Research summary
The Hodinohso:ni nation, commonly known as Iroquois or Six Nations, is made up of the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga and Seneca Peoples. As Canada Research Chair in Tentewatenikonhra'khánion (We Will Put Our Minds Together), Dr. Talena Atfield aims to regenerate cultural practices in Hodinohso:ni communities using cultural materials held in archival and museum collections as a way to facilitate cultural healing.
To achieve this goal, she and her research team are contextualizing life at Ohswé:ken (a Mohawk community in Ontario) during the first quarter of the 20th century. Through community-led interviews and talking circles, they are working on a project to analyze and interpret the archives, the material culture, the language used in the archives, and the photographs collected by Canadian ethnologist and natural historian, F.W. Waugh, between 1900 and 1924.