Read the full article by Nancy Joseph discussing the amazing built family through their tribal canoe journey on the College of Arts & Sciences website. Start reading below…
On a hillside in Suquamish, Washington, Nicole Kuhn and her two teenage sons watched brightly colored canoes make their way toward the beach below on a sunny July afternoon.
Kuhn was searching for a canoe with a colorful red and green salmon painted on its exterior. When she spotted the canoe, she teared up. Among the paddlers — called pullers — were her two older children, Ethan and Naomi, participating in their first Tribal Canoe Journey.
“We are Haida,” says Kuhn, a UW doctoral student. “Canoe culture is integral to who we are. I’ve been wanting to be part of a canoe family for years, and I’ve wanted to bring my kids into this for so long.”
Tribal Canoe Journey is an annual event that brings together tribal and First Nations communities to celebrate their shared heritage. Large canoes navigate the waters of the Pacific Northwest over days or weeks (depending on their starting point) before reaching the host tribe for a full week of protocol and celebration. This year the Muckleshoot Tribe hosted, with about 100 canoes arriving at the final destination — Alki Beach in West Seattle. Suquamish was one of the stops along the way.
Kuhn had watched canoe journey landings at Alki during previous summers, wishing she could participate. But she didn’t see a way. Her Haida relatives lived up north in British Columbia, Canada, and she was in Seattle raising four children.
To Kuhn’s surprise, the University of Washington provided the answer.
Kuhn and her children are part of the new Shell House Canoe Family, č̓away̓altxʷ ʔiišəd, made up of UW students, alumni, faculty, staff, elders, and other community members. The group spent the past year planning its first canoe journey. They carved paddles, trained as pullers, learned songs and protocols, and coordinated complex logistics for each landing site. For many, it was their first time participating. For most, it won’t be their last.
