The Université du Québec en Abitibi-Témiscamingue (UQAT) will play host to the 17th Inuit Studies Conference, during the last week of October 2010 (dates to be confirmed). The event will be held at the First Peoples Pavilion on the UQAT Val-d’Or campus in Quebec, Canada.

UQAT is proud to invite you to the 17th Inuit Studies Conference, the theme of which will be The Inuit and the Aboriginal World. We would like to suggest an exploration of the sub-theme of relations between the Inuit peoples and the other Aboriginal peoples around the world, in particular their neighbours, the First Nations, the Inuvialuit and the Samí. Organizations which represent the Inuit (Inuit Circumpolar Conference, Greenland Home Rule, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, Makivik Corporation and others) have a determining role to play in the future of these peoples and their interactions have local, regional, and international consequences. The further sub-themes of education, teacher training and academic success are also proposed in order to establish a connection with current leadership, as well as with the leadership of tomorrow, upon which the future of the Inuit will be built.

The call for proposals by interested presenters will soon be open. Please check our website at the address below over the coming weeks, for more information: http://www.uqat.ca/isc-cei-2010.

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OLD CROW – The Yukon and the Vuntut Gwitchin governments are pleased to announce the creation of a 1.21 million-hectare Habitat Protection Area (HPA) that will safeguard one of the most important wetland complexes in Canada.

“By designating these lands as the HPA, the Yukon government is doing its part to protect the ecological integrity of the wetland complex,” Environment Minister Elaine Taylor said.

Old Crow Flats (Van Tat K’atr’anahtii) is located on the Old Crow River system north of the Arctic Circle. The wetlands contain more than 2,000 ponds and marshes, ranging in size from 0.5 to 4,700 hectares. The area is an important breeding and moulting ground for half a million water birds.

“With the creation of this HPA the Vuntut Gwitchin ancestral homeland is now fully protected,” Vuntut Gwitchin Chief Joe Linklater said. “This is the final land issue to be dealt with in our Final Agreement with Yukon and Canada, and we appreciate the Yukon government coming through in this regard. It is to the credit of the three orders of government involved that the ecological integrity of the area will be preserved through this complementary conservation regime.”

The United Nations has recognized Old Crow Flats for its ecological significance through a RAMSAR Convention designation. Home to the Porcupine Caribou Herd, muskrat, moose and other wildlife, the lands protected by this new HPA, the adjacent Settlement Lands and the national park are a critical part of the Vuntut Gwitchin Traditional Territory.

The Government of Yukon's Wildlife Act allows for HPAs to be established in areas where disturbance to wildlife, or to the plants on which they depend, could lead to the decline of a species or population. An HPA may be an area where a wildlife species is concentrated at certain times of the year, a habitat type that is rare in Yukon, or a site that is particularly fragile.

Through the Old Crow Flats Special Management Area Management Plan, the federal, territorial and Vuntut Gwitchin governments work together to sustain the traditional way of life the wetland supports. The management plan is available on the Environment Yukon website, under publications.

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Brian S. Bauer quotes a chronicler on the conquest of the Inca empire, who described “old Indians who, upon seeing Cuzco, stared at the city and gave a great cry, which then turned to tears of sadness, as they contemplated the present and recalled the past” (p. v). Sadness indeed, as the Incan capital was first looted, occupied, then burned, and finally demolished and rebuilt by the conquerors. Although some parts of the city furnished the core of Spanish Cuzco, those who remembered the former architecture and open spaces must have been shocked when they encountered the new reality. Across the centuries it has become more difficult to discover and analyze evidence of the Incan past as modern society gobbles up real estate, often bulldozing away all that remains. In Europe, North America, and Asia, as well as in Peru, housing tracts and shopping centers are steadily erasing evidence of the past.

This compelling fact encouraged Bauer to begin a project that led to Ancient Cuzco. He and six contributors present an overview of the “cultural developments” (p. 1) in the Cuzco Valley from the era of earliest habitation to the Spanish conquest and the subsequent remaking of the valley. Bauer and his colleagues succeed well on two broad fronts. They provide a concise, yet thorough march through the history of human communities in the valley from roughly 2000 BC to the first decades of Spanish arrival. On another level, Ancient Cuzcoalso provides the reader with a wealth of information about landforms, agriculture, ceramic history, architecture, political infighting, and warfare in the valley. All this in less than 270 large-format text pages makes for an excellent introduction to ancient Cuzco and a powerful summation of the achievements and failures of that important human community.

