When you have finished for the day, cover the piece on the loom with red cloth. You have called the Ancestors to help and they are still there looking at it. Covering it lets the work rest and lets the Ancestors rest for the night.
—Chief Janice George, Squamish; a teaching from the late Subiyay (Bruce Miller), Skokomish
The exploration of Salish weaving as a creative art form and as a study of a traditional culture is increasingly important among weavers and academic researchers. This volume has suggested a typology of ceremonial textiles and an iconography of design motifs found on historical blankets. It has attempted to blend the material culture analysis and historical contextualization of museum research with the cosmological framework of First Nation weavers. Using this approach, the authors have put forward one possible interpretation for a group of patterned blankets that were woven during a period of significant loss of Salish traditional culture and population.
The project has been particularly useful in identifying future research. Histories of the collectors who brought the early textiles into museum care are fragmentary. Searches in nineteenth-century government, naval, and family archives could uncover relevant information about collecting practices. Additional analysis and documentation of woven bands, particularly tumplines, may help to establish a clearer Salish textile chronology. Further work is required to identify fibers and dyes in historical blankets. There is a role for local communities in gathering the names of past and present weavers and in recording their local Salish terms for weaving tools, techniques, motifs, and colors. Finally, this volume had space to recognize only a few contemporary weavers. All Salish communities should have an opportunity to tell personal stories about the weaving and wearing of ceremonial textiles and to honor their own teachers in print.
During a 2005 workshop at the Canadian Museum of History weavers suggested that increased public awareness of Salish weaving would create a better market for women’s work as fine art and fine craft. This volume offers a contribution toward building a better appreciation of the artists’ skills and creativity and of the remarkable history that forms the fabric of Salish weaving.