and I am now an established weaver. So I will be changing my name as directed by this Elder.

61. Siyaltemaat (Joy Joseph-McCullough) with ceremonial blanket and headband she wove. Photographer: L. H. Tepper, 2012. Canadian Museum of History Img2016-0014-0003-Dp1.jpg.

Becoming a Weaver

I started to weave with Chief Janice George and my cousin, Buddy Joseph. I got so excited when Jan was telling me that they took the [weaving course] training. I said, “Oh, will you train our [education] staff?” because I thought it was a really good opportunity and something I wanted to learn. She kindly agreed and trained about ten people. We were her first students here in the valley. We did three workshops on basic weaving and the last one was on advanced weavers’ techniques. Then we learned how to spin and dye the wool. Because I come from a cedar weaving tradition we wanted to learn the process of preparing the wool. Krista Point came up and did a two-day workshop with us.2

On Being a Weaver

I think it’s our Ancestors that are with me. When they see something that’s kind of been lost, they push. If you are open to it, they’ll guide you. I really feel at home when I weave. It brings me to another place and it fulfills me like nothing else. I can’t stop even though I’m really busy. I have a full-time job, but still I’m called to it.

My philosophy of weaving is that it is part of the heartbeat of our nation. The people that hold teachings or hold gifts are the heartbeat, meaning they keep our culture alive. We go outside our culture to get educated. We go outside our communities to live and work. People move out of the province or out of the country. But there’s always going to be a small core of people that hold teachings or that hold abilities. The weaving—the wool weaving, the cedar weaving— and the longhouse are all the different kinds of teachings that people have. It will continue, you know, but it’s up to us to keep it going. We just can’t let it go or it’s going to die out. So some people have to stay back, stay in our core, and make it bigger and bigger and bigger. That’s my dream—that it’s not always just going to be a small core of people who are carrying it on. There are going to be more of us.

We’ve had weavers coming through that haven’t continued, but at least we did our best to teach them. It’s up to them to see if it holds with them. At the same time we’ve got some awesome weavers who’ve given back to our Elders the gift of weaving. That was something that was taken away because of Residential School. People always say Elders give us our teachings, and here we are, giving teachings back to our Elders. We bring the child back to them because they didn’t get that joy when they were young. Now our Elders are weaving up a storm.

Weaving Plans and Projects

I really like the idea of being tied to the mountain goat through my name and using the natural materials from our local area. That was one of the reasons to learn wool dyeing. You connect to the land when you actually use plants like the stinging nettle, horsetail, or blackberry shoots. It has taken me and my staff on a journey. We walk together in the mountains, learning more about our plants and our natural dyes. Then we spin the wool and make our blankets from that. So my next project is to make something that’s totally from our area and that I’ve made totally on my own. It would mean getting the mountain goat hair and supplementing it with the fireweed, the duck down, or the cattail down. Then spinning it and dyeing it with all the natural dyes here. I would make it into a shawl or a blanket of some kind.

Teaching Weaving

Weaving is important because it teaches our youth about our own history and our own culture. It’s important that they know we didn’t wear button blankets like the Haida. It’s important to let them know that we did wear the mountain goat–hair blanket with the wool dog hair, as well as the cedar bark blankets. It’s a really good educational tool. It also lights our Ancestral Spirit in ourselves as well as our children.

Our hope is always that our children will carry on our traditions. When we were in school we didn’t have any teachings about our culture. For me it was the Haida in grade four social studies. That has changed today through our Education Department. We’ve done a full set of courses for School District 48. Charlene goes into the school and teaches Squamish culture and art.3 She introduced a whole weaving program this year to all the students, not just our First Nations learners. It has become part of the core program.

When I put my eldest daughter through puberty rites I started teaching her weaving because that’s my job, to teach her what I know. She did it, but she didn’t hold to it. I had to acknowledge and respect her for who she is, so I didn’t push it on her anymore. I just wanted her to have the knowledge. I said, “Someday someone might ask you, ‘Does anyone know anything about wool weaving or cedar weaving?’ You’ll be able to say, ‘Yes, I do,’ even if you don’t carry it on.” I know my younger daughter will carry it on, and I think my third daughter will too.

Right now we are also, as part of our training project, teaching community members who wanted to learn how to weave. We worked to find a way for them to have the classes, learn how to weave, and give back to the community. That worked out really well because some people didn’t have the money to take a class. We would teach them for free, but the payment would be making the tunics for our dance group.

