Potlatch at Gitsegukla

Download or read book Potlatch at Gitsegukla written by Marjorie M. Halpin and published by UBC Press. This book was released on 2011-11-01 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: William Beynon was born in 1888 in Victoria to a Welsh father and a Tsimshian mother. He was an accomplished ethnographer and had a long career documenting the traditions of the Tsimshian, Nisga'a, and Gitksan. In 1945 he attended and actively participated in five days of potlatches and totem pole raisings at Gitksan village of Gitsegukla. There he compiled four notebooks containing detailed and often verbatim information about the events he witnessed. For over 50 years these notebooks have seen limited circulation among specialists, who have long recognized them as the most perceptive and complete account of potlatching ever recorded.