What are the challenges we face around water in Western Canada?What are our rights to water? Does water itself have rights? Water Rites: Reimagining Water in the West documents the many ways that water flows through our lives, connecting the humans, animals and plants that all depend on this precious and endangered resource. Essays from scholars, activists, environmentalists, and human rights advocates illuminate the diverse issues surrounding water in Alberta, including the right to access clean drinking water, the competing demands of the resource development industry and Indigenous communities, and the dwindling supply of fresh water in the face of human-caused climate change. Statements from community organizations detail the challenges facing watersheds, and the actions being taken to mitigate these problems. With a special focus on Environmental and Indigenous issues, Water Rites explores how deeply water is tied to human life. These essays are complemented by full-colour portfolios of work by contemporary painters, photographers, and installation artists who explore our relation to water. Reproductions of historical paintings, engravings and film stills demonstrate how water has shaped our country's cultural imaginary from its beginnings, proving that water is a vital resource for our lives and our imaginations.
Jim Ellis is Professor of English and Director of the Calgary Institute for the Humanities at the University of Calgary. He has written widely on art, literatue and film. Helen Knott is a Dane Zaa, Nehiyaw, and mixed Euro-descent woman living in Fort St. John, British Columbia. In 2016 Helen was one of sixteen global change makers featured by the Nobel Women's Initiative for being committed to end gender-based violence. Helen was selected as a 2019 RBC Taylor Prize Emerging Author. This is her first book.
Acknowledgements Introduction: Rethinking our Relations to Water Jim Ellis Embodying Kinship Responsibilities In and Through Nipi (Water) Michelle Daigle Petrography and Water: Artist's Statement and Portfolio Warren Cariou Women, Water, Land: Writing from the Intersections Helen Knott Tanya Hartnett: The Poetics and Politics of Scarred/Sacred Water Nancy Tousley Y2Y: Conserving Headwaters Jodi Hilty, Aerin Jacob, Hilary Young, Kelly Zenkewich Elbow River Watershed Partnership Flora Giesbrecht Confluence: Artist's Statement and Portfolio Leslie Sweder Indigenous Water Rights and Global Warming in Alberta David K. Laidlaw Watershed+: Rethinking Pulblic Art Ciara McKeown Swimming in Systems JosA (c)e MA (c)thot and Amy Spark Glorie A l'Eau (Glory to Water) by Alberta Tessier Charles Tepperman Water Rights/Water Justice Adrian Parr Appendix A: UN Declaration on the Human Right to Water and Sanitation Appendix B: UN Declaration the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
Water Rights is an insightful, moving, beautiful book. Melding the scholarly with the narrative and the artistic, the volume provides a unique contribution to the literature around water security and well-being. --Ingrid Leman Stefanovic, Great Plains Research Visually cohesive and elegant . . . recommended for anyone seeking to environmental studies work with Native perspectives and instructors looking for holistic approaches to environmental issues. --Ellen Ahlness, Electronic Green Journal Interspersed with full-colour photographs, maps, and artwork, the chapters from fourteen contributors address a wonderfully wide range of water-related topics . . . By incorporating narratives documenting both pressing problems and collaborative solutions, the volume presents the reader with both a sense of urgency and the possibility of justice and change, bringing us one step closer to reimagining water in the west. --Zander Albertson, BC Studies