The strength of this approach is in both organizing and explaining a great deal of useful information that is well known to specialists, as well as in presenting newer findings on sites recently discovered and evaluated. The effect is to present the reader with a detailed, clearly written narrative that gives a full picture of the Cuzco valley as it developed over the centuries until the era of Spanish intrusion. Familiar scholars such as Karen Chavez and Terence D’Altroy are cited extensively throughout the book, and the notes and bibliography provide the reader with the scope of recent scholarship on this important topic. Every chapter contains excellent maps and graphs that will be of interest to both specialists and students beginning their study of the Inca.

This reader found much to admire in the discussion of imperial expansion. The idea that Inca state development occurred over a longer period, and was the result of diverse political and economic processes, is fully presented and analyzed. Indeed, as Bauer and R. Alan Covey emphasize, “although Inca imperial expansion appears to have occurred quite rapidly, researchers increasingly view this as the result of antecedent and long-term regional political processes” (p. 72-73). The authors then discuss other views about class conflicts, economic distribution patterns, and duel inheritance as explanations for Inca state expansion. They then bring into play the new survey and excavation data of the last two decades to bolster their perspective concerning longer-term processes that propelled imperial development. The ample maps of the Cuzco valley in chapter 8 help the reader follow their line of presentation. Details round out the picture of Inca mastery, as the authors describe the level of agricultural surplus demanded by the lords of the valley. In the town of Cajamarca, Spanish conquerors discovered "certain houses filled with clothes packed in bales that reached to the ceilings of the houses.... The greater part of it is very fine and elegant wool and the rest cotton of various colors and rich hues” (p. 96). Cuzco became a “cosmopolitan center” (p. 106) transformed by the labor of provincial populations that the Inca now controlled through military, political, and religious means. An interesting counterpoint to the nuanced description of the valley’s changing aspects that the authors construct over the book’s first nine chapters is the comprehensive discussion of how quickly and vigorously the Spanish rebuilt and remade Cuzco as a European polity. By the 1580s, the character of the valley and the city were changed forever, literally re-constructed with materials from the vanquished Inca capital. Spanish appropriation of the past was not limited to stone and timbers, but also included the mummified corpses of Inca rulers. Their bodies, carefully and reverentially embalmed and displayed in elaborate temples during Inca rule, found new homes as some were placed on display in Spanish buildings.

Bauer concludes the study by noting that the “overall goal of this book is to document the settlement patterns for each major time period in the history of the Cuzco valley and to examine how those patterns changed over time” (p. 185). He also has included recent ethnohistoric data, graphs, charts, and lists of key participants in the valley’s history. He and his co-authors have succeeded on every count in producing a highly readable, coherent depiction of the great valley. A very small complaint: a fuller and more detailed description of the Spanish conquest as a separate chapter would make this excellent study even more appealing, even though much of the later conquest took place outside of the valley, and thus beyond the scope defined by the authors. Both specialty and general courses that cover the history and development of indigenous cultures in the Americas could use this book easily, although it might be too advanced for first-year survey courses.

Reviewed by Craig Hendricks, published on H-Urban

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The notion of contested conservation practices in ethnography develops out of a Western or Eurocentric view of the world. In this manner, heritage preservation involves a struggle between museum and societal policies within local, regional and national cultural organizations. In essence, museums and cultural organizations work together to properly and respectfully carry out the missions of the museum and the cultural artefacts of indigenous peoples. It is this latter point which illustrates the primary importance of addressing ways of decolonising conservation, or more specifically, ensuring control, use, and ownership of cultural artefacts or treasures (taonga) by the indigenous peoples themselves.

In Decolonizing Conservation,Dean Sully and other notable experts in Maori and New Zealand studies, discuss issues and concerns of Maori meeting houses (wharenui) in New Zealand, Germany, the U.S. and the U.K. Maori meeting houses are prominent community buildings for various rituals, events, funerals, marriages, births, and other social festivities. Only four wharenui exist outside of New Zealand, one of which is called Hinemihi of the Old World (Hinemihi o te Ao Tawhito) located at the Clandon Park estate in Surrey, England.

Hinemihi was built in Te Wairoa, New Zealand in the 1880s and shipped to England in the 1890s. In England, Hinewihi was to be used as "a public place where important decisions were made, visitors entertained, genealogies affirmed, relationships confirmed, births and marriages celebrated, and the dead mourned… a symbolic place to celebrate and confirm local Maori identity" (p. 130).

