Working the Waters

            Alexandra Harmon makes a deliberate mention of “the limitations and hazards of the lexical tools at my disposal” (Harmon 9). She addresses the implications and changing standards for describing the native populations with certain words; the meaning of each term is specifically related to a method of delineating differences between cultures, areas, or tribes. There is a great deal of focus on identity and how certain terms have changed their meaning within the communities they have described; subsequently, the author admits a liability to misplace terms referring to “people they called Indians” in proper accordance with their meaning. In addressing the use of terms, the author is well aware of the difficulties and struggles implicit in such a contextual and nonstandard descriptive device: “No doubt you will spot a poor choice of terms here or there. But at least you will be approaching this history with the consciousness that it hopes to promote” (Harmon 10).

            However, Harmon has erred in failing to use a tone, in describing such groups and their cultures, that reflects such “conscious” approaches to history. The element of diction is especially revealing of the author’s own bias, and is important to consider when analyzing the overall objectivity and, ultimately, the value of the text as a ethnographic analysis.

            In analyzing the experiences and attitudes of the “pale” Hudson Bay Company traders, Harmon expresses an unhindered speculative tone that serves to give a specific portrayal of the attitudes of these men. However, the choice of diction is subtly inclined towards perpetuating the very prejudices that can be held accountable for the conflicts that are central to the issues addressed in chapter 1. For example, presumptuous statements have no explanation as to their origin, and therefore, must be considered to be a biased presentation of truth by the author: “They [HBC men] anticipated the fishy stench hovering over such settlements. They were disgusted but not surprised to see inhabitants who covered their brown skin with little more than red-or-black-pigmented grease” (Harmon 16). There is a specific plane of description which Harmon construes as truthful evidence for such statements as “strongly attracted to each other yet repelled by each other’s alien appearance and behaviour’ – this statement is more opinion than fact. There is no way to make such assumptions as reciprocal truth. Although a similar statement may be made of the European prejudices, the value of appearance and behaviour to the natives may be very different from the Europeans.

            Similar biases are evident concerning the explanation of the European’s gestures to the natives. It is clear that Harmon attempts to misconstrue simple antagonism and fear as a certain “social code” adopted by the Europeans, and she continues to be formally contrived in her understanding of how gestures are sent and interpreted: “All parties at Dungeness were aware of impediments to communication but tried to signal their desires and intentions in ways they thought unmistakable. They alternately brandished weapons and made conciliatory gestures” (Harmon 19). Further bias against the natives is evident through choice of diction: “Much as children deciding who goes first know that the sign for rock beats the sign for scissors but scissors beats paper and paper beats rock, Puget Sound natives…” (Harmon 23).

“Rather than inferring that Hudsons’ Bay disapproved and intended to prevent violence and robbery, Klallams and their neighbors could have assumed that the foreigners shared or had embraced the indigenous social code, which sanctioned some retaliatory raids” (Harmon 21).

“McLouglin’s account of the showdown depicts Britons consciously trying to get a message across to people with an alien mind-set” (Harmon 20).