Litvyak's profiles

[apophenia]

Yeah, used bookshops have been rarae aves in Vancouver since the '90s.

Decades back, I spent eons haunting Lawrence Books in Dunbar. Great selection but that shop always had weird hours - only 1:30 to 5:30 in the afternoon. Alas, AFAIK, Lawrence Books hasn't been open at all since around 2019 (the owner was quite elderly and infirm).

[Litvyak]

Lawrence Books is the one I'd like to check out, yeah... I see their hours are 1 pm to 5 pm, Saturday and Sunday only... strange.

[perttime]

Sounds like a hobby...

[Litvyak]

So at great length and a ridiculous amount of work, I've been able to finish working out the borders of the Regional Districts and Indigenous Administrative Districts.



Please note that there are a bunch of small exclaves that aren't shown here, for being too small; for example, the city of Burns Lake is in Bulkley-Nechako RD, but some neighbourhoods are part of the Dakelh Federation IAD. There are a bunch of other such occurrences, particularly in the big cities. Utari Mosir is also not shown on this map. I don't know why, but drawing maps is a lot of fun.

Indigenous Administrative Districts
Each has a representative in the Council of Chiefs, except for the Ainu.

Champagne Aishihik Nation - seat: Nuqwaʼik-Àłsêxh (Southern Tutchone)
Dakelh Federation - seat: Tsetlʼadak (Cheslatta) (Dakelh)
Ditidaht Nation - seat: Ditidaht (Ditidaht)
Gitxsan Nation - seat: Hagwilget (Gitxsan)
Haida Gwaii - seat: Hlg̱aagilda (Skidegate) (Haida)
Haíɫzaqv Nation - seat: Bella Bella (Heiltsuk)
Haisla Nation - seat: Haisla (Haisla)
Kaska Dena - seat: Good Hope Lake (Kaska)
Ktunaxa Nation - seat: Yaqan Nuʔkiy (Ktunaxa (Kootenay))
Kwakwewlth District - seat: Weywakum (Campbell River) (Kwakwakaʼwakw)
Łingít Nation - seat: Wéinaa (Atlin) (Tlingit)
Nautʼsa mawt Nation - seat: Xwémalhkwu (Campbell River) (Several)
Nisgaʼa Lisims - seat: Gitlaxtʼaamiks (Nisgaʼa)
Nlakaʼpamux Nation - seat: Boston Bar (Nlakaʼpamux)
Northern Rockies Territory - seat: Fort Nelson (Dene, Cree)
Nuu-chah-nulth Nation - seat: Port Alberni  (Nuu-chah-nulth)
Nuxalk Nation - seat: Qʼumqʼuts (Bella Coola)  (Nuxalk)
Okanagan Nation Alliance - seat: Westbank (Kelowna) (Syilx)
Quwʼutsun Tribes - seat: Quwʼutsun (Duncan) (Cowichan)
Secwépemc Nation - seat: Tkʼemlúps (Kamloops) (Secwépemc (Shuswap))
shíshálh Nation - seat: chʼatlich (Sechelt) (Sechelt)
Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw - seat: Xwmelchʼstn (North/West Vancouver boundary) (Squamish)
Stlʼatlʼimx Nation - seat: Tʼitʼqʼet (Lillooet) (Stʼatʼimc (Lillooet))
Stsʼailes Nation - seat: Stsʼailes (Stsʼailes (Chehalis))
Stó:lō Nation - seat: Chilliwack (Stó:lō)
šxʷməθkʷəy̓əmaɁɬ təməxʷ - seat: c̓əsnaʔəm (Marpole, Vancouver) (Musqueam)
Tahltan Nation - seat: Telegraph Creek (Tahltan)
Tsilhqotʼin Nation - seat: Ulhkʼatcho (Chilcotin)
Tsʼmsyan Nation - seat: Ganiks Laxha* (Tsimshian)
United Sekani Nations - seat: Kwadacha (Fort Ware) (Sekani)
Utari Mosir - seat: Shana (Ainu)
Wuikinuxv Nation  - seat: Rivers Inlet (Wuikinuxv (Owekeeno))

* Ganiks Laxha was called Terrace prior to 1988.

