Great Lakes Research Alliance marks 20 years of celebrating Indigenous history, culture and language

By: Sean McNeely

Twenty-year anniversaries are most often associated with marriages or employment milestones, not international scholarly research projects … especially in the humanities.

But that’s exactly what the Great Lakes Research Alliance for the Study of Aboriginal Arts & Cultures(GRASAC) celebrated this summer. That’s two decades of preserving, celebrating and sharing cultural belongings and information about First Nations heritage in Canada and around the world while strengthening ties with international scholars and Indigenous communities.

Launched in 2005, GRASAC is a multi-disciplinary research network with more than 500 members who jointly research Anishinaabe, Haudenosaunee and Huron-Wendat cultures of the Great Lakes region of Turtle Island.

With a goal of bolstering and supporting Indigenous communities, cultural institutions and scholars alike, the GRASAC platform was created through support from the Faculty of Arts & Science, the Department of Historyand the Faculty of Information.

It now houses digital records of more than 5,000 Great Lakes heritage items and two online dictionaries with 17,000 Anishinaabemowin and Cayuga words. The site catalogues a variety of belongings (referred to as “relatives” by GRASAC) including moccasins, headdresses, tools, blankets, hunting weapons, pipes, dolls, crafts, and historic photographs and artwork.

But the site goes beyond just photos and dates. Every item listed has several image entries and a description outlining its function and how it was made. Also noted is each item’s creation date, building materials, and its current physical location. Entries for some materials also include a searchable map that locates the heritage item’s place of origin.

How does it feel for GRASAC co-founder, Heidi Bohaker — who first launched the initiative as a doctoral student with her then post-doctoral supervisor and other colleagues — to reach such an impressive achievement?

“It’s a sense of accomplishment and pride for sure,” says Bohaker, a professor with the Department of History. “It’s also a sense of amazement at watching students who were once working with us as research assistants, who are now graduates of various advanced degree programs or are faculty themselves.”

“So often, humanities research that’s community driven is not the kind of research that gets to be in the limelight,” says Cara Krmpotich, a professor with the Faculty of Information who joined GRASAC as co-director in 2017. “What makes GRASAC so special is the willingness people have to share, rather than guard, what they know.”

Looking back, Bohaker reflects on how much things have changed — for example, how museums were initially hesitant to work with GRASAC on a digital platform.

“Twenty years ago, museums were very nervous about putting anything on the web,” says Bohaker.

What’s also changed is GRASAC’s relationships with museums and how they too are evolving with respect to their connection with neighbouring communities. In fact, Bohaker believes that GRASAC’s community-based approach is rubbing off.

“Museums didn't have the same kind of connections with communities whose items they're hosting,” she says. “Now, there's more of a dialogue and exchange of ideas. Museums are repatriating items back to communities when appropriate. And in other cases, museums are integrating community ideas and knowledge into how they care for items.”

Read the full story on A&S News.