The Culture of Hunting in Canada
The Culture of Hunting in Canada is about a pivotal but little studied aspect of Canadian history, culture, and society. It covers elements of the history of hunting from the pre-colonial period until the present in all parts of Canada, featuring essays by practitioners and scholars of hunting and by pro- and anti-hunting lobbyists. The result crosses the boundaries between scholarship and personal reflection, and between academia and advocacy.
The essays collected here address important historical and contemporary issues regarding the culture and practice of hunting. Topics include hunting identities; conservation and its relationship to hunting; tensions between hunters and non-hunters and between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal hunting groups; hunting ethics; debates over hunting practices and regulations; animal rights; and gun control. The discussion involves consideration of the social, political, and economic context as well as class and racial tensions between sport hunters and subsistence hunters.
The Culture of Hunting in Canada makes an unprecedented contribution to the study of hunting in Canada and its role in our culture. It will appeal to sociologists, anthropologists, and historians of hunting culture; wildlife biologists, natural resource managers, and environmentalists; and, not least, hunters and anyone interested in the culture of hunting.
The value of this volume is as a primary document, a snapshot of academic cultures of analysis and of contemporary reflections onthe value of this volume is as a primary document, a snapshot of academic cultures of analysis and of contemporary reflections on the meaning of hunting at the beginning of the twenty-first century.
Illustrations
Preface
Introduction
Part 1: Hunting and Identity
1 Why I Hunt / Leigh Clarke
2 Learning to Hunt at the Age of Twenty-Seven: A New Hunter’s Views on Hunting / Jason E. McCutcheon
3 Hunting with Dad / Robert Sopuck
4 Hunting Stories / Peter Kulchyski
5 The Empire’s Eden: British Hunters, Travel Writing, and Imperialism in Nineteenth-Century Canada / Greg Gillespie
6 Powers of Liveness: Reading Hornaday’s Camp-Fires / Mark Simpson
Part 2: Hunting and Conservation in History
7 Views of a Swampy-Cree Elder on the Spiritual Relationship between Hunters and Animals / Louis Bird and Roland Bohr
8 “When the Need for It No Longer Existed”: Declining Wildlife and Native Hunting Rights in Ontario, 1791-1898 / David Calverley
9 Contested Terrains of Space and Place: Hunting and the Landscape Known as Algonquin Park, 1890-1950 / Jean L. Manore
10 The Sinews of Their Lives: First Nations’ Access to Resources in the Yukon, 1890-1950 / Kenneth Coates
11 The Canadian Wildlife Service: Enforcing Federal Wildlife Regulations / J. Alexander Burnett
Part 3: Hunting and Contemporary Challenges
12 Aboriginal Peoples and Their Historic Right to Hunt: A Reasonable Symbiotic Relationship / Bruce W. Hodgins
13 Personal Expression as Exemplified by Hunting: One Man’s View / Edward Reid
14 Gun Control in Canada / Simon Wallace
15 A Hunter’s Perspective on Gun Control in Canada / Dale Miner
16 The Activists Move West: Recent Experiences in Manitoba / Tim Sopuck
17 Fair Chase: To Where Does It Lead? / Edward Hanna
Conclusion
Contributors
Index