Regional Districts
Bulkley-Nechako Regional District - seat: Burns Lake
Cariboo Regional District - seat: Williams Lake
Cassiar-Stikine Regional District - seat: Cassiar
Central Kootenay Regional District - seat: Nelson
Chilkoot Regional District - seat: Fraser
Columbia-Shuswap Regional District - seat: Salmon Arm
Comox Valley Regional District - seat: Courtenay
Cowichan Valley Regional District - seat: Chemainus
East Kootenay Regional District - seat: Fernie
Fraser Valley Regional District* - seat: Chilliwack
Fraser-Fort George Regional District - seat: McBride
Greater Cranbrook Regional District - seat: Cranbrook
Greater Kamloops Regional District - seat: Kamloops
Greater Kelowna Regional District - seat: Kelowna
Greater Meziadin Regional District - seat: Meziadin
Greater Nanaimo Regional District - seat: Nanaimo
Greater Prince George Regional District - seat: Prince George
Greater Prince Rupert Regional District - seat: Prince Rupert
Greater Valemount Regional District - seat: Valemount
Greater Vancouver Regional District - seat: Vancouver
Kitimat-Kemano Regional District - seat: Kitimat
Kootenay Boundary Regional District - seat: Trail
National Capital District - seat: Victoria
North Island Regional District - seat: Port McNeill
North Okanagan Regional District - seat: Vernon
Okanagan-Similkameen Regional District - seat: Penticton
Peace River Regional District - seat: Dawson Creek
South Island Regional District - seat: Sooke
Squamish-Lillooet Regional District - seat: Pemberton
Strathcona Regional District - seat: Campbell River
Sunshine Coast Regional District† - seat: Sechelt
Thompson-Nicola Regional District - seat: Merritt
Tisquit Regional District - seat: Tisquit {RW: Powell River}

* Dissolved 2014; territory split between Nlakaʼpamux Nation, the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw, the Stlʼatlʼimx Nation, the Stó:lō Nation, and the Stsʼailes Nation IADs.
† Became shíshálh Nation IAD in 2014

[apophenia]

Wow! That must have been an astonishing amount of work!

A couple of the regional districts particularly caught my eye. One that puzzled was your Tisquit Regional District. (I tried Googling it but Google AI was obsessing over 'Biscuits' and 'Triscuits' ... very helpful!) So, is tisquit a Tla’amin alternative to qathet (for Townsite and environs)?

I also noted that the SCRD was dissolved in 2014 to become the shíshálh Nation IAD. I assume that means that IADs are purely political and/or geographical divisions which are distinct from traditional territory claims (in this case, the larger shíshálh swiya)?

Cool stuff! 

[Litvyak]

Wow! That must have been an astonishing amount of work!

This was one of those projects that about halfway in, I regretted having started. Just drawing the base map itself took quite a long time, nevermind figuring out where the borders should be.

A couple of the regional districts particularly caught my eye. One that puzzled was your Tisquit Regional District. (I tried Googling it but Google AI was obsessing over 'Biscuits' and 'Triscuits' ... very helpful!) So, is tisquit a Tla’amin alternative to qathet (for Townsite and environs)?

So, Tisquit is Powell River, from tiyskʷat, the name of the Tla'amin village that was on that site. From Wikipedia: "In May 2021, Tla'amin Nation submitted a request to Powell River city council to change the name of the city. The request comes because city namesake Israel Powell, B.C.’s superintendent of Indian affairs from 1872 to 1889, helped to ensure that the sale of Lot 450, land that included tiyskʷat village, went through, as well as overseeing the removal of children from their homes to be sent to residential schools, and the banning of potlatch, language and other Indigenous customs."

Now, I haven't really worked out how things were before the Universal Settlement, but have some vague ideas. I know that there was no residential school system, and there wasn't a systemic banning of languages and customs the way there was *here*, nor was there any sort of enforced segregation. On the contary, re language, the situation was more like in Ghana for example, where indigenous languages were used in early primary education to teach English and "civilisation". Instead of "make the Red Man white inside" (that's a paraphrase, I can't remember how the actual quote went) that was the Canadian policy, the BC attitude was more to try to instill a sense that being part of the Empire was a part of their own national identity.

