Learn about uluit, sealskin and the importance of cultural preservation while Mina Campbell is interviewed by Hope Elson, Brittany Janes, Samantha Newman and Mary Lampe-Saunders.
Inuk knowledge holder and crafter Mina Campbell speaks about uluit, sealskin and more.
Campbell describes the process of making uluit, explains the traditional use of uluit and their cultural significance as a woman's knife passed down through generations. She expresses concern about the decline in interest in traditional practices, noting that younger generations prefer modern methods. Campbell also shares her method of cleaning seal skins, while highlighting the importance of passing on traditional skills and practices to future generations.
Campbell discusses how her upbringing by her grandparents shaped her values and traditional skills. She emphasizes the importance of practicing culture to keep traditions alive and pass them on to future generations, while sharing her concerns about the future of cultural traditions and the need for innovative ways to engage younger generations. She highlights the role of technology in preserving cultural knowledge and the importance of community and family in Inuit culture.
Tune in for an inspiring conversation that honors the voices of the past while empowering the leaders of tomorrow.
For accessibility, transcripts are provided with all episodes.
Read more about the Program here: Timeless Voices
0:00
Hello. Welcome to Timeless Voices. My name is Heidi Atter. I'm one of the instructors for the Timeless Voices Youth Podcast Program. These interviews were recorded in July 2024 in this piece, you're going to hear Hope Elson, Brittany Janes, Samantha Newman and Mary Lampe-Saunders interviewing Mina Campbell. Mina is 61 years old, an artist and crafter and Inuk knowledge holder. We spoke to Mina at the Labrador Friendship Center. It was these young people's first time doing an interview. You'll also hear 18 month old Amy make an appearance. How's that? Perfect.
1:27
Tell me how and when you started making uluit? [plural of ulu]
1:31
I started the year of COVID, which I think is maybe four years ago. So about 30 years ago, I did a ulu workshop and just made one. And then years when I like, 30 years or so, and then when, because I work at the Center seasonal and it's a tourism center, the year of COVID, we hardly had any visitors, so I only work in the summer, and then in the fall, I get laid off, and then I start doing crafts for the winter. But that year, because we weren't having any visitors because of COVID, we all brought our crafts to work. And by the fall, I was sick of doing crafts, so I said, I'm going to try to do something else. And I remembered that I made an ulu one time, and I said, I'm going to try to start see if I remember which I did. I remembered most of it. And then I went to see John Goudie, because he knows how to make lots of things to refresh my memory on a few parts. And then I made 10. I made 10 uluit to make sure that I wouldn't forget how to do it. And so since then, I've made, I don't know, quite a lot. So that's about four years ago. I guess COVID was somewhere around there. So I have to have the equipment, which is first, I have to have a saw blade. So I make them from hand saw blades, those ones like this. So that's what I cut the ulu out of and I use a dremel tool, which just a little easy hand tool, and that's what I like using, because it's not stressful. I'm not wanting to do it fast. I just want it's a hobby, so I use a dremel tool to cut it out, and then I have to have a sander to sand it up, a grinder, a drill, and I think that's about it.
1:43
What did you do you hear about uluit growing up?
3:36
Well, my grandmother used to clean seal skins for people, so back in them days, in the spring, we used to have a hunt, and we still do have a hunt. But back then, the seal skins were sent out to the fur market, so people would make money after seal skins. So she would clean them for the people, and that's what she used, was an ulu to clean the seal skins, which is what I also do. But people also use them for cutting up meat and stuff, but mainly we use them for cleaning seal skins. The tradition is that it's a woman's knife, and that once you have an ulu, it's yours forever, until you pass it down. And that people in the in the past, and I guess still could, like once you have an ulu, that it's yours. And people have them and take them to their grave. So they're buried with with the women that owns them. And I don't think traditionally, women made uluit. They just use them. So it's something that may be a tradition that will be started, yeah,
4:38
Why do you still use uluit?
4:40
I use them for cleaning seal skins mainly. once in a while. I might use it for cutting something up, if I'm cutting up fish like out my workshop, but it's mainly for cleaning seal skins. Well, it's the best that's the only tool that I know how to clean a seal skin with, and it's the best one because of how it's shaped, and that's what my grandmother used, and many other Inuit and non Inuit, mainly women would have used but some men also used them. I sure hope they do continue to use them and make them because it's a big part of our culture, an Inuit culture to use uluit, something that's been used for since before, since time immemorial, which is before memory so and hopefully it'll continue to be used and passed on. And the problem is, these days, I find that people are more they don't want to touch things that they find, like they might find gross like seal skins and people mainly want to do stuff on their phones. So this way, I think that if we keep a handful of people interested that will pass it on, like Samantha and people, then it'll be passed on for the future, and it needs to be kept on, passed on the traditional usage of them. People send me these videos of people cleaning seal skins with a pressure hose, like I must have had about six or seven email messages, because you can clean them really fast. You put them on a board and you just sprayed them. I'm not interested in that. People think I'm interested in it because I clean seal skins, but I'm not interested in that. And it's okay for other people to do it if they want to, but it's not for me. Yeah, the faster way to clean your seal skin if you want.
