Craig Ginn - Spirit To Be
The Animal Kinship Project

Getting Started

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Not long after I had finished the Songs of Justice Project in 2021, I was asked what my next music project would be about.  Next project? I wasn’t sure if I was up to the task creatively, and I did not have an album concept in mind for a follow-up project. Upon reflection, the references to bison and eagles referenced in the Songs of Justice Project served to provide a sequel. While these references were meaningful, I knew there was more to say about animals. And as I started to think about their presence and impact, song ideas started to develop. It took almost three years, but here it is, an album dedicated to animal kinship.

Personal Connection

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This project is only a small glimpse into the vast world of animals.  The animals I write about in the album are native to the lands known to me; lands that know me.  The album cover features a polar bear walking on the shores of Hudson Bay near Churchill, the photo taken by Paul Souders. 1  The image provides a personal connection for me to land, water, sky, and animals.  I grew up in Northern Manitoba until grade eleven, my early childhood years in Churchill.  The first song I wrote was about a flock of Canada geese. I can still remember the words:

Vs 1
The geese are lovely just like you
Their feathers are damp like the morning dew
They fly like your hair on a windy day
They sound like your voice when I hear you say

Chorus
I can see the geese in the sky
I can even hear them fly by
Where are they going and why?
No one knows besides you and I

Vs 2
The geese in the sky fly lovely
The geese in the sky fly noiselessly
The geese in the sky fly swiftly
The geese in the sky fly beautifully

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OK, the second verse loses the plot, but I was only nine. Many years later you might say I’ve come back full circle, a bit like the geese returning to the north after wintering in a warmer climate.

Inspired by Teachings and Research

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From the outset I wanted to write lyrics that were informed by Indigenous histories and worldviews. I was inspired by the Seven Grandfather Teachings 2 that uphold the values of respect, love, courage, honesty, wisdom, humility, and truth, each value represented by a different animal. 3 For example, the buffalo represents respect. In January 2023 I attended a meeting of the Continental Bison Working Group, a group dedicated to restoring bison herds. 4 The meeting featured presentations and discussions including Elders, tribal policy directors, buffalo herd managers and researchers, as well as those who work in education, parks and wildlife conservation, law and policy, veterinary medicine, and more.  At the time I was working on Let the Mountains Hide You, a song that recounts the near extinction of the bison. 5 The meeting was a landmark experience for me.  I came away with increased confidence that the Animal Kinship Project could contribute to meaningful research and educational resources.

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From the Deep pays tribute to the majesty and destiny of Orca Travel Without Me commemorates the loss of Inuit sled dogs Lord of Rivers acclaims the engineering mastery of the beaver Let the Mountains Hide You recounts the near extinction of the plains bison Wonders of the Sky acknowledges the dominion of the soaring eagle To the Wild honours the spirit   of wolf as the spirit of the wild Raven recalls the raven as a symbol of transformation Ever Wandering One venerates Nanuq’s journey through every storm and season Messenger of Destiny narrates a life-changing encounter with a snowy owl This Life Mystery contemplates the spirit of life awake in all beings

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Through the Continental Bison Working Group I met Jordan Kennedy, an interdisciplinary field researcher with strong ties to her Blackfeet tribal community. In October 2023, the International Indigenous Studies Program hosted Jordan at the University of Calgary in partnership with the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine and the Faculty of Science. Jordan’s plenary talk, “Building Like a Beaver, Moving Like a Buffalo, Singing Like a Bird: Interdisciplinary Land - based Research Within Tribal Lands” included highlights from her PhD research. 6 I was recording a song at the time that celebrated the beaver’s extraordinary capacity to build. I was confident that I was on the right track with the lyrics, but Jordan expanded my horizons as I learned that beavers not only build intricate dams but also shape entire ecosystems with extensive canals. Lord of Rivers, a rock anthem celebrating the engineering mastery of the beaver, seemed more and more a worthy title and fitting music genre.