What I do know for certain is that things were significantly better enough for First Nations in BC than in Canada, that a goodly number of Cree and Dene from Alberta, Saskatchewan, and the Territories opted to go to northern BC, where there were already indigenous Cree and Dene populations; if a local band accepted someone from Canada as part of the band, that was good enough for Victoria. AltBC was and is far from a perfect place, but going back to the time of James Douglas there was a recognition that the First Nations are the indigenous population, and BC took to heed (to greater or lesser extent) the words of John Robson in 1864 (this is an RW quote): "Every acre of land we obtain by improper means we will have to pay for dearly in the end, and every wrong committed upon those poor people [i.e. Natives] will be visited on our heads".

I think it might have been the case that there was a system of reservations, in which various bands had some linguistic and cultural autonomy; there may have been some "second class" status to opting to remain on reserve, though, perhaps the reserves got less funding/development aid than non-reserve lands? These are the details that I'm not sure about yet. As I said, AltBC was and is far from perfect, but it was rather better to be Indigenous in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, than to be, say, Chinese (a sudden thought: perhaps some bands let Chinese live on their reserve lands? I could certainly see a government with an anti-Chinese outlook being content to let the descendents of the coolies disappear onto the reserves...)

I also noted that the SCRD was dissolved in 2014 to become the shíshálh Nation IAD. I assume that means that IADs are purely political and/or geographical divisions which are distinct from traditional territory claims (in this case, the larger shíshálh swiya)?

Cool stuff! 

The IADs aren't completely equivalent to traditional claims (though, those *do* add up to over 100% of BC's territories), though they were taken into consideration when the settlements (i.e. treaties) were agreed. What I did was look at various settlements, locations of reserves, etc, and used those as a guide to working out the borders. Basically, they're largely political, like say the Dakelh Federation is made up of (I think) all the Dakelh/Carrier Nations together, similarly for the Kwakwewlth, Sekani, and some others - the in-world reasoning being that the government was like, okay, we want to make a deal, but not with 300 different little tribes - so most of them followed the Naut'sa mawt example (which means "working together", incidentally) of various tribes/bands getting together to negotiate as a united entity. So, the IADs are a political alliance, but they have no effect on the way the various member units are organised - they are, by and large, just a way to organise their representation in Parliament. And, they're also for administration of territory like RDs, but with a bit more autonomy in certain areas of competence (for example: language; RDs all have English and Chinook Wawa as their official languages; IADs can have their own language(s) as official within their borders, along with at least one of the two official languages. This applies to Cymru Newydd too, which is somewhere between an RD and an IAD in its autonomy).

I figure that there was a fair bit of back and forth and negotiation before everyone was satisfied enough to sign the documents, and compromises were made, etc. I guess with the shíshálh, they didn't come to an agreement until 2014? Which coincided with when the Squamish, Sto:lo, Thompson, Lillooet, and Chehalis finally agreed on mutual borders to divide the FVRD. I have a feeling the Cariboo and Bulkley-Nechako RDs (maybe others) also have their present borders because of overlapping claims that couldn't be sorted, so the various interested parties agreed on the compromise of having the territory be part of an RD.

The Champagne-Aishihik IAD *was* almost entirely political, though. The Southern Tutchone weren't recognised as a BC nation back when the Settlement happened, and that territory was part of the Chilkoot until 2004. In 1994, Royal Oak Mining announced its intention to develop a massive copper-cobalt mine on the Windy Craggy site, and work started to prepare the site for mining, building access roads, etc. But then there was an election in 1996, Labour won, and put a stop to the project by expropriating all the land and creating the Tatshenshini-Alsek National Park; this was done without consulting any of the local Indigenous population ("not a recognised Nation" is a convenient excuse). The Champagne and Aishihik bands got together and launched a legal challenge to this (as they were set to benefit from the project); this was rejected in 1998, and another was rejected in 2000... not long before the 2001 elections. The Liberals seized the opportunity, included resource development and discussions with the Champagne and Aishihik nations... they won, the discussions were held, the territory of the National Park and everything west of the narrowest point between Canada and Alaska becoming part of the Champagne-Aishihik IAD in 2004... who immediately created the Champagne-Aishihik Resource Development Corporation and announced its intention to resume development of the site. (Cancelling it and creating the park was also political/economic, as Labour-associated developers benefitted by that cancellation via the development of mines elsewhere in far northwestern BC...)

[apophenia]

Thanks for the explanation of tiyskʷat. I had read somewhere that qathet was the traditional name for the village ... but that was obviously ill-informed nonsense. Googling it now, I see that qathet was chosen as an RD name by Tla'amin Elders and means something akin to 'Working Together' in ʔayʔaǰuθəm (Ayajuthem).

