Changing Landscapes: "Sustaining Traditions": Proceedings of the Fifth and Sixth Annual Coquille Cultural Preservation Conferences by Donald B. Ivy, R. Scott Byram

Abstract

literatureduring what can now be termed the "Moulton era" (1981-present) could have been the narrative capstone of an otherwise exhaust inglycomplete tome. Bibliophiles will pour over thepages of this book for generations, and, accordingly, any seri ous institutional libraryneeds a copy.The work thatwent into the collation, description, and cross-referencingof thepublished literatureby thebibliographers is most impressive.Icould find only one error, the suggestion (p. 59) that Lt. William Broughton ofGeorge Vancouver's expe dition sailed up the Columbia River in the Chatham toPointVancouver inpresent-dayClark County, Washington. In fact,Broughton and some of his crew rowed up the river from the estuary in a launch and cutter.This singlemis step aside, The Literature of theLewis and Clark Expedition is sure to go intohistory as one of the landmarkpublications of theexpedition's bicen tennial. In this respect, the epigraph for this book might have been Jefferson's famous quip to John Adams: "I cannot live without books." On page 22,Beckham provides his own wise corollary to Jeffersonby universalizing the proposition: "Books are part of the glue thathelps hold to gethercivilization." The burgeoning literature and wide appeal of theLewis and Clark story,a veri tablephenomenon unto itself(much to thedis may of some intheacademic community), binds millions ofAmericans together ina community of common historical interest. This book istheir card catalog on a shelf. Changing Landscapes: "Sustaining Traditions" Proceedings of theFifth and SixthAnnual Coquille Cultural Preservation Conferences Edited by Donald B. Ivy and R. Scott Byram Coquille Indian Tribe, North Bend, Ore., 2002. Illustrations, photographs, maps, bibliography. 200 pages. $25.00 paper. Reviewed by David V Ellis Archaeological InvestigationsNorthwest, Portland, Oregon At a time when themedia portray con troversies such as those surrounding Kennewick Man as clashes of irreconcilable worldviews, Changing Landscapes: "Sustaining Traditions" provides good evidence thatanthro pologists and Native Americans can work to gether.Since 1997,theCoquille Indian Tribe has hosted theCoquille Cultural Preservation Con ferenceand published threecollections ofpapers from theconferences.This isthe thirdvolume in the series,all entitledChanging Landscapes, and it offers a selection of papers from the 2001 and 2002 conferences. Changing Landscapes: "SustainingTraditions" includes one poem and eleven papers written by Coquille Indians,members of other tribes,and non-Indian scholars. The contributions are a di verse mix, treating traditional stories, ceremo nies, tool-making, insights fromhistorical In dian correspondence, the natural history of sea otters, Coquille use of resources, reconstructions of cultural geography, thepre-contact and early contact environment of theAlsea Valley, and the historyof the word Coquille. Beneath theireclec ticcharacter isa common theme ofmaintaining traditions and recovering forgottenhistory. The Indian and non-Indian authors provide an excellent balance to the volume. George Wasson ? aCoquille Tribalmember who holds a Ph.D. in anthropology ? recounts the engag ing tale "Coyote and the Strawberries."Honor ing theCoquille tradition that such stories can 440 OHQ vol. 104, no. 3 be told and discussed only in thewinter, I can only urge the reader to enjoy this storyand the comments offered afterward byWasson and Barre Toelken, a professor of folklore studies at Utah StateUniversity.Patty Whereat of theCon federatedTribes of Coos, Lower Umpqua, and Siuslaw Indians and David Lewis of theConfed eratedTribes ofGrand Ronde offerexamples of how forgotten anthropological and historical records can help recover traditional legendsand shed light on earlyreservationlife. Coquille Tribal member JasonYounker discusses how thepot latchtradition was quietly sustainedby individual tribal members despite official suppression through the late 1800s and early 1900s and is now experiencing a public revival. David Brainard of theConfederated Tribes of theCoos, Lower Umpqua, and Siuslaw Indians writes of his personal experiences inreplicatingtraditional tools. The articles by the non-Indian researchers follow thearticlesby tribalauthors.An articleby David Hatch, a SiletzTribalmember, and a joint paper byMarguerite Forest of theUniversity of Wisconsin and Donald Ivyof theCoquille Tribe mark this transitionwith complementary dis cussions of thebiological evolution of thePacific Northwest sea otterand itsextinction inhistori cal times.Hatch's discussion is especially poi gnant inhis insightson how theoverhunting of the otter adversely affected coastal ecosystems and on the challenges facing recent efforts to re establish otterpopulations. The four articles by non-Indian authors fo cus primarily on the relationships between Na tive populations and their natural environments. Roberta Hall discusses how archaeological data and oral histories...