One of the camps we organize is just for the dance group children. We had looms up by the river and we had them weaving their own headbands. With the two boys they spend like three minutes, but the girls just sat there and wove. Over the three days we spent there, most of them finished their headbands. We want them to understand that it’s important that they make their own regalia. We want them to know how they’re supposed to be when they start to make their regalia. You have to be in a really nice spiritual place, a clear place. You actually say a prayer; you clear your mind and you’re not feeling any stress or anger or anything, because whatever you’re feeling you put into your weaving.

Making the Tapestry for the Squamish-Lil’wat Cultural Centre

The design for that weaving came to me in a dream.4 I stressed about it. I was like, “Wow, it’s supposed to be eight feet by six feet. What can I make out of eight feet by six feet?” I was just stuck on the space. Then I went to bed one night. I fell asleep and had a dream about it. Our Ancestors visited me and they said, “Joy, this is what you’re going to put on your blanket. You’re going to put mountains on there, you’re going to put the sky on there, you’re going to put the earth on there, and you’re going to put the water on there.” That’s to remind us as First Nations people that we are the guardians and the stewards of the land. We have to remember that is our job, appointed to us by the Creator for our people. We have to be more vocal about it and we have to do something visual to put the point out there. So the top of my blanket has exactly that—the mountains, which are in brown, and then the blue for the sky and the green for the earth. The dark blue is for the water. Mother Earth is on there. The Ancestors told me to acknowledge and remind our people that it took sixteen families to form the Squamish Nation and that we need to be reminded about how we came together to become the Squamish Nation. I needed to include red because that represents healing in our people. So I twilled sixteen diamonds into my blanket to represent the sixteen families and had the red represent healing for our people. The last part of it is to honor our past weavers who have come before us—the people that have discovered all the weaving techniques and have kept the tradition going.

In the very center of my blanket I chose to use the Capilano pattern because there’s that famous picture of all our chiefs going to England. I was studying the pictures and most of them have that Capilano pattern on their blankets and I thought it would be good to put that pattern in the center, in the heart, of the blanket. So the Capilano pattern is right in the middle. I used all the same colors that are in the Capilano pattern and the colors that the Ancestors told me to. Otherwise, I don’t think I would have used those colors. I would have picked a different color scheme for it. But I said, “Okay, I’m just going to listen, I’m just going to do it.” I’m really happy with it. So that’s the story of my blanket.

Weavers

It was powerful to be with other weavers [working on the cultural center tapestries] and not be sitting by myself weaving, And to feel everybody else’s happiness about being there too. Even the hard times, when everybody was stressing out, you actually learn about people, to be compassionate and to try to help. It was really important to be together. That’s why I wanted a studio here, so that people could actually weave together. It feels so isolated when you’re alone, when you’re just at home. You’re not able to celebrate with other people, or just debrief, or just talk about weaving. You have so much connection when you have a studio. It was awesome.

I think the only thing that’s really been holding strong to me is having a weavers’ conference, a gathering of wool and cedar weavers. I know they do it in the States a lot, but it would be nice to do here, to bring weavers together more often. I don’t think we’ve had anything like it so far. It would be an annual event, not just every five or ten years, but an actual annual event. We can have a weaving gathering. You just set up a bunch of tables and everybody just goes. We will have to do this for weaving, for the different types of weavers. Weavers helping weavers.

I am slowly seeing more people using weavings for Speaker blankets and sashes. They are promoting it as our traditional wear, more so than the paddle shawls or vest. I’d rather wear the wool. I think it’s going to grow and I think we need to share it with everyone because they don’t know what it is. Our dance group, every time we go out, we explain what we’re wearing and where the regalia comes from. We explain that our people traditionally wore the mountain goat blankets and these items were all handwoven in the community. That’s why we’re wearing the tunics and the shawls—every time we go out and perform, it’s explained. It’s getting out there.

Moving beyond the Salish Community

It is about education—educating the general public about Coast Salish blankets. We need to establish an appreciation and a higher regard for Coast Salish weaving as an art form and as an acknowledgement of our culture. Most of the people that we meet outside of our community know what a button blanket is, but they don’t know that much about our weaving, about the mountain goat, the twilling and the twining. I would like to promote it more than it is. We’re teaching in the public schools. We’re just teaching the tabby weave, but there’s a lot of open discussion and education about what Coast Salish weaving is. That’s my goal, that’s what we’ve been doing, promoting Coast Salish weaving to the general public, building a knowledge of and an appreciation for our weaving.