Awareness and Survival

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I have learned to appreciate the reverence for the beaver among the Blackfoot peoples, which differs from my experiences in Northern Manitoba, where trapping beaver was common. I was most interested to learn that Peter Fidler had a similar experience over 230 years ago when he traveled from York Factory to the Rocky Mountains to map the fur-trade route. Fidler, a significant figure in Métis history and ancestry, recounts in his journal how the Piikani were reluctant to kill beaver. 7 As described by James Daschuk, “Archaeological studies indicate that an important prehistoric adaptation to the grasslands was a prohibition on the killing of beaver as a means to manage water supplies in a region prone to drought.” 8 In Blackfoot Ways of Knowing Betty Bastien describes the beaver and otter as “potent underwater beings” essential to maintaining the cosmic world of balance 9 and, that more generally, animals gave knowledge to humans who otherwise had no knowledge of survival on earth. 10

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In these songs I reflect on some ways that humans have survived because of animals, such as the polar bear teaching humans to hunt and the beaver teaching humans to build. Arguably, even if human life came into being in the absence of animals, I’m not sure that humans would have had much of a chance to survive without them.  So, while I have tried to feature Indigenous worldviews that value kinship with animals and include histories that have impacted Indigenous peoples, these songs are for humans, regardless of Euro-centric or Indigenous worldviews. We can all gain from an increased awareness of animals. And for what it’s worth, I believe that animals can teach us how to be better humans.

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Selecting a Title

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Reading through the song lyrics and looking for a stand-alone phrase or term that represented animal kinship I settled on the phrase “spirit to be” from the final song This Life Mystery. Understanding the origins of life and the parameters of consciousness is a longstanding endeavour, and many humans across cultures, communities, tribes, nations, religions, and philosophies have developed ways of knowing to understand being.11

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Questions in the Songs

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While looking for a phrase, I noticed that I asked many questions in these songs. Twenty-five, to be exact! There are rhetorical questions that emphasize the impact of animals. I ask Orca, “Who is not silenced by your presence from the shoreline?” I ask Eagle, “Where is the nation that does not know your name?” In my attempt to speak for qimmiit I ask a vital question of kinship and loss, “How will you travel without me?” I draw attention to the Qikiqtani Truth Commission 12 in asking about the deaths of sled dogs, “Who would shoot us by the hundreds, by the thousands?” and “Did they bring you to your knees when they sent us to our graves?”  There are questions I ask to gain understanding from animals. Of the birds I ask, “Will you make your home in these familiar skies? Or will you travel with the changing seasons of life?” I bring questions of knowing and being to Orca asking, “What is your nature, your language, your incarnation?  Finally, there is one question that I asked of myself about the impact of animals, “Will I learn from their ways to journey on this path?” These questions are not just a display of curiosity but, I trust, a testament to humility. In the Seven Grandfather Teachings, humility is represented by the wolf.  

An Educational Resource

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The Animal Kinship Project is an educational resource – which I believe it is.  Still, I will admit that I have sometimes erred from romanticizing the wild and idealizing animals. Perhaps this tendency is to be expected due to poetic license that tends toward hyperbole.  Lyricists can easily default to idealism and exaggerate love and devotion when writing about humans. Would a human really walk 500 miles to fall down at another human’s door as sung by the Proclaimers? Or, living up to Vanessa Carlton’s lyrics, walk 1000 miles just to see them tonight? 13 The promises in these songs may express the best of intentions but who can actually travel these distances? And does anyone expect that they will even try? In contrast, think of the remarkable will and endurance of animals. In the summer of 2018, a female orca carried her lifeless calf for seventeen days and more than 1,000 miles. 14 In 2008 a polar bear was tracked swimming 426 miles continuously for 232 hours. 15  Perhaps a bit of idealism is warranted.  Animals have inspired humans since time immemorial. In Wonders of the Sky I depict the eagle’s capacity to inspire bravery, freedom, and truth across generations, empires and nations. In the Seven Grandfather Teachings the eagle represents love. Indigenous peoples honour the eagle, seen as a messenger to link the physical and spiritual worlds. 16  The eagle was observed to fly higher than other birds and trusted to carry prayers to Creator, its feathers considered sacred. The recent introduction of the eagle feather in Canadian courtrooms to hold while swearing oaths is a tangible way to honour Indigenous worldviews and is another step towards Truth and Reconciliation, even if a small one. 17

