KINSHIP TO THE CANYON

HUALAPAI TEK IN THE 

GRAND CANYON

By Bennett Wakayuta & Carrie Calisay Cannon, 

Hualapai Tribe, Department of Cultural Resource
BACKGROUND

The Hualapai Tribe’s Reservation includes 108 miles of Colorado River in the western Grand Canyon, and contacultural sites located within a landscape affected by the oof the Glen Canyon Dam. 
BACKGROUND 

In addition to quarterly involvement in theAMWG, the Hualapai Tribe’s Cultural Resources Department conducts annualmonitoring river trips down the Colorado Riverto conduct studies of the natural and cultural resources. Results derived from ongoing tribal monitoringare utilized in part to provide management andpolicy decision making input regarding GrandCanyon and Colorado River resources throughan Adaptive Management framework with other key stakeholders. The inclusion of a TEK based study is a recent outcome of stakeholder meetings as a means to support research the Hualapai and other tribes deem relevant to their involvement. 
Hualapai Natural and Cultural Resou

Monitoring in the Grand Canyon

• Botanical Studies• Archaeological 

Monitoring

• Cultural 

Activities 

• Ethnobotany & 

TEK 
BOTANICAL STUDIES

-Line Intercept Method -3 Transects each at Granite Park and National Canyon -20 Years of consistent study -4 Major Findings From Vegetation Studies 
1. Increase in Riparian 2.Side Canyon Influences Vegetation Along Colorado Over Vegetation: National River: Granite Park Canyon 

3. Establishment of Mesquite along NHWZ: Granite Park 

4. New Study Monitoring Loss of Tamarisk and Establishment of Other Species: Mohawk Canyon 
ARCHAEOLOGICAL 

MONITORING

-Pictographs & Petroglyphs -Roasting Features -Artifact Scatters -Springs -Traditional Cultural Properties -Sacred Sites 
Pictographs & Petroglyphs Artifact S

Roasting Feature Springs 
Sacred Sites 
Traditional Cultural Propert
CULTURAL ACTIVITIE
Hualapai TEK Study

“Words and places carry meaning. Morals, identity, and embedded in the streams and fields of Native landscapes. serve as cultural mnemonic devices that remind peopland the significance of those events for morality, behavior, a

-Jeff Sheppard 
ETHNOBOTANICAL &

TRADITIONAL ECOLOGICAL 

KNOWLEDGE WORK

1. Intergenerational Harvesting and 

Processing Activities 

2. Ethnographic Interviews and Oral H

Approach 

3.Hualapai Talking Dictionary 
Processing Activities: 

1. Intergenerational Harvesting Indian Tea: Jumway 
Banana Yucca: Manad 
Prickly Pear Cactus: Alav 
Agave/Yucca Rope Twinin
Red Berry Sumac 

Juice & Yucca Fiber 
Wild Tobacco Harvest: U
1. Intergenerational Harvestin

Processing Activities: 

For the Hualapai people, culture and nature are 

inextricably linked. It has only been approximately 140 years since members of the Hualapai tribe were living entirely off the land. Even after Hualapai tribal members were forced to take up wage labor employment beginning in the late 1880s, it was not uncommon for members of households to continue many traditional subsistence practices well into the 20th century to supplement livelihood. In addition to 

knowledge of plant species identification, elders have cultural knowledge about plants that tie certain species to stories in their oral traditions, ceremonies, and other relevant knowledge regarding their landscape. This invaluable knowledge links Hualapai culture with their land and must be kept alive in the Hualapai tribal 

community as a living tradition. Engaging in harvesting activities on th

serves to maintain the continuity of this knowledge. 
Approach 

2. Ethnographic Interviews an

Oral History 
Formalized Interviews 
Oral History Approach 
TEK is empirically based knowledge, tested and adapted th

and experience and interpreted by local indigenous peoples local places. This knowledge has most often been passed on orally from generation to the next via tribal elders. This form of knowtransmission is at the crux of TEK. Should TEK and assocethnobotanical knowledge begin to lose its foothold within Native communities, which is in effect its home base, it losmajority of its power, because as it is disseminated it becomdecontextualized. 

The Hualapai Department of Cultural Resources therefore 

the specific need for Hualapai TEK studies centered arounintergenerational transmission of knowledge about the Grathat in turn promotes the largest degree of dissemination amtribal community. In this modern era, the customary continTEK transmission from elder to youth is highly at risk. 
Oral History; Showing By Do

Hands on Knowledge Transmi

Pinon Butter 

Red Berry Sumac Juice 
3.Hualapai Talking Dictiona

-Digital Camera Documentation -Audio Reordering -Video Recording -GPS 
Hualapai Talking Dictiona
Hualapai Talking Dictiona
The Hualapai names for the many different 

species of prickly pear cactus correlate to the animals that have been observed to feed on them. During ethnographic interviews, elders have translated some of the Hualapai prickly pear cacti names into English. These different species’ names in the Hualapai language directly reference the primary animal species which feed on the cacti fruits as shown in the list below: 

a) quaq h’de (deer fruit), 

b) de g’se h’de (buzzard fruit). 

c) gul h’de (jack rabbit fruit), d) hlo h’de (cottontail rabbit fruit), and e) g’squala (chicken hawk fruit). 
The name for cattail is hams’iv, which means 

“star” in Hualapai, and refers to the star shape of the cattail fluff when it goes to seed. Although this detail may be esoteric to an English speaker, its significance in the Hualapai language is that the name teaches the speaker something about the plant. The Hualapai name for cottonwood is A’ha, “ha” meaning water; the name for this plant derives from the fact that it grows near the water. 

Although lists of Hualapai plant names translated 

into common and scientific forms have been acquired already through traditional Linean means, and are available in multiple texts, there has not been sufficient inquiry into Hualapai folk taxonomic classification systems. Hualapai folk plant classification systems have not been examined and provide only one example of the type of further inquiry that is needed in documenting and disseminating Hualapai TEK as we continue to add to the “Hualapai Talking Dictionary.” 
“Languages aren't different word

the same thing, languages are different words for entirely differways of seeing and conceptualizithe world. The words we use largdetermine how we perceive the world, but the words we use also determine how we perceive each other.” 

“I would like to thank the 

Hualapai Cultural Department for taking me on their annual river trip. If it wasn't for them I wouldn't have been able to take the trip of a lifetime, and to walk in the steps of my ancestors and where they once roamed. Being a descendant of Paiute and seeing where they once lived at Deer Creek and from the Hualapai side, I got to see where my family lived in Mohawk Canyon which was probably only less than 150 years ago. That canyon protected my family from capture from the U.S Calvary, which is why I'm here to this day. ”-Jewel Honga