A Digital Assemblage: Diagramming the Social Realities of the Stikine River Watershed by Candis L. Callison B.A. Business Administration Trinity Western University, 1992 SUBMITTED TO THE PROGRAM IN COMPARATIVE MEDIA STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF SCIENCE IN COMPARATIVE MEDIA STUDIES AT THE MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY MAY 2002 ©2002 Candis L. Callison. All rights reserved. The author hereby grants to MIT permission to reproduce and to distribute publicly paper and electronic copies of this thesis document in whole or in part. Signature of Author: ______________________________________________________ Program in Comparative Media Studies May 15, 2002 Certified by: _____________________________________________________________ Joseph Dumit Associate Professor of Anthropology and Science and Technology Studies Thesis Supervisor Accepted by: ____________________________________________________________ Henry Jenkins III Professor of Literature and Comparative Media Studies Director, Program in Comparative Media Studies A DIGITAL ASSEMBLAGE: DIAGRAMMING THE SOCIAL REALITIES OF THE STIKINE RIVER WATERSHED BY CANDIS L. CALLISON Submitted to the Program in Comparative Media Studies on May 15, 2002 in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science in Comparative Media Studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. ABSTRACT This study examines the landscape of the Stikine River Watershed through varied perspectives and heterogeneous data sets following a mode of inquiry that uses landscape as a condition for relating factors of knowledge, discourse, and power. Working with the premise that each piece of data represents a fragment of information, the digital assemblage was conceived, built, and examined as a possible solution for reflecting the underlying rhizomatic structure of social realities. At the heart of this study and experimentation is a question of how to represent the complexity of social realities through the limitations and capacities of various forms of media and digital space. This thesis is comprised of two parts: a written analysis, and a built prototype of the digital assemblage on CD ROM. The written analysis provides a kind of designer’s manual for understanding the ways in which theory, history, and practice interact to create a conceptual foundation for the built digital assemblage. The built assemblage experiments with diagramming and representing geographic topography, social and capital institutions governing land use, aspects of cultural history, economic and community land and resource developments, areas of conflict therein, and the resulting social conceptions about the geographic space of the Stikine Watershed. Thesis Committee Member: Joseph Dumit (Chair) Title: Associate Professor of Anthropology and Science and Technology Studies Thesis Committee Member: Michael M.J. Fischer Title: Professor of Anthropology and Science and Technology Studies Thesis Committee Member: William Uricchio Title: Professor of Comparative Media Studies A Digital Assemblage: Diagramming the Social Realities of the Stikine River Watershed Candis Callison, Comparative Media Studies, MIT - Page 2 of 75 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would sincerely like to thank my thesis committee: Joseph Dumit, Associate Professor of Anthropology and Science and Technology Studies, William Uricchio, Professor of Comparative Media Studies, and Michael M.J. Fischer, Professor of Anthropology and Science and Technology Studies. Each of their involvement and advice in the process of refining and crafting ideas has been an essential part of this thesis. I am very grateful for their insight and interest in this project. In addition, I would like to acknowledge Dr. Peter Donaldson (MIT), Dr. Ron Burnett (Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design, Canada), and Dr. Wyn Kelley (MIT) who individually provided valuable support and feedback at various stages of the thesis process. I would also like to extend my appreciation to members of the Tahltan Nation, and individuals from companies, organizations and government departments who gave freely of their time and perspectives for personal interviews. The success of this thesis is also due to their involvement and interest in the project. As well, special acknowledgement goes to Tahltan-Tlingit Artist Dempsey Bob, and my father, Dempsey Callison – both of whose ideas have individually shaped my view of the land and culture in the Stikine area at various stages in my life. And to my sisters, Cynthia Callison, Camille Callison, and my brother-in-law, Darwin Hanna for providing me with more than a few books and resources along the way. Many thanks to my fellow CMS graduate student colleagues for our bi-weekly thesis support