Bridging Rituals: A Daughter's Song

Interrituality is the term ritual studies scholars use to describe rituals that transpire in the between traditions.1 Since such spaces lie in the interstices, they are, by Victor Turner's definition, liminal. In Latin Limen means threshold, so for Turner, liminality is a mediating space located betwixt and between. However, a bridge is perhaps more apt in the case of interrituality. Unlike a threshold, a bridge is not domestic. It connects two non-adjoining spaces, and flowing often transpires beneath it. I have studied rituals on or around four actual bridges: Charles Bridge in Prague, the Czech Republic (fig. 1); the Crossing in Nijmegen, the Netherlands (fig. 2); and the Living Bridge in Limerick, Ireland (fig. 3). All of these are beautiful enough to warrant adoption as a symbol for the generative and conflictual space between rituals.But the bridge I want to talk about is not quite so beautiful. It is the Mercier Bridge, which traffics in and out of Montreal. These are the only slightly romantic images (figs. 4, 5) I could find of the bridge. Many Montrealers think of the Mercier as a crumbling infrastructure bearing a log jam of traffic, (fig. 6) or as the scene of conflict (fig. 7).The city of Montreal lies across the St. Lawrence River from land that is home to the Mohawks of Kahnawake. The Mohawks are one of the six nations that make up the Haudenosaunee (or Iroquois Confederacy). The land along the river has a complex and contentious history. In 1961 the city of Oka, an hour west of the Mercier Bridge, built a golf course on land contested by the Mohawks of Kanesatake. Then in 1989 the city proposed to double the size of the golf course and add luxury condominiums. The land's ownership had been contested by Mohawks since 1717, and it contained a burial ground.In 1990 Mohawks from Kahnawake and Akwesasne joined those from Kanesatake to erect blockades. From across North America native and nonnative people joined the protest. Eventually, protestors blocked the Mercier Bridge, a key commuter artery connecting Montreal with Kahnawake and the suburbs. Local residents retaliated by throwing stones and bottles and burning native people in effigy (fig. 8). The emerging media images of guns and tanks shocked Canadians. The second image (fig. 9) became iconic and was broadcast around the world. Some read it as an image of peace-loving, fearless Canadian soldiers. Others read it as an image of fearless Mohawks declaring: you are on our land.On July 11, 1990, Quebec police fired tear gas. In the confrontation that followed, an SQ (Surete du Quebec) corporal was killed. For 78 days the Quebec police, and later the Canadian army, occupied First Nations reserves with guns, tanks, and aerial surveillance, while Mohawks resisted with weapons and overturned cars to block roads.As A Daughter's Song opens, it is the autumn of 2014, almost twenty-five years after the Oka crisis. I am walking through Centennial Park with Stephane Azoulay, a Jewish father and husband who has lost his wife Myriam to leukemia.2 She had converted from Islam to marry him, and soon they had a child named Aaliyah. Even though I have just met Stephane, he and I are soon telling stories about the deaths of loved ones. Walking with us is his mother-in-law, Fatiha, who is looking after his daughter. It is now three months after Myriam's death, so tomorrow's ritual will not be a funeral but a Mohawk Condolence Ceremony.Francis Boots, a Mohawk spiritual leader from Akwesasne, who had been active in the events of 1990, has never enacted this ceremony among nonnatives. Invited to lead it, he consulted the Longhouse leadership. As he tells the story, he was met with silence. The message, he says: he must him decide for himself. His willingness to cross the rusty, highly symbolic Mercier Bridge for an interritual event is remarkable.3 The event was facilitated by NativeImmigrant, a group that facilitates cooperation between immigrants to Canada and First Nations people. …

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