Untitling

Shared Definitions

In tending to the memory of a friend who passed away, two bald eagles emerged from the trees and hovered above us while the sound of the gusting wind passed through the wet needles on the Redwood, Fir, and Cedar trees of Mt. Tabor. One eagle flew circling the perimeter of this now dormant volcanic vent, moving miles with ease and speed. The second stayed, almost frozen in the sky, directly above our heads, somehow defying physics.

I live in the so-called United States of America, where—to some—the symbolism of the bald eagle infers freedom, and to others, a connection to the divine. I believe that my understanding of the divine is akin to a connection to all things, and through this mutual responsibility, I find my own freedom.

Responsibility can be viewed as freedom because accepting it provides agency and the ability to act in alignment with personal values, creating true liberation rather than burden. Freedom is not the absence of all duties, but the power of the individual to choose actions and accept their consequences, which ultimately leads to personal empowerment and purpose.

Freedom without responsibility is freedom that can be taken away. Without responsibility, freedom can become unstable and extractive of other human and non-human beings. Personal sovereignty, or agency, gained through recognition of one’s interdependence with other beings, allows the opportunity to form a life that is authentic and free.

Acoustic ecology is a discipline studying relationships, mediated through sound, between human beings and their environment. When I was first introduced to the idea—a field of study that was formalized where I grew up in Vancouver—the discipline hadn’t interested me too much. Being a young punk, it appeared that these movements in academia were most concerned with the effects of sounds that humans created on other humans (anthrophony), highlighting a sort of sticky gunk that Western society created for itself and continues to critique for itself through analysis (complaint). My relation to this field has shifted in witnessing the response of researchers, specifically those within the realm of bioacoustics, in consideration of mass extinction events and sound’s persistent sensory nature.

Regardless of one’s ability to “hear” sound through the ears, it is always felt in the body. We are affected by its presence, as well as its absence. Sound travels through air, ignoring barriers or borders. It is difficult to control or contain at certain volumes. It moves through water at an especially high speed.

I woke up this morning knowing that there are speakers underwater installed by humans to mirror the sound of what that world was like before the man-made poison took over. This sound helps larvae believe that a coral system is healthy, so they inhabit it as a restorative action—a method called acoustic enrichment.

“Healthy coral reefs echo with a chorus of purrs and grunts from fish feeding, looking for mates, or defending their territories, underscored by the persistent crackling of snapping shrimp. Damaged or degraded reefs are much quieter, and it appears that some coral larvae can tell the difference.”¹

Right relations: Relativity here is understanding that each thing is a being, even if time may move faster or slower for many of them. With an understanding that all things are conscious, right relations hold no pronouns; they are found through actions, not nouns. In a world where all things are called It,² the space between myself and others is only as strong as my relations.

Break

Now deep in these fragments, I can introduce myself. I am Nêhiyaw from Treaty 6, and my practice is interested in deep relational encounters between bodies, technologies, and land. This writing is interested in working towards a reclamation-based understanding of acoustic ecology that incorporates the drum and songs from Beaver Lake Cree Nation, where my family is from, through investigating the intersections of sound, ceremony, and Sovereignty.

In a healthy ecosystem, much of the frequency spectrum is inhabited through diverse species sounds, a full-spectrum mix of song cultures. Losing frequencies is also fragmentation, demonstrating where the noise has interrupted the signal. Creation has gifted each species its own range of calls; humans, while naturally able to move between these ranges and extend them through instruments and voicing, have also most directly altered the composition in service of the colonial project.

I am interested in how fragments might highlight how there is no such thing as finality, one answer, or one solution. The space between cracks or gaps can allow for a series of potentials.⁴ These potentials or collaborations might lead towards right relations in stewardship: a space beyond a Just Transition.

Let us now consider how sound in ceremony can become a means of environmental restoration. Could the sound of humans in right relation with the land be a means of acoustic enrichment, a tool for survivance amongst the pollution?

Moving Beyond Apocalypse to Apocalypse

My relative, Crystal Lameman, has been leading the trial to Defend the Treaties—previously known as the Tar Sands Trial—for many years. This trial has been ongoing since 2008, and on January 18th, 2027 Alberta, Canada, and Beaver Lake Cree Nation (BLCN) will be in hearing at the Supreme Court.

When I think of Crystal, I hear her various deliveries of voice, the way she holds her children with it, her laugh over the phone. I hear the chirpers in the grass, the songs of ceremony, and her teaching me a language I cannot yet speak. Crystal calls me nisimis: our word for younger relation/sister. While we are cousins in a colonial sense, there is no word for cousin in the Cree language, as we are defined through our relations: either you are in relation or you are not.

BLCN’s trial is a landmark case as it is holding the Canadian government responsible for their part in allowing extractive industry to damage and endanger treaty land, water, members, and animals. Most cases we have seen around resource extraction are addressing the companies rather than the systems that enable them. If this case is won, it would set a long overdue precedent of responsibility to Indigenous Sovereignty in both the interpretation and enactment of treaty rights, which is much more in line with the rights outlined in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). It could also greatly shift the soundscapes of the land.

“In 2009, the oil sands (or tar sands) company Nexen gave funding to the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute (CDFAI) to prepare a now-forgotten study called Resource Industries and Security Issues in Northern Alberta… [in it] Flanagan warned of a possible “apocalyptic scenario” if there were ever prolonged and deep collaboration between environmentalists, First Nations, Métis people, among other groups. By “apocalyptic” he meant that industries like oil and gas would have trouble continuing to extract resources and profits in Northern Alberta… If these groups were to “make common cause and cooperate with each other,” Flanagan wrote, they could form “a coordinated movement with the ability to block resource development on a large scale.”⁵

This excerpt—from a book Crystal co-authored called “The End of this World”—goes on to outline the apocalypse presently happening, what settlers have named the anthropocene, and a path towards repair and Just Transition. The reader is being educated on Cree ways of being, labor law, and various other forms of organizing, while being presented a path towards a livable future. The main catch being a need to collaborate with others, this is most successful when prioritizing right relations.

Chloe Alexandra Thompson is a Nêhiyaw (Cree) interdisciplinary artist based in New York exploring listening as a way of knowing and relating, inviting deep relational encounters between bodies, technologies, and land.