meetings. It was so motivating to know that we were all in this together. And finally, my appreciation and acknowledgement goes to my husband, Mark Podlasly whose continual gifts of support during this thesis process form a list too long to encapsulate here. A Digital Assemblage: Diagramming the Social Realities of the Stikine River Watershed Candis Callison, Comparative Media Studies, MIT - Page 3 of 75 I. INTRODUCTION: UNDERSTANDING THE ASSEMBLAGE________________ 5 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ______________________________________________6 PROJECT DESCRIPTION: THE STIKINE WATERSHED ________________________8 USE OF DIGITAL SPACE: DESIGN/METHOD ________________________________10 II. WHAT MAKES A RIVER____________________________________________ 12 DIAGRAMMING THE DIAGRAMMED: GEOGRAPHICAL IMPLICATIONS ______13 STRUCTURING INQUIRY __________________________________________________19 CONSERVATION CONVERSATIONS: IMAGERY AND IDEALS_________________24 III. HUMAN SETTLEMENTS, HUMAN CONTACT ________________________ 28 TAHLTAN ORIGINS AND CULTURE ________________________________________29 CONTESTED BOUNDARIES AND TRADING PARTNERS ______________________35 SHIFTS IN HUMAN POPULATIONS _________________________________________38 IV. ADMINISTRATION, PLANNING, AND DEVELOPMENT _______________ 42 WHO OWNS THE STIKINE_________________________________________________43 INDIAN AFFAIRS: ASSIMILATION BY ADMINISTRATION ____________________47 DIAGRAMMING DISTANCE AND ABSTRACTION ____________________________51 THE GOLDEN TRIANGLE: LAND, RESOURCES, AND PEOPLE’S PLANS________54 INSIDE THE GOLDEN TRIANGLE: FAIR REPRESENTATION__________________57 V. CONCLUSION: DIAGRAMMING IN DIGITAL SPACE ___________________ 61 BIBLIOGRAPHY______________________________________________________ 63 Personal Interviews _________________________________________________________72 Government Website Sources_________________________________________________73 Other Website Sources ______________________________________________________75 A Digital Assemblage: Diagramming the Social Realities of the Stikine River Watershed Candis Callison, Comparative Media Studies, MIT - Page 4 of 75 I. INTRODUCTION: UNDERSTANDING THE ASSEMBLAGE “Life on earth appears as a sum of relatively independent species of flora and fauna with sometimes shifting or porous boundaries between them. Geographical areas can only harbor a sort of chaos, or, at best, extrinsic harmonies of an ecological order, temporary equilibriums between populations.” – From A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia by Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari1 How do we look at a landscape? Perhaps, we gaze at it from a lush or spectacular vantage point, or we may take a look at a photograph of a similar view. We may read a map, see a family member’s home video, or listen to stories of an adventure. Or for more remote, distant areas, we may simply know something about a geographical area through television, print or radio journalism and/or tourism propaganda. These broadcast stories for a mass audience may include spectacular imagery or fantastic stories promoting some aspect of a landscape, its inhabitants, or in this day and age, its combatants. Each of these forms of media represents a fragment of information, or a glimpse of a reality present within a certain geographic space. How is this different than a lived experience within a landscape? How do we explain our knowledge of a city, a park, or a favorite hiking path? Often this kind of knowledge is contextualized within stories, adventures, or an individual’s sense of belonging to a community and/or a history. This kind of non-electronically mediated experience may seem more immediate, realistic, cultural and/or historical, and may reveal several related fragments of information. But there are no widely used methods or conventions for recording this combination of disparate information, nor does it stand as a representation of multiple perspectives. And what of the biologist, geologist or commercial fisher who may work in an area and see it through a lens of data and/or commercial requirements? Like a local resident, or a tourist, their experience, both lived and quantified, reflects the fragmentary nature of our society, and human relationships with landscapes.2 1 Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, trans. Brian Massumi, (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1987), p. 48. 2 Richard White, The Organic Machine: The Remaking of the Columbia River, (New York: Hill and Wang,1995), p. ix. White’s work in this text originally inspired me to starting thinking in terms of humanity and nature as parts of a synthesized interactive whole. His concept of an organic machine provides an access point and view of the river