Connecting Past and Present
June 3, 2026 By: Elkie
Conservation
Luke Faulk’s article in Pique Newsmagazine discusses the Lil’wat Nation leading a cultural burn near Mount Currie as part of wildfire prevention and ecological restoration. This connected strongly to the Unit 3 readings on conservation because it challenged the assumption that protecting forests requires removing people from the landscape. Roach and Gillis explain that by the early twentieth century the Canadian government had formalised fire suppression and forest management through state agencies, reflecting a conservation model focused on control and regulation. In contrast, the Lil’wat cultural burn demonstrates how Indigenous peoples have long used fire as a management tool to maintain ecosystem health and reduce wildfire risk. The article made me reconsider conservation as active stewardship rather than simply preservation.
Parks
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/parks-canada-indigenous-policy-1.7364200
Lisa Ward’s article in CBC News examines Parks Canada’s new Indigenous policy and its effort to include Indigenous knowledge and governance within park management. This connects directly to Unit 3 discussions about how national parks were historically created through the exclusion of Indigenous peoples from their traditional lands. Binnema and Niemi show that park officials often viewed Indigenous hunting and land use as a threat to conservation, despite evidence that railway development, settler activity, and other non-Indigenous impacts contributed significantly to wildlife decline. The CBC article suggests that Parks Canada is now moving away from those exclusionary policies and toward recognizing Indigenous stewardship as an important part of conservation.The article challenged me to think about how parks are increasingly being reframed as places of partnership and cultural recognition rather than purely state-controlled wilderness.
Bibliography
Binnema, Theodore, and Melanie Niemi. “Let the Line Be Drawn Now: Wilderness, Conservation, and the Exclusion of Aboriginal People from Banff National Park in Canada.” Environmental History 11, no. 4 (2006): 724–750.
Faulks, Luke. “Lil’wat Nation to Lead Cultural Burn near Mount Currie This Fall.” Pique Newsmagazine. Accessed June 2026. https://www.piquenewsmagazine.com/local-news/lilwat-forestry-ventures-to-lead-cultural-burn-near-mount-currie-this-fall-11229904.
Roach, Thomas R., and R. Peter Gillis. “The Canadian Forestry Service and Conservation, 1899–1911.” Journal of Forest History 26, no. 4 (1982): 158–171.
Ward, Lisa. “Parks Canada Unveils New Indigenous Stewardship Policy.” CBC News. Accessed June 2026. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/parks-canada-indigenous-policy-1.7364200.
Hi Elkie,
I really enjoyed reading your post, especially your discussion about the Lil̓wat Nation’s use of cultural burning practices. I agree that it challenges the traditional idea that conservation means removing people from nature. Your example showed how Indigenous knowledge can contribute to ecosystem health and wildfire prevention in ways that modern conservation efforts are only beginning to recognize. It made me think more critically about conservation as active stewardship rather than simply preserving landscapes by restricting human involvement.