Speaker Series on Aboriginal Issues 2017 — Encountering Early Photography of Northwest Coast First Nations

This presentation examines a set of photographs held in the research archive of the Bill Reid Centre for Northwest Coast Studies at SFU. It traces shifts in meaning as they have moved from commercial, government, and museum contexts toward being held up as symbols of Indigenous pride.To view some of the photographs mentioned in the presentation, go to www.sfu.ca/brc/virtual_village.html SPEAKER BIOBryan Myles is the Interim Director of the Bill Reid Centre for Northwest Coast Studies at SFU, where he is working on an interdisciplinary PhD that explores the changing relationship between memory, institutions and Indigenous peoples. His research interests include Indigenous cultural heritage in digital contexts, visual anthropology, postcolonial studies, and material culture. Myles' doctoral research investigates the use of new and emerging media technologies to record, document, safeguard, and create access to Northwest Coast visual cultural heritage.Myles completed his Master’s degree in sociocultural anthropology at Carleton University in 2008. His M.A. thesis project examined the disjuncture between ecotourism and cultural tourism principles and practice in the Mesoamerican country of Belize.In his time with the Bill Reid Centre at SFU, Myles has been involved in numerous Northwest Coast art and cultural heritage projects that draw on the visual histories of the coast and the work of historic and contemporary Northwest Coast artists.