Canadian Arctic Expedition of 1913-1918 commemorated

The Mary Sachs, one of the expedition vessels.

From 1913 to 1918 the Canadian Arctic Expedition located and mapped unoccupied islands in the far north and studied the Western Arctic and Victoria island.

Yesterday, this first major Canadian government research study undertaken in the North was commemorated at a ceremony at the  Vancouver Maritime Museum.

The ceremony included the unveiling of a Historic Sites and Monuments Board plaque marking the expedition as an event of national historic significance. 

The expedition, organized by Vihjalmur Stefansson, set out from Esquimalt Harbour on June 17, 1913. It was divided into the Northern Party, commanded by Stephansson, and a Southern Party led by zoologist Rudolph Anderson.

The expedition ships were headed for Herschel Island, but as a result of unusually harsh conditions all were frozen in before reaching their destination.

Eleven crew members died after the principal ship of the expedition, the Karluk, was carried off and eventually crushed by the ice. Six others died during the course of the expedition, which continued with newly purchased ships the North Star and the Polar Bear. 

As well as discovering land previously unknown even to the Inuit, including Brock, Mackenzie King, Borden, Meighen and Lougheed Islands, the expedition collected many animal, plant and rock specimens, cultural objects, and film and photographic records of Inuit life. The mission's legacy is reflected in the name of Sachs Harbour, named for the expedition's abandoned ship, the Mary Sachs.

A champion of Arctic development, Stephansson became known as the "prophet of the North," but was considered arrogant and a charlatan in some quarters. He later became widely discredited over a failed scheme to raise reindeer in the North, and his unauthorized claiming of Wrangel Island, north of Siberia, for Canada in 1921, which caused an international incident.

Another expedition participant was celebrated anthropologist Diamond Jenness, who took part in the traditional life of the Copper Inuit around Coronation Gulf.

The commemorative plaque was unveiled by Dr. Colin Carrie, parliamentary secretary to environment minister Leonna Aglukkaq. 

Two examples of the plaque will be installed, one at Fort Rodd Hill and Fisgard Lighthouse national historic sites, overlooking Esquimalt Harbour in British Columbia, and one in Sachs Harbour, Northwest Territories.

The Government of Canada originally recognized the historic significance of the Canadian Arctic Expedition in 1925 and a plaque was originally erected in Ottawa.

Truth and Reconciliation event kicks off in Edmonton

To compelling drumbeats and singing, a grand procession wended its way around a packed Hall A of the Shaw Conference Centre this morning, part of the opening ceremonies of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Alberta National Event.
The procession included tribal chiefs in full headresses, RCMP and military personnel, young dancers, provincial politicians, members of the clergy and more.
It opened the seventh and last of a series of national public events organized by the commission, which is looking into the history of Canadian residential schools, which some 150,000 Aboriginal children were forced to leave their families to attend, and where many suffered physical and sexual abuse.
Allowing residential school survivors to relate their own experiences, either in open sessions of the commission or privately, is the main focus of the four-day event. There are also film showings, a free concert, reconciliation lunches, a talent show and displays and artisans.
"We must all at some point get together and reconcile -- and that means all of us," said Chief Cameron Alexis, regional chief of Alberta Assembly of First Nations, following a prayer in Cree by Elder Bob Cardinal.
"We all have to keep working together as First Nations, Aboriginal people, Albertans, Canadians to make this country what the creator meant it to be."
Mayor Don Iveson received received the first of several rounds of hearty applause when he opened his remarks with the Cree greeting "Tansi."
Iveson acknowledged that the meeting was taking place on Treaty Six traditional land, and noted that the location now known as Edmonton has been special place for a very long time, a place of exchange.
"This is not a 200-year-old place," he said. "It's a 10,000-year-old place. And we celebrate that for the richness it conveys."
The mayor noted that Edmonton has an Aboriginal population of 60,000, of whom 12,000 are residential school survivors, and will soon the largest urban Aboriginal community in Canada.
Some people have reacted to that fear, but it is time to stop that, he said. "Indigenous people are welcome."
Justice Murray Sinclair, one of the three members of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, pointed out that it came about as part of the settlement of claims made against the federal government by residential school survivors.
"A national memory was created for this country to ensure this could never happen again."
Sinclair said that purpose of the schools, particularly earlier on, was not education so much as to force Indigenous children out of their own culture and assimilate them to the dominant culture.
Though it was realized shortly after it was put into effect some 130 years ago that the residential school system was not working as a tool of assimilation, the government remained committed to it.
"It took that long for people to realize that wasn't going to happen. Indigenous people are resilient people."
Young indigenous people are beginning to seek out their cultural heritage, he indicated.
"We must first of all ensure our children and grandchildren haves a strong sense of self respect.
The way to reconciliation is to put an end to disrespect, disrespect that is far too prevalent among our leaders.
"What we need to know is to understand the importance of teaching our children and grandchildren to be respectful. It is through involving our leadership in this conversation we know that we can move toward reconciliation and we can stop being so disrespectful to one another."
Reconciliation won't happen in our lifetimes, Sinclair said, but it is possible if we commit to it and it is necessary.
"We are not going to allow the current situation and the situation of the historical past to continue any more."
He added, "This experience of residential schools is not an Aboriginal problem, it's a Canadian problem."
For further information go to www.trc.ca.

Peter Handke wins 2014 International Ibsen Award

Peter Handke in younger days

"Tense, unnerved, and close to madness before writing—and when I read what I’ve written it looks so calm." 

-- Peter Handke, "The Weight of the World"

Controversial author Peter Handke has been awarded the International Ibsen Award, which goes to individuals or institutions that have made a significant contribution to the development of theatre as an art form. 

