Between 1922 and 1924, the young Canadian anthropologist T.F. McIlwraith spent eleven months in the isolated community of Bella Coola, British Columbia, living among the people of the Nuxalk First Nation. During his time there, McIlwraith gained intimate knowledge of the Nuxalk culture and of their struggle to survive in the face of massive depopulation, loss of traditional lands, and the efforts of the Canadian government to ban the potlatch. McIlwraith’s resulting ethnography, The Bella Coola Indians (1948), is widely considered the finest published study of a Northwest Coast First Nation. This volume is a rich complement to McIlwraith’s classic work, incorporating his letters from the field as well as previously unpublished essays on the Nuxalk. Vivid and lively, the letters show the human side of the anthropologist, and provide a fascinating insight into the famous Northwest winter ceremonials and potlatch -- events in which McIlwraith was one of the few white men privileged to participate as a dancer and partner. Extensive editorial annotations and striking photographs make this book a pleasurable read that will appeal to anthropologists and historians, as well as those with interests in Northwest cultures and the history of anthropology in Canada.

A comprehensive guide to Nuxalk culture and a central document in the study of ethnographic methods.

This paper describes the ethnographic context and analyses the structural characteristics of Bella Coola songs. Seventy-three original transcriptions which encompass a broad spectrum of Bella Coola ceremonial and non-ceremonial repertoires are included.

When Clayton Mack was a child, his parents wrapped him in wolf skin and dumped him in water four times so he would grow up strong and fierce in the woods like a wolf. True to this Nuxalk tradition, Mack grew up to be a world-famous grizzly bear hunter and guide. Clayton Mack's first book of amazing tales about bears and q'umsciwas (white men), Grizzlies and White Guys, became an instant best seller when it was published in 1993. In Bella Coola Man, Clayton Mack continues his hair-raising stories about pulling bears out of the bushes by their legs, eating fresh bear meat with Thor Heyerdahl, finding gold nuggets in the bush, murder in the Big Ootsa country and dead men's talking beans, plus Crooked Jaw the Indian agent and where to find good fishing. Clayton Mack was a walking encyclopedia of tribal lore, and one of the best storytellers ever born. The stories in Bella Coola Man are the last he told, and reflect his desire to pass on as much information about Nuxalk life and legends as he could before his death. Hear about the man-eater dance performed at River's Inlet where the dancers ate a dead woman's head, or about the last Indian war on the coast, native remedies like devil's club tea which is "good for anything," Alexander Mackenzie's travels through Bella Coola country along the Grease Trail, how native hunters killed mountain goats by prying them off cliffs with sticks, and about forgotten villages and places, which come alive again through Clayton Mack's words. Clayton Mack had a deep understanding and appreciation of life on British Columbia's rugged coast. His stories are unique lessons in history, as well as pure entertainment. Here are the stories of the legend himself, Clayton Mack.

Writing the Empire is a collective biography of the McIlwraiths, a family of politicians, entrepreneurs, businesspeople, scientists, and scholars. Known for their contributions to literature, politics, and anthropology, the McIlwraiths originated in Ayrshire, Scotland, and spread across the British Empire, specifically North America and Australia, from the mid-nineteenth century onwards. Focusing on imperial networking, Writing the Empire reflects on three generations of the McIlwraiths’ life writing, including correspondence, diaries, memoirs, and estate papers, along with published works by members of the family. By moving from generation to generation, but also from one stage of a person’s life to the next, the author investigates how various McIlwraiths, both men and women, articulated their identity as subjects of the British Empire over time. Eva-Marie Kröller identifies parallel and competing forms of communication that involved major public figures beyond the family’s immediate circle, and explores the challenges issued by Indigenous people to imperial ideologies. Drawing from private papers and public archives, Writing the Empire is an illuminating biography that will appeal to readers interested in the links between life writing and imperial history.