Obomsawin, as a filmmaker working for the National Film Board of Canada, was allowed to cross the barricades and document the standoff from the perspective of the Mohawks involved in this historic land dispute. Golden: North American Press, 1993. In one scene it is explained that the song that is being sung was composed of verses collected through travels across the country, by which the Mohawks reached out for solidarity from other bands and clans. However, Jeff York and Loreen Pindera assert that after tense land disputes over the Seaway in 1968, Warrior Society evolved from the Singing Society that had developed in an effort to preserve Mohawk language and culture through traditional songs and drumming. In 1990, when the town of Oka decided it was going to allow the expansion of a golf course on disputed territory —including on a Mohawk burial ground — people living in the neighbouring Mohawk community of. Furthermore, the physical location and implications of the blockades are expanded upon in the documentary Rocks at Whiskey Trench that I will discuss further along. The issue of language is present in many forms, while My Name is Kanehtiisota focuses on Kanehtiisota’s fight to have her Mohawk name recognized by a Canadian court of law. In 1990, when the town of Oka decided it was going to allow the expansion of a golf course on disputed territory —including on a Mohawk burial ground — people living in the neighbouring Mohawk community of Kanesatake rose up in defence of what they said was their land. The rain of rocks was more than salt in an open wound, after the convoy had been stopped on the bridge for a solid three hours while every car and person was searched. The failure of the Meech Lake Accord in 1989 was not the only catalyst that lit the fire of Oka. Utrecht, Holland, November 12, 2017. It was a crisis that grabbed international headlines, with Mohawks and Canadian soldiers involved in a lengthy stand-off that often appeared on the verge of exploding into full-blown combat. Kanehtiisota on the other hand was held for four days longer than the other women on account of her insistence on using her Mohawk name. Abekani filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin was able to document the seventy-eight day standoff between the Mohawks, the Quebec National Police (SQ, Sûreté du Québec) and the Canadian army. My Name is Kanehtiisota focuses attention on the Mohawks commitment to Mother Earth and Mohawk culture through Kanehtiisota’s story. Within this third space Obomsawin allows for daily life in Kahnawake to unfold along with all its daily interruptions. Obomsawin alludes explicitly to the struggle of the Mohawk people in the title of Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance. Alanis Obomsawin: The Vision of a Native Filmmaker. He explains, “Whoever was there would see me looking…see a strong face, being strong. Language is framed as explicitly tied to the plight of Indian sovereignty. The swat team failed to show up and the SQ were not equipped to handle a riot. The Oka Crisis was extensively documented and inspired numerous books and films. The barricades were put up in order to prevent the development of condominiums and the expansion of nine more holes to the local golf course on reservation land, including development through the Mohawk’s sacred pines and cemetery. In fact, 1989 was a volatile year that sullied the Mohawk image in the public eye during a course of pro and anti-gambling and smuggling situations involving Warrior Society and the American government. "You reach a point after a while where you have to make a stand," Kanesatake resident Linda Simon, who experienced the violence, said in an interview. Twenty-five years on, the legacy of the Oka Crisis for many of those who experienced the tension west of Montreal is a greater awareness of indigenous issues. She also interviews people of Chateauguay, Montreal, Peacekeepers and local Chiefs. Offering a unique look behind the barricades at one man's … The opening and closing shots of Spudwrech: Kahnawake Man frame the small town, panning across the skyline eventually incorporating the Mercier Bridge and it’s traffic into the landscape. NY: Routledge, 2004. Rather, struggle and resistance has been the long suffered history of the Mohawk people since Columbus arrived centuries ago. People of the Pines: The Warriors and the Legacy of Oka. This is reaffirmed by in Spudwrench with close attention to the daily cultural resilience of the Mohawks of Kahnawake through sweat lodges, healing circles, drumming and circle dances. It may seem irresponsible for children to be placed at the center of a volatile situation however, Kanehtiisota strongly affirms that for the Kanawake mothers, it was important that their children not be hidden from the legacy of violence that has plagued the Mohawk people. Rather she reveals how complex the issue is by allowing layers of meaning to surface in dialogue with each other. The Quebec government called in the Canadian Forces and roughly 800 members of the Royal 22e Regiment encircled the Mohawks in the pines with barbed wire. The first installment Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance (1993) focuses on the crisis as it unfolded in front of Obomsawin’s cameras. In this short documentary Obomsawin trains her lens on the role of the women who were involved in the seventy eight day standoff, specifically focusing on Kanehtiisota’s role. (Courtesy NFB) Amelia Kalant suggests that, “the dramatic impact of the warriors’ masks and camouflage clothing was a double-edge sword” (187). Like Spudwrench, Kanehtiisota’s story is woven into Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance, Obomsawin expanded on these stories as a way to redress the incident and to flesh out the stories of the people directly involved. The children and women were separated from the men, while the children who had relatives at hand were released into their custody. A member of the Abenaki Nation, Obomsawin, whose last name means “pathfinder,” returned with her family to the Odanak reserve near Sorel, Quebec, when she was six months old. Hilda Nicholas (left) said she was honoured to translate legendary documentary filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin’s seminal documentary, though the material was emotional to get through at times. On the one hand, the image of the Warrior was attention grabbing. The men explain that every Friday night they would take the six and a half hour drive from New York City up to Kahnawake in order to spend the weekends with their families, before driving back at the crack of dawn on Monday mornings, year after year. border resulted in 3 Indian councils (Akwesasne, Kahnawake and Kanehsatake) vying for power over eight thousand people on 28,000 acres of heavily polluted land astride the Saint Lawrence (ix). Beyond the brutal history that has been the