In this book, the nature of public policy, museological studies and conservation of wharenui are interconnected and multifactoral. One of the problems with museum conservation standards of heritage preservation involves a quandary in determining "appropriate standards of museum care and interpretation of cultural treasures…in direct contradiction to or at variance with the source communities from where they originated and from where their meanings and significances lie" (p. 45).

In order to solve the dilemma between respecting and honoring Maori rights amid global preservation and display of artefacts and culture, several legislative and political components need to be discussed. Thankfully, Dean Sully and other contributors largely fill this void by presenting protective legislation, including the Treaty of Waitangi, the Objects Protection Act 1975, Ministry for Culture and Heritage, New Zealand Historic Place Trust, and the Department of Conservation. It is important to understand the historic contributions and implications of wharenui on display, while concomitantly considering the contemporary purpose for Maori artefact protection and display. Moreover, this book reiterates that there are "living relationships between the taonga [treasures] and the communities and peoples from which they originate and with which they identify" (p. 54). As a result, living descendants "should not be relegated to the historic past; rather, the cultural significance of these taonga have restorative dimensions in relation to the articulation of identity, belonging, and connection" (p. 55).

The essay by Julie DeLong Lawlor and Katy Lithgow examines the role of The National Trust and Hinemihi at Clandon Park is of particular note. Part of the responsibility of The National Trust resides on determining a conservation management process by preparing a statement of significance. This statement is used to identify the most significant features of the property or structure, which deem it unique and a vital social, political, and cultural component of the Ngati Hinemihi (descendants of Hinemihi) and Ngati Ranana (London Maori Club). Lawlor describes Hinemihi as "many things to many people, a whare tupuna (ancestral house), a whare runanga (meeting house), and a whare wananga (house of learning) for UK-based and visiting Maori and an opportunity for visitors to Clandon to appreciate Maori culture and history…it is appropriate that Hinemihi continues to develop as a focus for Maori culture in the United Kingdom" (p. 154).

Historic preservationists face many difficulties and considerations for restoration and reconstruction projects and Hinemihi provides an informative example. For instance, wharenui restorations were incredibly difficult to accomplish, since a thorough knowledge of materials used for construction were necessary. The importance of maintaining a commitment to preserving wharenui as close to natural as possible was a key issue for the National Trust and Maori communities. Ultimately, the effects of weather and time degraded wharenui materials. The predicament for historic preservationists resulted from indecision regarding when and how to properly repair roof structures and painted walls according to Maori customs and traditions. Historical accuracy, community support, and Maori appeasement were paramount to any form of restoration.

Sully's last essay eloquently sums up the issues discussed earlier in the book. However, the definition of 'decolonising conservation' is not clearly defined, but its implications for ethnic communities and historic preservation and conservation practices are numerous. In fact, decolonising conservation provides alternative ways of approaching the conservation process by contextualizing past relationships with contemporary communities and indigenous aspirations. In effect, it provides an interconnected link between the past and present with object-centered social networks.

The book's chapter layout and contributor essays are well-organized, succinct, and relevant for the study of New Zealand wharenui in international locations. A one-page poem included by Rosanna Rowland--So Who Invited Tu?--is a worthy addition for a work on Maori poetry, but oddly is included in this book. Still, Sully's expertise on Maori meeting houses is unsurpassed. Likewise, undergraduate and graduate students of Maori studies, cultural preservation, museology, oceania, anthropology, folklore, and archaeology will find Decolonizing Conservationmost helpful. Finally, in Decolonizing Conservation,Sully understands the larger picture regarding an active role in caring for Maori meetings houses outside New Zealand, because "the involvement of communities has occurred as heritage institutions and their professionals have allowed it to take place…Maori participants are clearly guests and are not hosting the process" (p. 238). The complicated and interconnected role of government, museums, private institutions, and public policy ultimately shape the present and future outlook of meeting houses for indigenous families and descendants of Maori throughout the world. Although the real solution for protecting New Zealand wharenui resides with the Maori themselves, James Schuster offers his own observation of the Maori view of Hinemihi at Clandon quite poignantly "we owe her [Hinemihi] our lives…when she is ready to return [to New Zealand], she will. It may be right to leave that question to her" (p. 239).

Reviewed by Matthew J. Forss, Independent Scholar