CHAPTER 3: Methodology
3.4 Location and duration of field work
3.4.1 Field work location
Field work for this project was conducted on the Kainai (Blood) Indian Reserve, which is located in the south-western corner of Alberta, Canada, along the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains. The Reserve, which encompasses an area of approximately 642 square miles, was established in 1883, and it lies in the heart of traditional Niitsitapi territory (§1.2; Figure 1.1).
45 It is the largest Reserve in Canada (Brown & Peers 2006:19). The administrative headquarters of the Reserve are located in the town of Standoff. Based on 2006 Census data, Statistics Canada (2008) estimates the (aboriginal) Reserve population at approximately 4195.
During my field visits, I worked out of Red Crow Community College (RCCC) on the Kainai Reserve. RCCC is a post-secondary institution founded in 1986 under the direction of the Blood Tribe Education Committee. In 1995, RCCC became the first tribally-controlled college in Canada. It offers diploma and degree programs in partnership with the University of Calgary and the University of Lethbridge, as well as courses such as Kainai Studies, which includes the study of Niitsi’powahsin, and Traditional Land Use Study (Red Crow College 2006). Its main campus (shown in Figure 3.1) is housed in the former St. Mary’s Residential School building; a place where Niitsitapi children were deprived of their linguistic and cultural identities during an era of forced assimilation of the native tribes in Canada (§1.2).
The Director of Kainai Studies at RCCC, Akáyo’kaki, Ryan Heavy Head, very generously accommodated me in an office at the College during my field visits. Although working at RCCC meant a daily commute of approximately 140km to and from my place of residence in Lethbridge, the overriding advantage of the situation was that I was placed right in the centre of the community, and thus had access to a wealth of resources, including the invaluable assistance of Niitsitapi scholars, students, and other community members, as well as use of the RCCC library and digital archives. Furthermore, Ryan Heavy Head’s appointment as co- supervisor for the dissertation greatly facilitated my ability to work within the Kainai community, and provided me with much needed support and guidance during my visits to the Reserve.
46 Figure 3.1: Red Crow Community College (RCCC) main campus, Kainai Reserve, Alberta, Canada.
3.4.2 Duration of field work
The field work portion of the research project was carried out over the course of three years, in different phases. As mentioned in §1.4, I made an initial exploratory visit to the Reserve in March 2005, which effectively constituted the planning phase of the research. The bulk of the data collection, which essentially involved learning about Niitsitapi names and naming practices, took place during two separate time periods: the first being the three week period of 22 October 2005 to 12 November 2005, and the second being the four week period of 10 September 2006 to 10 October 2006. The reason for conducting this particular phase of the field work in such a ‘spread out’ manner can be contributed primarily to my personal circumstances; in particular, the physical distance involved in travelling between the Reserve and Chicago (approximately 3052 miles round-trip), as well as my having to work around family commitments, and the availability of financial resources. With regards to financing,
47 this phase of the field work was partly paid for through my own personal funds, and partly by a grant awarded by the American Philosophical Society’s Lewis and Clark Fund for Exploration and Field Research.
I also made several follow-up visits to the Reserve during the writing phase of the dissertation. My ability to do this was greatly facilitated by our family’s relocation, in July 2007, from Chicago to Lewistown, Montana, which brought me much closer to Alberta. The main purpose of these shorter trips, which were each usually about a week in duration, was to validate my interpretations of the knowledge that had been shared with me around Niitsitapi names and naming, with my advisors in the Kainai community. In this way, I tried to ensure that I maintained a Niitsitapi perspective in providing explanations as to what I had learned from my research. I also found, however, that with every subsequent visit, my learning experience within Niitsitapi culture continued, and even deepened; providing with fresh insight into various aspects of the work that I had been doing, and thus greatly enriching the study. Furthermore, the ongoing visits enabled me to keep in personal touch with my co- supervisor, Akáyo’kaki, Ryan Heavy Head, whose collaboration and guidance was essential to the project from start to finish. Of particular significance was the visit I made to the Reserve in late April, 2008. The reason for this trip was partly to review with Ryan the written work that I had completed up until that point in time, and partly to attend, at Ryan’s invitation, a Beaver Bundle opening ceremony. It was during that ceremony, held on April 26, 2008, in the mountains near Waterton, that I received my Blackfoot name, Iinisskimmaakii, ‘Buffalo Stone Woman’, from elder Narcisse Blood. The importance of this experience, as it relates to the study, and to me personally, is explained in §3.7.2 and §5.8.