“…when the Cree speak of their land they mean more
than just the ground on which they stand…..What they mean by land is the entire multidimensional web of beings that
occupies eastern James Bay: people, animals, plants, earth. So their story is one
of place, but also one of the complicated
relationships --- physical and metaphysical, human and other-than-human ---
that have shaped land and people together. The land is full of their names,
their stories, their personal memories about these relationships, and all of
these inhabit the remembered earth. These narratives, even if they remain
something of a mystery, a linguistic and
symbolic world that we are as unprepared for as we are to make our living by
hunting on the land of the bay, become a responsibility for anyone who wishes
to speak about the Cree and their land. The responsibility is to remember that
these stories are not curiosities, but, rather, have past and present meaning
on the land.”
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