Sq’éwlets: A Stó:lo-Coast Salish Community in the Fraser River Valley

A collaboration between the Sq’éwlets First Nation, the Stó:lo Research and Resource Management Centre, Ursus Heritage Consulting, and team of archaeologists, software developers and designers. See full credits.

Making Culture Lab Contributions: Kate Hennessy, Media Lead, Virtual and Physical Exhibition Co- Design; Aynur Kadir, Reese Muntean, Rachel Ward - Project Media Assistants.

Funded by Virtual Exhibits Investment Program, Virtual Museum of Canada. The Virtual Museum of Canada is managed by the Canadian Museum of History, with the financial support of the Government of Canada.

Launched in 2017
View the Virtual Exhibit at http://www.digitalsqewlets.ca/

Sq’éwlets: A Stó:lō-Coast Salish Community in the Fraser River Valley is an online project that is the product of a major interdisciplinary, cross-cultural collaboration. It is the work of community leaders, anthropologists, historians, media specialists, and other content experts. It stems from a collaborative relationship formed 25 years ago between Chief Clarence Pennier of Sq’éwlets and archaeologists from the University of British Columbia and Stó:lō Nation. A partnership was formed in 1992 to excavate, examine, understand, and protect the ancestral archaeological resources at one of the Sq’éwlets community’s primary ancestral sites, Qithyil. Based on several decades of community-based archaeology, oral history, and ethnohistorical work, and the recent production of short video documentaries, the website presents a long-term perspective of what it means to be a Sq’éwlets person and community member today. It also resulted in a series of physical exhibitions at the Chilliwack Museum & Archives, the Reach Gallery Museum in Abbotsford, and the Bill Reid Centre at Simon Fraser University, Burnaby.

The virtual exhibit was launched in January 2017 at http://www.digitalsqewlets.ca/

*Winner of the 2018 MUSE Silver Award for Online Presence , American Association of Museums
*Winner of the 2017 Best Interactive Media Award, Society For Visual Anthropology Film and Media Festival (Washington DC)

“With a digital space such as the Sq’éwlets virtual museum, the obligation to nurture relationships continues to be negotiated in real-time interactions within Sq’éwlets people and communities, and across broader Stó:lō and Coast Salish contexts; however, as an added space for physical, emotional, social, cultural, and historical interaction, digital space offers a means to connect to Sq’éwlets from afar, no matter how remote in distance or time. As long as the site is maintained online, it may also foster an intergenerational connection to Sq’éwlets stories, “belongings,” and territories for generations not yet born. In the “Story of This Project” page is where I see an alignment with the stated intention of the Sq’éwlets community to share its history with the world through this online space. The Sq’éwlets vision is as follows: Our ancestors made and used and curated them [our ancient be-longings] personally. They were owned and cared for and belonged to our people, and we intend to do the same for them today.”

— Dr. Dara Kelly (Stó:lō) - New Media Review in BC Studies Journal, 2017

Reach Gallery Museum, Abbotsford B.C. Exhibition, 2017-2018. Photo by Reese Muntean.

Opening of Exhibition at the Reach Gallery Museum, Abbotsford B.C. Exhibition, 2017-2018. Photo by Reese Muntean.

Installation at Chilliwack Museum and Archives, 2018.

Installation at Sq'éwlets Band Hall, 2018 - permanent

Installation at Sq'éwlets Band Hall, 2018 - permanent. Photo by Reese Muntean

Installation at Bill Reid Centre, Simon Fraser University, 2016-2017

Publications and Exhibitions

Hennessy, K., Lyons, N., Schaepe, D., Blake, M., Phillips, A., Pennier, C., Muntean, R., and Kadir, A. (2018)
Collaborative Digital Curation and Recursive Publics: the Making of Sq’éwlets: A Stó:lō-Coast Salish Community in the Fraser River Valley.
Proceedings of Museums and the Web, 2017, Vancouver: Archives and Museums Informatics (link).

Schaepe, D., Pennier, C., Hennessy, K., and Lyons, N. 2017)
Digital Sq’éwlets: A story of belongings, worldview and teachings. University of Melbourne Collections Issue 20, June 2017 (Special Issue: Future of the Object Symposium). Pp. 62-67.

Hennessy, K., Schaepe, D., Kadir, A., Lyons, N., and Pennier, C., with the Sq’ewlets Advisory Group and the Chilliwack Museum and Archives (2017)
Sq’éwlets: A Stó:lō -Coast Salish Community in the Fraser River Valley. Exhibition of digitalsqewlets.ca. Cholliwack Museum and Archives, Chilliwack BC, Nov. 2 – April 28, 2017.

Kelly, Dara (2017).
Sq’ éwlets: A Stó:lō-Coast Salish Community in the Fraser River Valley Virtual Museum. New Media Review. BC Studies (194):195-197.

Hennessy, K., Schaepe, D., Kadir, A., Lyons, N., and Pennier, C., with the Sq’ewlets Advisory Group [co-curators] (2017)
Sq’éwlets: A Stó:lō -Coast Salish Community in the Fraser River Valley. Exhibition celebrating the launch of digitalsqewlets.ca. Reach Gallery Museum. Abbotsford BC, January 26 – May 7 2017.

Lyons, N., Schaepe, D., Hennessy, K., Blake, M., Pennier, C., Welch, J.R., McIntosh, K., Phillips, A., Charlie, B., Hall, C., Hall, L., Kadir, A., Point, A., Pennier, V., Phillips, R., Muntean, R., Williams, J. Jr., Williams, J. Sr., Chapman, J., Pennier, C. (2016)
Sharing Deep History as Digital Knowledge: An Ontology of the Sq’éwlets Website Project. Journal of Social Archaeology, Fall 2016 (DOI: 10.1177/1469605316668451), 26 pages. [pdf]

2011 Natasha Lyons, Andy Phillips, Dave Schaepe, Betty Charlie, Clifford Hall, Kate Hennessy, and John Welch.
The Scowlitz Site Online: Launch of the Scowlitz Assemblage Project.
The Midden (Publication of the Archaeological Society of British Columbia) 43(2):11-14.

Sq’éwlets: A Stó:lo-Coast Salish Community in the Fraser River Valley

360˚ Video for Sustainability (2018)

snəw̓eyəɬ (teachings) (2015)