I remember seeing DIA references similar to your "make the Red Man white inside". Now, with the DIA dead and gone, that concept has been reversed in castigations for the 'Red Apple' 

I can really see your IAD approach working ... particularly the part where IADs may only make up a portion of traditional claims. As you said, such claims would "add up to over 100% of BC's territories". So, by definition, the hard outlines of IADs will exclude many potentially-contentious overlapping claims. Nice!

I also like that Ghanaian approach to education. For AltBC, this better recognises the value of early education in the language spoken at home. Then, later learning English (or Cymraeg?) becomes less about conquest (regardless of how one feels about that politically) and more about developing a facility with a lingua franca. And that raises a semi-related question: Would non-indigenous students in BC receive instruction in Chinook Wawa? Or in the language(s) of their local band(s)?

[Litvyak]

Now you've got me thinking about language and education more - so far I've put little thought into it. However, I did write this on the Utari Mosir page on the wiki, in the "Demographics and languages" section:

English is the dominant language in Utari Mosir. Although Ainu is an official language in Utari Mosir alongside English, according to the last census only 4.7% (93.2% of the Ainu population) of the population claimed Ainu as their first language; and only 57.6% of these reported speaking Ainu in day-to-day life outside the home. Consequently, English enjoys the dominant position on the islands. However, due to the demographics of the islands' Anglophone population - originating from all over mainland BC, or the children and grandchildren of immigrants, who learnt English in school - Utari Mosir's local dialect of English is largely equivalent to RP. By the time the Kuril Islands Trust Territory formally became part of BC in 1979, 34 years after the beginning of British Columbian administration of the islands, RP had effectively become the local dialect of the islands, so that the lifting of the restrictions on the use of local dialects on radio and in schools - which had not applied to the Trust Territory when first passed - had no effect on the islands. Unlike in the rest of BC, where Chinook Wawa is a mandatory subject from kindergarten through junior secondary school (Grades 8 through 10), in Utari Mosir it is mandatory only in intermediate grades (Grades 4 through 7), and is available as an elective from Grade 8 through 12 alongside Ainu, Japanese, and Russian; Ainu is a mandatory subject throughout elementary school (Kindergarten through Grade 7). emphasis added

So based on this, yeah - everyone gets instruction in CW, given it's one of the two national languages.

I know that IRL, in Creston and I think in Cranbrook, Ktunaxa language classes are available as an elective in elementary schools (I think secondary schools as well) - with an additional cool twist, that there are also classes where parents of non-Ktunaxa children can learn the language in order to help with their children's studies.

So...

There is a national curriculum set by the Ministry of Education. Through primary school (K-3), classes may be taught in either English, CW, or a local language, depending on the demographics of a given school's catchment area, or whatever the school board of the IAD decides. English and CW curricula are set by the MoE; if a district wishes to use another language as the medium of education for primary classes, it must formulate the curriculum at its own expense and submit it to the MoE for approval.

Broadly speaking, by the time they finish grade 12, students will have intensively three or four languages through primary, junior secondary, and senior secondary levels. The basic pattern is this:

Kindergarten: Education is in the official languages of the RD or IAD (so English and CW in RDs, English and Welsh in Cymru Newydd, the local language and either CW or English in the IADs). English is mandatory through grade 12, the second language is mandatory through grade 7.

Grade 4: In IADs and Cymru Newydd, either English or CW is introduced, whichever was not used from Kindergarten; in the RDs, another BC language is introduced - usually something relevant to the area (e.g. Secwépemc or Dakelh in the Cariboo RD, Dakelh or Gitxsan in Bulkley-Nechako, Sto:lo, Squamish, or Musqueam in Greater Vancouver, etc; the choice of the specific language is up to the local school district - e.g. North Vancouver schools offer Farsi or Squamish; Richmond offers Musqueam, Cantonese, or Mandarin; in Utari Mosir the choices are Japanese, Russian, or Cantonese, due to the close ties the region has to Japan, Primoria, and Hong Kong; in Sointula, Finnish; in Mishkolts*, Hungarian; in Surrey, Sto:lo or Punjabi). This language is mandatory through grade 7.

