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magazine / ja04
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July/August 2004 issue |
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EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK
On the powwow trail
If you've ever been to a powwow, you'll
know the moment photographer Nance Ackerman is talking
about. The drummers get a beat going, and that first voice
rises in a cry which becomes a chant and then a haunting
song plucked right from the soul of the first High Plains
hunter. "It never fails," says Ackerman, whose
grandmother is Mohawk and who photographed our cover story
at the Echoes of a Proud Nation Powwow on the Kahnawake
Mohawk reserve near Montréal and at the Carry the Kettle
Nakota First Nation reserve east of Regina. "At the
first few notes, the hair stands up on the back of my
neck. I get shivers down my spine. It's intense. It's
personal. And it makes me feel at home."
The drumming, singing and dancing at powwows, which
are now held in communities across North America, touch
many people in the same way. In an essay accompanying
the photos, playwright Drew Hayden Taylor describes
powwows as "fabulous and fattening" summer
gatherings where families, friends, neighbours and visitors
gather to renew old acquaintances, share a meal and
enjoy the blessings of the season. But it is the music
and the dance competitions that give shape, form and
purpose to powwows. Many dancers, drummers and singers
who follow the powwow circuit are on the road from late
spring until fall. What's remarkable is how both the
competitions and the events have become embedded in
aboriginal cultures across the continent.
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When Ackerman proposed the powwow story to us, her
passion for it and her enthusiasm were strong selling
points. And that's pretty much the tale of her career.
She's always caught her own breaks.
Ackerman grew up in the United States, but in the 1970s,
her family moved to Nova Scotia, where she still lives.
When she was in high school, she had dreams of working
for National Geographic. Someone suggested that to do
so, she should become an archaeologist, but at university,
she ended up studying geology. After graduating, she
landed a job at a gold mine in Timmins, Ont. Not a great
job choice for someone who suffers from claustrophobia. "I
worked underground," she says, "but I didn't
like it." So in her spare time, she began taking
photos of the mine and the workers. "One day, my
boss saw my photos, and he told me, 'You're a better
photographer than you are a geologist.' He was great.
He told me to go out and do it. And if it didn't work
out after three months, he said he'd give me my job
back."
Ackerman took the offer, moved to Toronto and walked
in cold to the newsroom of The Globe and Mail. "I
told them, 'I'll do anything. Clean up or whatever.
I just want to learn.' If you are humble, you'll be
amazed at how far it will take you."
Within three months, she was freelancing for the newspaper
on a regular basis. She later worked for The Toronto
Star and The Gazette in Montréal and is now one of Canada's
most accomplished documentary photographers. Her first
book, Womankind: Faces of Change Around the World, with
text by Donna Nebenzahl, features portraits and essays
of women activists around the world. It is a finalist
for the prestigious $50,000 Roloff Beny Photography
Book Award.
Congratulations to all our contributors and to our
own editorial staff for their 2003 National Magazine
Awards nominations. Our special issue on shelter was
nominated for Best Editorial Package (CG Jan/Feb 2003).
From the same issue, writer Marci McDonald was nominated
in the Science, Technology and the Environment category
for "The affordable architect," her profile
of Avi Friedman, the designer of the Grow Home. McDonald
was also nominated in Health and Medicine for "Smog
sleuth," a profile of environmental scientist Tom
Hutchinson (CG May/June 2003). In the same magazine
and category, Anita Lahey was nominated for "Unsafe
assumption," her story on the new family of toxic
chemicals now rising through the food chain. In Words
and Pictures, photographer Karim Rholem, writer Mark
Abley, contributing editor Monique Roy-Sole, photo editor
Margaret Williamson and art director Stephen Hanks were
nominated for "Kindred spirits," a series
of portraits of large families (CG Nov/Dec 2003). And
Linda Goyette was nominated in Politics and Public Interest
for "The X files," her story of how, at the
turn of the past century, the Metis were swindled out
of their land (CG Mar/Apr 2003). The winners will have
been announced at the awards banquet on June 11, after
this issue went to press.
— Rick Boychuk
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