6:39
Tell us how you harvest and prepare your seal skin?
6:43
Okay, that's a big question, the harvesting part, especially so we go out on the ice in the spring, usually around the end of April, and we go out at the end of April because that's when the seals are good. Good means that they're now white coats because they're young seals that were just born a few weeks, well, maybe a couple of months, they're probably two to three months old. And so we don't want white coat skins, and we don't even want any seals that have white coat on them. We want them to be black, because when they're born, they're white. And it's really controversial the white coats because the Newfoundland seal hunt. They used to kill white coats like Greenpeace, and all those people are against it, and so are we. We don't want to kill white coats. So we wait till around the end of April, and then we go out on the ice on Lake Melville, which is from North West River to Rigolet area, and we look for the seals. Sometimes we see them on the ice, and sometimes we find the houses, which are rough pieces of ice that are around. And so they have breathing holes. So there's probably eight or nine breathing holes, or holes where the seals come up, lie down on the ice. And so we wait by the holes to either shoot or Dart them. And so that's a skill in itself, is you have to keep your feet still, because any little movement, just like that, they would hear it, and they'd go away to another hole. So there could be eight or 10 holes, and some holes could be this big, and some could be this big. And so all they want to do is, some of them are breathing holes. They just stick the nose up for a breath and go back down. And the bigger holes, they come up on the ice, and they sunbathe and roll around and play. And so that's how we seal hunt. So I use the meat. So we eat the meat. My first meal is always a fried fried with onions, and then a second meal, I'll stew it with salt beef and potatoes and onions, and put a pastry on the top, so that's the meat. And then the seal skin usually got about this much fat on it, and I take that off with a knife, sometimes with ulu, but usually that's done out on on the ice. It's taking that big thick so there's only about that much fat left on it that I'll then take home. I'll take home the skin, because then it's about this big, instead of this big with all that fat on it. And clean it on a Mudge big board. It's called a board, which is a two by eight board, and I clean it with the ulu. And then after it's cleaned with the ulu, then I wash it a couple times with blue Dawn dish liquid. That's the kind that they used to get the oil off the birds. So, yeah, so that's what I use. Wash it a couple times and then then just rinse it in cold water. And now these days, something different than my grandmother did. I salt it, so I put it out on the floor, spread it out, and put a whole box of table salt on it, fold it up, and put it away for a week, and I take it out, and then I wash the salt off, and then I spread it on a frame. And. And I then it's then I dry it, and it probably takes a week, depends on the weather, so it's done outside, and then after it's dried, then I'll cut out whatever I'm going to make, probably most always, boots. So I'll cut a boot leg out, which is about that big. So one seal is for one boot. And then I got a scrape, scrape it, scrape any greases on it, and soften it up, like this, fold it up and soften it up, and then I can make a pair of boots.
10:27
What are your favorite things to make with it?
10:31
I like making boots because it's the easiest. It's just a straight sew right down and put the bottom on. But I also like making ookpik because they're so cute when you're finished. So the little, you know what it is, the little owl, the little ookpik owl. So when I make them, I cut them out, and then I cut out the eyes and the beak and the feet and sew that on. But then I stuff it, and I saw it around, and the last thing that I do is put the pupils in the eyes and it comes alive. So they all have, like, their own little personalities. When I teach a course, the eyes and the beak and the feet are from Moose hide, and the seal is from seal skin. So I just cut out a square and make them cut their own eyes and beak out and feet, so it's their own, and they can make it look like and then you don't even try to make it look like anything. Sometimes I put little dot on the pupil. Sometimes they're big, but each one of them, and sometimes, if I make a lot and I have them all like right there, and looks like they're all looking at me, so I got to turn away because they're all looking at me. So it's probably my favorite thing, because they're so cute.
11:46
How does seal skin connect you to your to your culture?
11:51
Yep. So seals were, and still are, the one of the most important animals to the Inuit culture, because Inuit live on the coast, and it was the main animal for food, for shelter, because they made seal skin houses, for clothing, even for transportation, because they used the skins for sleighs. In the past, they would have but it's still important, because I use it for food and for the skins. And like I said, it's most important, one of the most important animals, to the Inuit culture, because of where they live on the coast.
12:23
Tell us about how you were raised, shaped who you are today.