The award was established by the Norwegian government in 2007 and and is awarded every second year on the birthday of celebrated playwright Henrik Ibsen, born in 1828 in Skien, Norway.

Previous recipients have been Peter Brook, Ariane Mnouchkine, Jon Fosse and Heiner Goebbels. The winner receives 2.5 million Norwegian kroner ($C463,000).

Handke, 71, was born in Austrian state of Kärnten and studied law at the University of Graz from 1961 to 1965, but dropped out when the manuscript of his first novel Die  Hornissen (The Hornets) was accepted for publication. In the same year, the avant-garde play Publikumsbeschimpfung (Offending  the  Audience) was put on in Frankfurt, directed by Claus Peymann. 

Handke has since published more than thirty novels and works of prose, and has written a number of plays and screenplays. Perhaps his widely known work is Die Angst des Tormanns beim Elfmeter, (The Goalie's Anxiety at the Penalty Kick), novel and screenplay of a 1972 film. He also wrote the screenplay for Wim Wenders' award winning Der  Himmel  über  Berlin  (Wings  of  Desire  or  The  Sky  Above  Berlin,  1987). 

Handke's previous awards include the 1973 Georg Buchner Prize, 2002 America Award, 2009 Franz Kafka Prize and 2012 Mulheimer Dramatikerpreis. In 2006 he was also nominated  with the Heinrich Heine Prize but the award was withdrawn as a result of opposition to his views on Serbia's role in the Yugoslav wars.

In 1996 Handke produced Eine winterliche Reise zu den Flüssen Donau, Save, Morawa und Drina oder Gerechtigkeit für Serbien (A Journey to the Rivers: Justice for Serbia), a film combining travelogue and essay in which he expresses his view of Serbia as among the among the victims of the wars. He also attacked Western media for misrepresenting the causes and consequences of the conflict. In in March 2006, Handke spoke at the funeral of Serbian wartime leader Slobodan Milošević. 

The jury's citation states that the 2014 International Ibsen Award is being awarded to Peter Handke for "a body of work that is unparalleled in its formal beauty and brilliant reflection", and continues: "If Ibsen was the model playwright of the bourgeois epoch, which has yet to end, Peter Handke is undoubtedly theatre's most eminent epic poet." The citation is available at http://www.internationalibsenaward.com.

The Euromaidan Project and Taras Shevchenko's 200th

While the physical conflicts that lead to the flight of Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych were begin fought in Kyiv's Independence Square with stones and Molotov cocktails, a battle of ideas was also taking place.
In the struggle against the Yanukovych on what became known as the Euromaidan one of the major weapons was graphic art -- posters that expressed rejection of the regime and aspirations for a different kind of Ukraine.
Fifty of the the posters that went up around the square and elsewhere can now be seen as part of The Euromaidan Project: The Art of Revolution, an exhibition now on at the St. John's Institute Culture and Arts Centre in Edmonton.
"The 50 posters displayed here circulated widely on the Maidan," said curator Dr. Bohdan Kordan, a professor at St. Thomas More College in Saskatoon.
"Designed and created for mass distribution through the medium of the private, they testify to a deep desire for change and are symbolic of the best impulses of a society mobilizing for it's own defense."
With their striking graphics and vibrant color, predominantly the yellow and blue of the Ukrainian, these creations are reminiscent of Cuban revolutionary posters and the imagery of the May-June 1968 revolt in France. Many incorporate a single drop, meant to symbolize that the convictionss of each individual collectively make up an ocean of protest.
The Euromaidan Project can be seen at St. John's Institute, 11024-82 Avenue, until Sunday, March 16. The institute is largely a residence, so visitors have to ring to be buzzed in.
From Edmonton the exhibition organized by the St. Thomas More Prairie Centre for the Study of Ukrainian will travel to Winnipeg, Toronto and Yorkton.
Bicentennial of Taras Shevchenko, Ukraine's national poet
"Ukraine, O my dear Ukraine,
My dearest!
When I think of you, my homeland,
My heart can only cry…"
-- Taras Shevchenko, Night of Taras, November 6, 1838. (Translated by Peter Fedynsky.)
Although in Night of Taras Taras Shevchenko, Ukraine's most renowned bard, was speaking of an earlier period of the country's history when it was oppressed by Poles and Russians, one can imagine that those would also be his sentiments today.
This month marks the 200th anniversary of the poet's birth in Simferopol in the Crimea, currently torn apart by a crisis in Ukraine-Russia relations and ethnic conflict between their respective groups in the territory.
However, planned celebrations in Sebastapol to mark Shevchenko's March 9 birthday were disrupted by clashes between Russians and Ukrainians, although a celebration in his hometown went smoothly.
The Shevchenko bicentennial is being celebrated with an exhibition at the University of Alberta's  Rutherford Library. The small display of books and artwork reproductions is located in the Galleria, just outside Rutherford South.
Also commemorating the bicentennial will be a concert put on by Ukrainian Art Song Project in the city on Friday, March 15. Part of a series of concerts taking place in North America and Ukraine, the concert will include a choral cantata, The Raging Rivers, by Mykola Lysenko, and Testament, by Mykhailo Verbytksyj.
Sponsored locally by the Ukrainian, Music Society of Alberta, The concert will be held at 7 p.m.  at the West End Christian Reformed Church, 10015-149th Street. Tickets are available at Orbit, Meest and at the door.
In addition to the concerts, the Ukrainian Art Song Project is celebrating the bicentennial with the release of a featuring art songs based on Shevchenko poems. Further information is available at http://www.musicaleopolis.com.