Leech Lake to be on Smithsonian Web site

By Molly Miron
Bemidji Pioneer

BENA — The Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian Indigenous Geography Web site features in-depth profiles of six native communities.

The Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe will be the seventh site along with the Hopi Nation in southwestern United States; Wolastoqewiyik (also known as Maliseet) in northeastern U.S. and eastern Canada; Kawésqar in southern Chile; Q’eqchi Maya in Central America; Na Po’e o Hana in Hawaii; and Akhiok on Kodiak Island, Alaska.

Students at the Bug-O-Nay-Ge-Shig and Deer River schools worked with Smithsonian outreach members this week to learn video and audio recording skills, interview techniques and editing methods to capture the essence of their communities for the new site. Amy Van Allen, community services manager for the National Museum of the American Indian, said she expects the Leech Lake site to be completed and available in about one year.

Meanwhile, seventh-grade students at Bug-O-Nay-Ge-Shig guided by teachers Tami Liberty and John Parmeter, and high school students at Deer River guided by Gerald White, will record traditional Anishinaabe activities as they are practiced currently and interview elders about their recollections of earlier times.

“We decided in our community, the students would do the project,” said Liberty.

For example, on Monday, Liberty’s students went to a sugar bush with elders to learn about tapping maple trees for sap to make syrup and sugar. As the seasons progress the students will take part in spearing fish and harvesting wild rice. Students in summer school will also go berry picking and raise heritage vegetables in the school’s garden.

“As a whole, the school is working to incorporate seasonal activities into the curriculum,” said Liberty.

“It’s broader than what you think of as physical geography,” Van Allen said. “It’s cultural geography. This is one program the museum offers as an outreach project.”

Van Allen and the other Smithsonian outreach team members, Shannon Quist, Gussie Lehman and Mark Christal, explained that the Indigenous Geography Web site includes aspects of the various communities’ origins, senses of place, economies, families, rituals and languages.

For the language component of the Bug-O-Nay-Ge-Shig School, the students attended the Niigane Ojibwe immersion class, where they had to refrain from speaking English.

“Those kids can talk Ojibwe pretty good,” said William Robinson, one of the seventh-graders working on the Indigenous Geography project. “They read us a story in Ojibwe.”

The students also shared what they learned during the day at the sugar bush where they worked and interviewed people experienced in tapping.

Autumn Tanner said she learned how to use a camera, while Dylan Lightfeather said interviewing someone was a new experience.

“Some questions you had long answers, but some had really short answers,” said Rueben Ironbear.

David Bobrowoski said using a computer-based microphone to record an interview was new to him. Jennifer Mitchell said she learned how to use a video camera.

The students also gained some traditional knowledge.

“A woman discovered sugar bush,” said Jamie Littlewolf.

The Web site is at www.indigenousgeography.si.edu.