Parallel Paths

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Elders and Traditional Knowledge Keepers carry ancestral understandings of life and the world, including land, water, vegetation, seasons, climate, and animals.  In particular, region-specific knowledge can be helpful in education and wellbeing. I have been fortunate to witness efforts to include Indigenous knowledges in academia.  The Indigenous Strategy at the University of Calgary supports relational reciprocity and walking together in a good way, encouraging parallel paths by “weaving Euro-centric and Indigenous worldviews.” 18 In my research of the Christian missionary impulse and participation in Truth and Reconciliation, I am interested in the intersections and differences between Indigenous and Christian worldviews. In his seminal work God is Red, Vine Deloria Jr. contrasted the worldviews of tribal religions with the Christian religion.  For Deloria Jr. tribal religions value kinship between humans and other living beings as “a great conception” shared by many tribes in distinction to the alienation between different life forms that is shaped by Christian readings of the Genesis account. 19  Might kinship with animals help these traditions walk together in a good way? In Raven and To the Wild I have tried to weave stories and traditions. Some listeners will recognize the reference to the Genesis flood narrative in Raven, which shares the archetypal figures of Creator and animal helpers known in many flood stories. 20 I have also braided references to the wolf in the song To the Wild, setting Isaiah’s apocalyptic image of the wolf living with the lamb 21 parallel to “the Pawnee conceptualization of the wolf” 22 as a cosmic symbol of renewal, “who was the first to be killed and the first to return from the dead.” 23 I have watched with interest as animal theology and the ethical treatment of animals have gained momentum in western Christianity due in part to interaction with eco-theology and Indigenous knowledges. But kindness and kinship are not synonymous.  In kinship humans respect relationality with animals and the interconnectedness of life.  

Healing and Meaning

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The increasing urbanization of our lives can create a cityscape environment that diminishes our awareness of wildlife and interconnectedness. I wonder how many of us consider ourselves and our lives to be removed from land and animals. In the song To the Wild I have attempted to narrate something of this disconnect and convey the desire to nurture kinship. Writing songs about animals has increased my understanding of the presence and impact of animals and Indigenous worldviews.  And it has been therapeutic, which came as an unexpected surprise. Upon reflection, perhaps I should have anticipated that I would experience elements of music therapy and animal therapy in these melodies and lyrics. I trust that others will find healing and meaning in these songs and, in the spirit of kinship, an awakened sense to be.

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1 Paul Souders Photography https://worldfoto.com/ I am very grateful to Paul for his generosity, allowing usage of his photography within a modest budget.  There are many more of Paul’s polar bear photos featured in the video Ever Wandering One.

2 Also referred to as the Seven Sacred Teachings. John Borrows expands the title to the Seven Grandmother/Grandfather teachings. See Borrows, John. Law’s Indigenous Ethics. University of Toronto Press, 2019.

3 The teachings may have originated with the Anishinaabe but were embraced broadly by other Indigenous nations over time. Amy Klemm Verbos recognizes that the Seven Grandfather Teachings come from a Potawatomi and Ojibwe story.  See Verbos, Amy Klemm, and Maria Humphries. “A Native American Relational Ethic: An Indigenous Perspective on Teaching Human Responsibility.” Journal of Business Ethics 123, no. 1 (2014): 1–9.

