Latest news with #KwanlinDün
Yahoo
3 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Whitehorse's McIntyre Creek area is now a territorial park
Years in the making, the Yukon has designated a large swath of land along McIntyre Creek in Whitehorse as a new territorial park. Chasàn Chùa Territorial Park was designated a "natural environment park" in a decision involving both local First Nations and other governments. It brings the total number of territorial parks in the Yukon to nine. Sean Smith, chief of Kwanlin Dün First Nation, said protecting the area has been important to him as both a Whitehorse resident and First Nation citizen. He recalled his time as a child growing up along the McIntyre Creek. It's important, he said, "for younger generations to have access to … [the area], to enjoy nature within it." Access to the area will not change with the new designation. Existing zoning and municipal bylaws for the City of Whitehorse will continue to apply. The new designation protects nearly 36 square kilometres of land and includes prohibitions on mineral staking. Future use of the park will be defined by Kwanlin Dün First Nation, Ta'an Kwäch'än Council, the City of Whitehorse, and Government of Yukon. Park management planning is the next step, according to the territory. Chasàn Chùa means "copper creek" in Southern Tutchone. The Whitehorse 2040 official community plan, released in February, included developing a management plan for the area. The park is ecologically connected to the Łu Zil Män (Fish Lake) area and protects much of the headwaters of the creek. Nils Clarke, Yukon's environment minister, said protecting the area is an issue people have been advocating for at least three decades. To put the announcement into context, Clarke said the new park is about nine times as large as Vancouver's Stanley Park. "It's 'the Wilderness City' and … [this] will be land set aside for recreational opportunities for all Whitehorse residents and for all Yukoners," Clarke said.
CBC
18-05-2025
- General
- CBC
Revitalization and reclamation at heart of Kwanlin traditional tattoo gathering
Gathering in Whitehorse last week was about taking back traditional practices and revisiting shared history Image | Whitehorse tattooing gathering Caption: Tattoo apprentice Bowie Whalen, from Alaska, giving a tattoo at the Kwanlin Traditional Tattoo Gathering in Whitehorse earlier this month. (Isabel Ruitenbeek/CBC) Ashley Cummings is smiling as her chin gets poked over and over with a needle. "Hurts a little bit, but not too bad," she says after the work is done. "It's worth it." Cummings is being tattooed at the Kwanlin Traditional Tattoo Gathering in Whitehorse. The first of its kind, the gathering brought four Indigenous tattoo artists, plus apprentices, to the Kwanlin Dün Cultural Centre over three days, from May 9 to 12. Cummings is from Pangnirtung, Nunavut, and now lives in Whitehorse. She calls the tattooing an act of reclamation. "Inuit almost lost our tattoos entirely," she said. "Now, there's some really stellar women that are being matriarchs and bringing it back to us." For Cummings and other participants, that's what this event is all about — taking back traditional tattoo practices. It's a way to reclaim identity, and find others with a shared past. That's how Holly Nordlum sees it. Nordlum, on the other end of the needle, is a tattoo artist and has been for over a decade. Nordlum, an Inuk from Kotzebue, Alaska, who now lives in Anchorage, says there's something powerful about poking the skin and talking about "hard stuff." The key, she said, is "finding joy in hard stuff." "It really does make you who you are." Lost history To Nordlum, hard stuff means shared trauma — substance abuse, sexual abuse, "all those big issues that have affected us for generations," she says. That's what comes up most often between her and her clients, she says. She's travelled to other places with their own tattooing traditions, like New Zealand and Hawaii. In both places, traditional practices were also harmed by colonization and missionaries. "We're all people of colour who have been colonized and are struggling," she said. Anne Spice, a Kwanlin Dün citizen and tattoo artist, says that each nation has its own tattoo tradition and style, but that there are gaps in that knowledge because of the generations where tattooing was outlawed. To fill that gap, Spice looks to other forms of art to take inspiration for tattooing. But now, she says, there's a push to revive Indigenous tattoo practices. "[In the Yukon] we're at the very beginning stages of this resurgence," she said. Learning together Bobby Rose Koe has a fresh caribou antler tattoo on her shoulder, hand-poked. "I come from caribou," she said. Koe is Teetl'it Gwich'in from Fort McPherson, N.W.T. The new caribou antler is one of many tattoos on her body, each one a reminder of what she's been through and who she is. Koe says the biggest conversation at last week's gathering was on the responsibility around tattoos. People learned the history of tattoos, and what is or isn't appropriate. "I think that it's so beautiful that we're all learning here together," she said. Koe's participated in plenty of gatherings and meetings in the cultural centre's multi-purpose room. Often, those are centred on important conversations but she says the tattoo gathering is something special.