fight for Indian sovereignty, Obomsawin has focused on Mohawk identity and culture, as well as the problematic situation of the Mohawk people within Canada, Quebec and straddling the U.S./Canada border. In My Name is Kanehtiisota, Kanehtiisota herself states, “the pines, they are our grandfathers. "The common lands had slowly been given away and sold and there came a point where people weren't going to take it anymore.". Kelley mentioned provincial funding for the Kateri Memorial hospital on the Kahnawake reserve south of Montreal — which he said required several bureaucratic hurdles to overcome such as modifications to labour laws — as an example of a change in government attitude toward Indigenous Peoples. Born in New Hampshire, United States and raised primarily in Quebec, Canada, she … One man states that it is, “good to recall, wounds need to be cleansed deeply and profoundly.” The sentiment “we must continue but we cannot forget” is expressed by various Kahnawake residents across the four films. The women and the men repeat across all four films the importance of the land, and their duty to protect it. "[The provincial police] took my cousin Angus Jacob and brought him to the back of a barn and handcuffed him to a metal chair," he said in an interview. rose up in defence of what they said was their land. Her films generate discussion, and create space for learning and healing. Kalant, Amelia. On October 2nd, Kanehtiisota is released after her lawyer produces her birth certificate to the St. Jerome’s court judge. I agree with Lewis’ identification of four threads that run across Obomsawin’s work. Twenty-five years after … Obomsawin does not set up the two different perspectives on the burial grounds in opposition. As of August 2017, she has directed 50 films with the NFB, with her documentary film Our People Will Be Healed, about the Helen Betty Osborne Ininiw Education Resource Centre in Norway House Cree Nation, premiering in the Masters programme of the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival. Serge Simon said it has taken a generation for people to overcome the trauma of the crisis and band council politics have only recently started to calm down after years of tension and sometimes violence between community members. In Spudwrench the importance is reframed in a poignant montage showing the photos and names of passed over Kahnawake ironworkers who rest in the Kanehsatake burial grounds amidst the pines. York, Geoffrey and Loreen Pindera. As its title implies, Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance is about much more than the Oka Crisis. This is Alanis Obomsawin's most recent film documenting the Oka crisis (1990)in Quebec. On October 5th the men were released from custody and returned to Kanawake; all this for a name in English or French but not in Mohawk. From the Oka Crisis, during which a group of Mohawk engaged in a 78-day standoff with Canadian police and military in defense of their land, to the story of First Nations Vietnam War veteran Eugene Benedict, Obomsawin has been there documenting, educating, and … Kanehtiisota holds steadfast to the notion that “the young ones see and become stronger.” As a result many of the children who grew up in the aftermath—and the few who remember—are now referred to as “Oka Babies.” This is so that they are always reminded of the struggle of their people and to reaffirm the strength and solidarity of the Mohawks. Many of the women in My Name is Kanehtiisota describe the Mohawks belief in maintaining a concern for the future generations. She explains the significance of a sacred resting place for the Mohawk people by saying that the ancestors cannot rest peacefully until they are protected from further invasion. Perhaps it is not surprising to hear the people themselves explain the way they were able to adapt the concept of family to their needs. Beyond the encroachment of ongoing modernization, the crisis led to numerous checkpoints, and 10 roadblocks erected by the police and army, including two boats patrolling the Ottawa River in early July 1990. The issue of the cemetery is expanded upon in Spudwrech, though Kanehtiisota also mentions the importance of the cemetery and how development would have meant digging up the cemetery. Produced by the National Film Board of Canada, the film won 18 Canadian and international awards, including the Distinguished Documentary Achievement Award from the International Documentary Association and the CITY TV Award for Best Canadian Feature … One startling effective shot in My Name is Kahentiisota frames the narrow space between two Kanawake homes capturing a barge as it passes along the seaway cutting across the landscape and blocking the view of the water. This certainly had its effect on the spin that the Canadian media would take in representing the Warrior as Un-Indian, distinctly non-Canadian and certainly not Québécois. The problems of land disputes, and national belonging are fleshed out in Spudwrench: Kahnawake Man by way of the long history of the Mohawks working state side as ironworkers for several generations. In his book about Obomsawin, Randolph Lewis identifies four threads running through Obomsawin’s body of work. (Re)covering Oka: Alanis Obomsawin’s Representation of the Crisis at Oka The complacency of the Quebec SQ becomes a major focal point in Rocks at Whiskey Trench depicting the failure of the police to safely see a convoy of sixty some cars across the Mercier Bridge and through to the neighboring town of Châteauguay to Kahnawake. The prosecutor representing the Quebec government did not accept her Indigenous name. Whereas, the Warrior image was easily aligned with what Canadians also wanted to believe about Indians, the Warrior problematically provided the Canadian government with a stereotype that was readily employed to render the entire crisis “illegitimate” (Kalant, 187). This documentary by acclaimed filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin introduces us to Randy Horne, a high steel worker from the Mohawk community of Kahnawake, near Montreal. Within all of Obomsawin’s four Oka films, Warrior Society is represented in such a way as to dispel many myths about the Mohawk people and their connection to Warrior Society. Kanehtiisota describes in voice over, the chaos and fear she had for her children until they were reunited on the women’s bus. Back home, Quebec Aboriginal Affairs Minister Geoffrey Kelley said provincial and federal governments have appreciated since Oka that First Nations groups need to be consulted when development projects affect their territory. By employing this Warrior archetype, Indianness was aligned against modernity and away from Canadian, or Québécois, nationalism positing the Warrior as American. The Oka Crisis was extensively documented and inspired numerous books and films. 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