Grade 8: From grade 8 on, English is the primary medium of education everywhere, but it is mandatory for each student to take one other language throughout both JSS and SSS. The student may opt to continue one of the languages they'd taken through elementary school (CW, Welsh, the local language, or the language chosen in grade 4), or they can opt for a "world language" - French, German, Japanese, Cantonese, Mandarin, Russian, Spanish, and Hindi are generally available at most schools, but this can also vary from school district to school district and even school to school, depending on demographics or other factors, so languages as diverse as Vietnamese, Tagalog, Ukrainian, and Scots Gaelic are available at certain schools. This language is then mandatory through to the end of grade 12.

* https://dominionofbc.miraheze.org/wiki/Mishkolts - on a few occasions, I *have* taken the occasional liberty... :)

[apophenia]

I particularly like your mixed Secwépemc-Hungarian language in Mishkolts.

Somewhat OT but you mention that BC Highway 99 is part of the Pan-American Highway. That made me wonder: does OTL Hwy 101 still exist between Langdale and Lund?

[Litvyak]

I particularly like your mixed Secwépemc-Hungarian language in Mishkolts.

Thanks, it's a fun idea... I've had the occasional thought to work out a few words and phrases in the language, but knowing my tendency to fall down rabbit holes, I probably wouldn't stop until I've translated Madách's The Tragedy of Man into it...

Somewhat OT but you mention that BC Highway 99 is part of the Pan-American Highway. That made me wonder: does OTL Hwy 101 still exist between Langdale and Lund?

https://dominionofbc.miraheze.org/wiki/BC_Highway_101 

Only as far as Lund; from Tisquit the ferry to Comox, and then the road from Comox to Courtenay, are part of Highway 101.

More rabbitholing: https://dominionofbc.miraheze.org/wiki/Highways_of_British_Columbia

[apophenia]

Thanks, it's a fun idea... I've had the occasional thought to work out a few words and phrases in the language, but knowing my tendency to fall down rabbit holes, I probably wouldn't stop until I've translated Madách's The Tragedy of Man into it...

Okay, but only after you have completed the Secwépemc-Hungarian/Hungarian-Secwépemc Dictionary, right? 

https://dominionofbc.miraheze.org/wiki/BC_Highway_101 

Only as far as Lund; from Tisquit the ferry to Comox, and then the road from Comox to Courtenay, are part of Highway 101.

More rabbitholing: https://dominionofbc.miraheze.org/wiki/Highways_of_British_Columbia

Good stuff! Rabbitholification it is 

[Litvyak]

Okay, but only after you have completed the Secwépemc-Hungarian/Hungarian-Secwépemc Dictionary, right? 

Eiiiii...

[Litvyak]

I read that the hamlet of Severo-Kurilsk was flooded by tsunami from the Kamchatka quake, but that there was no major damage other than some damage to a fish processing plant. (Edit to add: Severo-Kurilsk is on the northernmost island of Paramushir, in spitting distance of Kamchatka... *there*, part of Primoria, and about 600 miles from the northernmost part of Utari Mosir)

I saw Japan got tsunamis up to 1.2 metres in height, which got me thinking about Utari Mosir... I saw that Nemuro on Hokkaido, which is right close to the southernmost islands of the archipelago, Kunashir and Shikotan, got tsunamis of 80 cm height - I figure then it's safe to assume that that's about what hit the islands. And so they're also far enough away that there was no damage from the quake itself.

I guess the east coast of Urup and Iturup, and the northeast coasts of Kunashir and Shikotan would be most exposed to tsunamis from an earthquake off the east coast of Kamchatka. I imagine the islands use the same sort of things Japan does for tsunami prevention, with breakwaters, seawalls, etc to protect coastal towns, but I imagine not everywhere can be protected equally - small towns/villages might have taken some flooding damage. Shikotan's airport, half of the runway is on a causeway, but it's in a west-facing bay so was probably fine; Urup Airport on the north end of Urup in the town of Karasuno on the other hand is on a bit of lowland and facing a rather large bit of open sea to the next island northwards:



So despite protections, I think there may have been some flooding and damage there, and maybe Hiyori... probably similar light damage/flooding at other spots on other islands... I'll pay some attention to Japanese news about damage from the tsunami, and work with that to figure out what happened to Utari Mosir.

The last massive Kamchatka quake in 1952 was 8.8 and had tsunamis hit Japan with waves up to 3.3 metres in height, and 1200 homes destroyed...