12:29
Yeah, well, I was raised by my grandparents, so that made a big part of how I was raised. Because if you're if you're raised by a generation back, you get, you learn a lot of more traditional things. Because, you know, when I remember as a kid getting Christmas presents, or Christmas stocking, stocking presents, Santa Claus and I would have, I would have a doll that I'd have to make instead of Barbies, because of my grandparents, right? So that's just an example, but I learned a lot of different skills that I wouldn't have learned. I don't think if I was raised by my biological parents, because my grandparents knew a lot more, and they knew a lot more cultural and traditional things than my biological parents, because, for some reason, they didn't know very much, I don't think, yeah, so I say being raised by my grandparents made me and not only learning things, but having a certain way about you, like being more patient, which I think I am most of the time, but different values and different things when you're raised by your grandparents, especially my grandma, because my grandfather died when I was 11, so it was just me and my grandma and my little brother. So I also took on the skills of sort of co parenting with my grandma to raise Jerry, because she was old and she was 56 when she took or when they took me, she was 56 and he was 54 I think so. And that's how we that's how it was, not only in my family, in lots of other families, especially, and it was through traditional adoption. I don't have no paperwork, just whoever needed to help and take care of us. And so my uncle also and his wife also helped me, because they lived next door and were close by, so but it's like it was like that, and still is like that. People still still do that.
14:33
Why is it important to practice your culture?
14:36
Yeah, it's important so that it don't fade away and die and go away. And like I was saying earlier, one of the problems these days is people are so technical and wanting to be on their phones and iPads that the hands on traditional things are being not lost, but they're fading away. So it's important to try to keep them alive. So that they don't die, because even if we're not using things for the same means it still needs to be remembered and passed on.
15:13
Do you have any fears about the future of cultural traditions?
15:17
Yes, I do. I really do. Because, like I said, I think what they need to do is start making up games on their phones and things so that they'll learn. You can have a game on there clean the seal skin the fastest, because that disappear and where people even though, when I clean the polar bear skin, and I cleaned the seal skin at my work this year, two schools came over, Shehsatshiu and North West River, and none of them found it gross and I think they do, but I think it's because they're watching me, not actually doing it. And not only that, but it's a lot of work. It's a lot of work, and so I am concerned about it, because I don't know if the next generation of people are going to have the interest in working that hard for the end product.
16:15
Can you tell us about the danger of what you think won't happen if people don't practice their culture?
16:24
Don't want any part of our culture to die, because once it dies and that knowledge is gone, then it's gone, it's gone forever, and that part of our culture is going to die. And we don't want our culture to die, I can't say why. That's why we don't want our culture to die, and there's a risk of it. And not only that, but maybe some the next generation, or the next one, or the one after, will need those skills. Maybe this is all going to crash. Hey, it might all the technical and then you got to try to live up to land again, go back that way. So if you got these skills, it'll be easier, not easy, easier.
17:11
How do you think Inuit culture will evolve?
17:14
Well, just like I said, maybe you're going to put games on your phones to learn about Inuit culture. Maybe you're going to learn about it on by doing what you're doing here, doing interviews with people to save it and keep it alive. Because even if you don't use this for anything, you will have it. The knowledge that I'm sharing with you now you have video, video people doing it, because then it's saved and to teach it to younger people through technology, because that's what they're interested in. There's no other way that you're going to be able to do it, because you can't force people to do it. And games are in I think you make them see it more. That's it. And I think maybe that's something that society and society, meaning the schools and programs people, places like this and other Indigenous places have it, that's the only way make people go into those situations. And people are like even at where I work now, you know, the last couple years, there's a demand for people wanting to see seal skins being cleaned. And so that's the start, and then maybe the next one. And I did, I did teach one class, one year of cleaning seal skins, yeah. So more of that needs to come back. And it's, I think it's up to the Indigenous organizations and the government in general society to bring those things back in from people who get used to it. I mean, I never, ever used to find it smell good when I was a teenager, either. But as you get older, then you realize, like now, back then, when my grandmother cleaned seal skins in the spring, there'd be seal skins everywhere in our house, hung up over every door, every doorknob had seal grease, every light switch, everything. And I'm a teenager, like your age, and I'm going out, you know, this evening to maybe see if I can find somebody good to look at. And I'm full of seal grease, not good. So I didn't like it back then, but now I appreciate it because and she never, ever taught me like say, Come here Mina. I sit down. I'm going to show you. But because she was doing it in the spring all my life, all I got to do is close my eyes and I can see her, and I can see her cleaning it, and I can see her pushing the grease off. And I got a little bit of help. Had a couple questions from my uncles, who also cleaned or one uncle, I think that even though younger people might not want to be emerged in it now make them. Make them do it.