Colonial Lanscapes on the Northwest Coast of North America
My doctoral research investigated the social history of the Fraser Valley, Western Canada, from ‘pre-contact’ to the unsettling and sometimes violent upheavals of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century colonialism. Drawing on a diverse range of artefacts, from ethnographic texts and archaeological evidence to cartography and historical writing, this project traced the contours of landscape transformations and the way that changes in the land were implicated in constructing different perceptions of history, identity and place among Natives and newcomers. Recently, I published my conclusions in a major new book.
Continuing research in this area combines a focus on material culture and landscape with an examination of the history of intercultural relations. Because this period witnessed dramatic and yet asymmetric social and cultural changes, it provides fertile ground in which to explore the varied ways that interaction affected the development of both indigenous and incoming societies and how this was resolved at different times and places.