4 The meeting was led by team members from Indigenous Led.  See https://www.indigenousled.org/

5 In Let the Mountains Hide You I present two main causes of the slaughter, the scorched earth policy of the Frontier Army and the buffalo hide industry. I am grateful to George Colpitts for the recommended reading. In particular see Smits, David D. “The Frontier Army and the Destruction of the Buffalo: 1865-1883.” The Western Historical Quarterly, vol. 25, no. 3, 1994, pp. 313–38; Dobak, William A. “The Army and the Buffalo: A Demur. A Response to David D. Smits’s ‘The Frontier Army and the Destruction of the Buffalo: 1865-1883.’” The Western Historical Quarterly, vol. 26, no. 2, 1995, pp. 197–202.  I have also considered the work of M. Scott Taylor who attributes free trade in buffalo hides as a critical cause. Taylor also recognizes the promotion of shooting buffalo from rail cars and native overhunting. See Taylor, M. Scott. “Buffalo Hunt: International Trade and the Virtual Extinction of the North American Bison.” The American Economic Review, vol. 101, no. 7, 2011, pp. 3162–3195.

6 Kennedy, Jordan R.M. “Building in Flow.” ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 2023.

7 Bruce Haig, ed. Peter Fidler, Journal of a Journey over Land from Buckingham House to the Rocky Mountains in 1792 & 93. (Lethbridge: Lethbridge Historical Society, 1992), 10-15, Nov. 10, Nov. 15, 1792. In James Daschuk,  “Who Killed the Prairie Beaver? An Environmental Case for Eighteenth Century Migration in Western Canada.” Prairie forum 37, no. 1 (Fall 2012): 151-172, 162.

8 James Daschuk, “Who Killed the Prairie Beaver? An Environmental Case for Eighteenth Century Migration in Western Canada.” Prairie forum 37, no. 1 (Fall 2012): 151-172. 

9 Bastien, Betty. Blackfoot Ways of Knowing:The Worldview of the Siksikaitsitapi, edited by Jurgen W. Kremer, University of Calgary Press, 2004, 11.

10 Ibid, 92.

11 Or maybe humans developed ways of being to understand knowing. Which came first, theories of knowledge or theories of being?  I think, therefore I am?  I am, therefore I think? The metaphysical inquiry into essence and existence fascinates me. Do human beings have a soul? A spirit?  A self? What of animal beings? What is the capacity of animal communication, consciousness, and individuation?

12 Qikiqtani Truth Commission. https://www.qtcommission.ca/en

13 Even my lyrics of the geese in the sky are subject to analysis, for certainly the line, “no one knows besides you and I” is an unlikely truth-claim.

14 Gathright, Jenny. “After 17 Days And 1,000 Miles, A Mother Orca's 'Tour Of Grief' Is Over.”

NPR, August 12, 2018. https://www.npr.org/2018/08/12/638047095/after-17-days-and-1-000-miles-a-mother-orcas-tour-of-grief-is-over.

15 Durner, G.M., Whiteman, J.P., Harlow, H.J. et al. Consequences of long-distance swimming and travel over deep-water pack ice for a female polar bear during a year of extreme sea ice retreat. Polar Biol 34, 975–984 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00300-010-0953-2

16 Poks, Małgorzata. Decolonial Animal Ethics in Linda Hogan’s Poetry and Prose: Toward Interspecies Thriving. Routledge, 2024, 111. Perhaps there is a parallel with the dove as a form of the Holy Spirit, though this I did not include this in the lyrics.

17 Sinclair, Niigaan. “Eagle feathers in law courts just small step.” Circles for Reconciliation, Originally printed by the Winnipeg Free Press 09/27/2019 https://circlesforreconciliation.ca/eagle-feathers-in-law-courts-just-small-step/

18 Explore ii’taa’poh’to’p https://www.ucalgary.ca/indigenous/about-ii-taapohtop/explore-strategy  I am grateful for the wisdom of balance and spirit of reciprocity expressed in the U of C Indigenous Strategy.  Euro-centric and Indigenous knowledges are treated with mutual respect.

19 Vine Deloria Jr. God is Red: A Native View of Religion. 30th Anniversary Edition. Fulcrum Publishing, Wheat Ridge, Colorado, 2003, 88.

20 Asch, Michael, Borrows, John and Tully, James. Resurgence and Reconciliation: Indigenous-Settler Relations and Earth Teachings. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2018, 252.

21 Isaiah 11:6

22 Lopez, Barry Holstun. Of Wolves and Men. London: J.M. Dent, 1978, 112.

23 Ibid, 132.