Towagh Behr
Language Mapping Project
First Peoples’ Heritage, Language & Culture Council
University of Victoria

Networking Indigenous Self-Representation + Colonizing Databases in Web 2.0

My presentation will evaluate the use of new media technologies while delving into the complex matrices of production / consumption and relations of power present in an innovative project of research and online ethnographic representation. The project networks indigenous self-representation with ethnographic research and government databases to create the “First Peoples’ Language Map of British Columbia” (http://maps.fphlcc.ca/). The intention of the interactive map and website is to present the 41 languages, cultures, and over 200 First Nations in British Columbia (B.C.), Canada, from an “indigenous perspective”. Bringing together collaborative ethnographic research, indigenous self-representation, and government data in this project raises multiple theoretical and ethical quandaries. As indigenous people create self-representations, they become increasingly producers and consumers of Internet content about themselves, and multiple feedback loops of production and consumption become complexly intertwined. The self-producers of cultural content draw on their recordings of lived experience and community events. In doing so, family photography and personal records become part of a public matrix of cultural representation. What are the implications for viewers as well as those being represented when Web 2.0 technology brings together data and media created for different or even opposing purposes?