A new skin for an old drum: changing contexts of Yukon Aboriginal Baha'i storytelling.(Personal account)

Abstract: This article examines the construction of the religious self through the storytelling processes of Yukon Aboriginal Baha'is. Previous anthropological work has studied the social factors involved in the maintenance of faith amongst Aboriginal Baha'is. This sociological study focuses on the manner in which people put together stories to construct their contemporary Baha'i identity. Examining recorded life histories, public stories, and archival materials, I present one perspective on how people story their religious identities in changing historical contexts.

Background to the Study

In 2003, I was the recipient of funding from the Northern Research Institute to conduct a qualitative research project. The focus of the project was twofold: to recuperate materials about the history of Yukon Baha'is, (1) and to record life histories of Aboriginal women in this community.

Between the years 1960-1975, 204 people became Baha'is in the Yukon, 104 of which were from one family--the Johns (Tagish Nation). (2) Since the beginning of the religion in the Yukon (1953), materials such as oral recordings, archival paper records, family pamphlets, and other written works have become widely disseminated. My intent was to bring the materials together, catalogue them, and then deposit them in the Yukon Archives. There they would be protected for posterity and accessible to local Baha'is, the interested public, and researchers. (3)

The initiative to record life histories of Aboriginal women arose from my doctoral work on religion and identity in the lives of elderly Canadian Baha'i women. (4) I was notable to include any Aboriginal women in this study (1990s) because the women who were early Baha'is had passed away. And although I had been advised to record Yukon stories, I was not able to travel to the North for various reasons. It was serendipitous for me, then, to acquire a position at Yukon College in 2002.

In my first few months in Whitehorse I learned a number of significant things that encouraged me to embark on further research here. Aboriginal elders had approved documentation of their stories and histories in the English language--a significant boon and encouragement for a non-Aboriginal researcher. I knew the anthropological research of fifty years of Yukon cultural history would provide contextual material, and recent work (5) offered the opportunity to study rare interviews of deceased and contemporary Baha'is. As well, the commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of the Baha'i Faith in the Yukon was to take place in 2003. This meant that local people and those that had moved away would be coming together for a reunion to celebrate and share their reminiscences--a prime opportunity for a researcher to engage in participant observation and documentation. (6) Finally, I learned that no in-depth life history project had been conducted to record personal stories of religiosity, and no full story had been contributed to local families' histories. There was, then, a possibility to contribute to local women's history by recording life stories. (For those interested in further details about my methodology, see this note (7)).

As a sociologist, I am interested in how people, particularly women, make meaning of their lives and how they translate that meaning into action through social processes. I share a community of meaning with the participants based on our membership in the same religion. I also share, with contemporary scholars, an academic interest in agency, resistance, and strategies for survival. My academic work is grounded in symbolic interactionism, which recognizes that identities are multi-dimensional, and personal stories are filled with ambiguities, tensions, and contradictions, as well as intersubjectivity. (8) However, if you are looking for an analysis that would tease out such findings, you will not find it here. (9) This article focuses, instead, on experiences the individuals willingly offered and found important to mention, in the context of their becoming, or being Baha'is. In no way is it an authoritative explanation of Baha'i storytelling in the Yukon. It remains for Yukon Aboriginal peoples themselves, if and when they deem it necessary, to explore and interpret the full range of elements involved in identity formation and sacralization.