Screening with closed captions. There will be ASL interpretation for the intro and Q&A on May 1.
After a long winter in British Columbia’s Coast Mountains, the spring flow and annual arrival of the ooligan fish was a time of celebration for the Nuxalk people. It brought the community together, providing vital nourishment and medicine. Today, only the memory of those gatherings remains. Twenty-six years ago, the ooligan did not return; its disappearance threatened traditions that had been practised for generations. Why did the fish vanish? More than a century after a smallpox epidemic and subsequent village displacements, the loss of the ooligan is a stark reminder of colonial harm. At a remote community radio station in the Bella Coola Valley, voices rise as Nuxalk people gather to share stories and participate in Ceremony to speak the truth of the past and reclaim their future. The broadcasts are only one part of a wider effort to re-establish their territory and restore the natural environment devastated by deforestation and other outside forces. Collectively told by the Nuxalk Nation through animation, archival documents and testimony, this chronicle of resilience and cultural survival echoes across the land. Alexander Rogalski