This dissertation investigates the ways visitors to Haida Gwaii (sometimes called the Queen Charlotte Islands) have written about the islands. I argue that accounts by visitors to Haida Gwaii fashion the object that they seek to represent. In short, visitors' stories do not unproblematically reflect the islands but determine how Haida Gwaii is perceived. These perceptions in turn affect the actions of visitors, residents and governments. I contribute to that representational process, striving to show the material consequences of language and the ways discourses shape Haida Gwaii. The dissertation consists of three sections. "Early visitors" focuses on the last quarter of the eighteenth century, studying the earliest documented visits by Euro-American mariners and fur traders. "Modern visitors" concentrates on the last quarter of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century, when some visitors were busy imposing colonial forms of government and social organization, while others were resisting these projects. "Recent visitors" concentrates on the final quarter of the twentieth century, examining the campaign to save a portion of the archipelago from clearcutting and efforts to develop alternatives to resource-extractive economic practices. By examining three case studies for each period, I argue that the ways visitors imagine the islands have been transformed in each of these periods. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

This thesis concerns the introduction of exogenous cultural materials among the native inhabitants of the Alaskan and Northwest coasts prior to the and of the 18th century. It is an investigation of the sources of these materials and the manner and chronology of their introduction. The research is based primarily on data drawn from accounts of native life by explorers and fur traders who visited the coasts of northwestern North America in the 18th century. These accounts are supplemented by ethnologic and archaeologic data collected by anthropologists in the 19th and 20th centuries.

This thesis explore the technological role of bone and antler artifacts from two contact period southern Northwest coast archaeological sites, the Cathlapotle site (45CL1) and the Meier site (35CO5). Technological measures of sedentism are based on lithics, and predict residential sedentism promotes technological expediency in hunter-gatherers (Parry and Kelley 1987). Cathlapotle and Meier lithic assemblages consist of expedient and opportunistic assemblages and raw material stockpiles, with the exception of highly curated projectile points and endscrapers (Hamilton 1994). The expectation that residential sedentism promotes technological expediency in hunter-gatherers was tested on the Cathlapotle and Meier bone and antler artifact assemblages in two ways. First, curation and expediency were recorded for each artifact by measuring level of energy investment in manufacture or degree of working. Second, a spatial analysis was used to explore methods of artifact storage and disposal. Results revealed both Cathlapotle and Meier osseous assemblages are highly curated, except for expedient awls and flakers. Specifically, artifact classes related to subsistence procurement, modification including woodworking, and ornamentation were highly curated. Both sites contain stockpiles of unmodified bone and antler. The spatial analysis showed level of curation did not affect artifact disposal method. Despite this, some patterns were evident. At Cathlapotle, curated procurement and modification artifacts, expedient awls as well as worked fragments were concentrated outside the houses, specifically in Sheet Midden. Broken modification artifacts, ornaments, and detritus were randomly distributed. At the Meier site, curated procurement and modification artifacts, as well as expedient awls were randomly distributed. Broken modification artifacts, detritus and worked fragments were concentrated outside the houses. Ornaments were concentrated in the northern segment (elite area) of the house. There were also significantly more curated complete tools recovered from the cellar facility, while significantly fewer curated complete tools were recovered from the midden facility at Meier. In this thesis, the effects of contact on osseous assemblages were examined. It is an assumption of North American archaeologists that European-introduced metals replace and/or change the character of traditional technologies such as lithic and osseous technologies. Few quantitative studies comparing pre and postcontact artifact assemblages exist (Bamforth 1993, Cobb 2003). In some parts of northeast North America, European contact is followed by a proliferation of osseous tool working, and over time osseous artifacts drop out of the archaeological record (Snow 1995, 1996). Cathlapotle and Meier were occupied from AD 1400 to AD 1830, spanning European contact. People at Cathlapotle were in direct contact with Europeans and Euro-Americans since 1792 (Boyd 2011). Previously, it was assumed Cathlapotle was more involved in the fur trade than Meier, because Cathlapotle was mentioned several times in ethnohistoric accounts, while Meier was never mentioned. Also Cathlapotle contains far more historic trade items than Meier (Ames 2011). The assumption that European-introduced metals replace and/or change the character of traditional technologies was tested on the Cathlapotle and Meier assemblages by comparing artifact frequency, density, and assemblage diversity of pre and postcontact assemblages. Results show contact is reflected in the osseous assemblages at both Cathlapotle and Meier. Contact is evident, but is reflected in different ways. At Cathlapotle, artifact frequencies, densities, and assemblage diversity decrease postcontact. In contrast at Meier, artifact frequencies and densities increase postcontact, with some artifact classes tripling or quadrupling in frequency. The introduction of metal could have enabled people to work osseous materials faster and easier, decreasing manufacture time, cost, and overall energy investment. The gain in efficiency promoted the proliferation of bone working and an abundance of osseous tools at the Meier site. These results encourage a reevaluation of Meier's role in the fur trade. At Cathlapotle, metal objects may have replaced osseous tools resulting in the decline of bone and antler working and/or activity patterns shifted away from activities requiring osseous tools. The results of this thesis deviate from typical Northwest Coast bone and antler assemblages, challenge technological models of sedentism that are based on lithics, and contradict assumptions of Lower Columbians involvement in the fur trade.