Negotiating the production of space in Tl'azt'en Territory, 1969-1984

Henri Lefebvre has suggested that through social practices which visualize, administer, and use lands and resources, a society produces the space in which it operates. He emphasized the heterogeneity of social space and argued that it is a group's political power which determines its ability to influence the production of space. Historical geographers have described the means by which Europeans created new geographies in British Columbia, but little attention has been paid to the role Native people may have played in the production of space. There is a need to recognize pre- and post-contact Native spatiality and its influence on the legal and social spaces of British Columbia. Prior to the arrival of Europeans in central British Columbia, the territory of the Tl'azt'en people was a social and political landscape. Gradually Euro-Canadian visualization, administration and uses of land and resources were superimposed on Tl'azt'en space. Yet Tl'azt'en spatiality was never totally erased. As a result, Tl'azt'en territory can neither be viewed as a space which reflects purely the Tl' azt'en, nor purely the EuroCanadian, production of space. Instead the territory is made up of shared spaces and hybrid spaces which resulted from the interaction of Tl' azt' en and Euro-Canadian societies. The Tl'azt'en's ability to influence the production of space varied with their political power but never completely disappeared. The potential continued to exist for Tl ' azt' en spatiality to influence the production of space in their territory if they gained more political power. The social processes involved in the production of space are perhaps most visible when two parties are negotiating the allocation and management of lands and resources. In the 1970s the Tl' azt'en were engaged in negotiations with the Pacific Great Eastern/British Columbia Railway and the Provincial Government over the construction of a railway through their traditional territory. The Tl' azt'en used their Indian Reserve rights and threats of blockades to create a political space in which they could engage the Government in negotiations over the administration of lands and resources in their territory. The parties reached an agreement by which the Tl'azt'en acquired thirty-five new reserves and a Tree Farm License. Through these negotiations Tl'azt'en social and economic goals were inscribed to a significant degree within the spatial organization of the territory. Like current treaty negotiations, the negotiations between the Provincial Government and the Tl' azt' en in the 1970s involved compromises by both parties, and resulted in the creation of new hybrid social spaces which reflected the goals and strategies of both groups.