Eagle Down Is Our Law: Witsuwit'En Law, Feasts, and Land Claims

By Antonia Mills

Book Overview

Eagle Down Is Our Law is about the struggle of the Witsuwit'en peoples to establish the meaning of aboriginal rights. With the neighbouring Gitksan, the Witsuwit'en launched a major land claims court case asking for the ownership and jurisdiction of 55,000 square kilometers of land in north-central British Columbia that they claim to have held since before the arrival of the Europeans. In conjunction with that court case, the Gitksan and Witsuwit'en asked a number of expert witnesses, among them Antonia Mills, an anthropologist, to prepare reports on their behalf. Her report, which instructs the judge in the case on the laws, feasts, and institutions of the Witsuwit'en, is presented here. Her testimony is based on two years of participant observation with the Witsuwit'en peoples and on her reading of the anthropological, historic, archaeological, and linguistic data about the Witsuwit'en. In 1991, the judge who rendered the decision in the court case, known as Delgamuukw v. the Queen, dismissed the testimony of Mills and other anthropologists and ruled that the Witsuwit'en and Gitksan have no aboriginal title. This book contains the report that Mills rendered to the court. With its publication, the public can judge the quality of the expert opinion report for themselves. The report is introduced by Chief Gisdaywa (Alfred Joseph) of the Witsuwit'en, Chief Mas Gak (Don Ryan) of the Gitksan, anthropologist Michael Kew, and legal scholar Michael Jackson. A prologue by Mills describes the report in the context of the epic three-year court case, and an epilogue, also by Mills, describes what has happended in the provincial appeal and what the Gitksan and Witsuwit'en have done since the decision to further address the issues of aboriginal rights.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0774804971
• ISBN13: 9780774804974
• Release Date: October 2002
• Publisher: Univ of British Columbia Pr
• Length: 238 Pages
• Weight: 1.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.5" x 1.0" x 6.5"

Customer Reviews

delivery & book review

Very rapid delivery and arrived on time. The book is in really good condition and is a very good read and very informative.

Aboriginal Governance before Contact-Land, Language + Law

Wit'suwit'en and Gitksan Governance existed prior to contact. And so their societal and spiritual structure intertwined with the land through the Potlatch. The Potlatch, once outlawed by Canadian Statutes under the Indian Act at the turn of the 19th Century, Delgamuukw/Gis'DaWay (SCC 1997) accepts the traditional governance of Aboriginal Peoples of Canada as "we are all here to stay". The details of the actual Potlatch and protocols are a combination of spiritual beliefs that connect to the land, language and law (potlatch).The Aboriginal concept, "collective society", is outside the traditional realms of eurocentric thought of the individualism and property ownership. Appreciating the differences with this read may dispel one sided opinions of Aboriginal Society, not yet fully understood. I should know, I am from the Tsa'yu Clan of the Wit'suwit'en. My name is Sha-ohn, sister to Chief Wil'aat and Brothin-in-law to Wah'tah'gyet. Both are contributors to the book, as Indigenous Knowledge teachers. They also were a part of Wit'suwit'en and Gitksan Elders and Chiefs who gave evidence at the trial VS: British Colombia and again at the appeal courts, the Delgamuukw Decision. Enjoy your reading and re-reading as researched and presented by Antonia Mills.