Ceremonies

For the first time, over a dozen respected Indigenous elders from around the world have united to share their timeless wisdom beyond their lands and lineages.

Aniwa’s Council of Elders includes some of the globe’s most renowned Indigenous Wisdom Keepers. In a time fraught with ecological, social, political, and mental health crises, they share a mission to unite people of all races, colors, and creeds to promote healing and a deeper reciprocal relationship with our planet. Sacred Ceremony for a Sacred Earth brings together their profound teachings, stories, sacred ceremonies, and healing practices, amplifying the voices of Indigenous healers from diverse traditions.

In their worldview, we are all children of Mother Earth, destined to return to her embrace. This extraordinary book serves as a guiding light, beckoning humanity back to ancestral wisdom and restoring forgotten bonds with nature and self through ceremonies and practices.

Embark on a journey of self-discovery, unveiling the purpose of your soul and reclaiming your intrinsic relationship with Mother Earth, through ancient practices such as:

• Use of Feathers to Bless Yourself and Relieve Pain
• Pagamento for Trees
• Hopi Message of Comfort to Say Good-Bye to Loved Ones Who Have Passed
• Practices for Conscious Conception
• Create a Spiritual House for Your Inner Child
• The Feagaiga (Sacred Promise or Covenant) with Mother Earth
• Connect with Your Ancestors

Sacred Ceremony for a Sacred Earth calls upon us to awaken and rekindle the flame of connection with our roots and the natural world. Let the eternal wisdom of elders guide you toward healing, growth, and a profound reconnection with nature.

Reviews
"An essential guide to begin understanding culture, nature, and yourself."—Oona Chaplin, actress

"Beautifully and profusely illustrated throughout with full color photography of indigenous people, rituals, events, Sacred Ceremony for a Sacred Earth is informative, fascinating, insightful, and unreservedly recommended."—Midwest Book Review

Educator Information
Discover rituals and wisdom from Indigenous communities across the globe that, until now, have only been passed down orally and taught within closed circles.

Additional Information
224 pages | 8.30" x 10.25" | Hardcover 

Tap into guidance from the animal spirit realm and connect to ancestral wisdom with this transformative 44-card deck and guidebook from Indigenous Medicine Woman and author of You Are the Medicine and The Sacred Medicine Oracle, Asha Frost.

Everything is interconnected. All of creation carries a spirit. Indigenous people have always had a sacred relationship with animals and treated them as honored elders. Animal beings in the spirit realm are part of our spiritual support team as allies and medicine keepers, ready to help, waiting to remind you of your humanity and deep connection to the natural world.

With 44 Elder Animals depicted in a richly detailed traditional Ojibway art style, each card carries its own unique medicine. This deck offers meaningful insights and messages to guide you on your path both from the universe and in the voice of an animal spirit guide from the lands of the Ojibway people—from Elder Artic Hare to Elder Wolf. Whether you're seeking clarity, healing, or a deeper connection to your ancestral lineage, these cards provide a bridge to the spirit world.

Use this deck your rituals and ceremonies, do readings with it for your clients and friends, and share it with your communities. As the medicine ripples out, hold Indigenous people in your heart and honor how their history continues to impact your current reality.

Additional Information
128 pages | 3.50" x 5.00" | Card Deck & Guidebook 

A visual and cultural celebration of a traditional Haida wedding ceremony, exploring its roots, rituals, symbolism, joyfulness, and contemporary significance for a thriving Indigenous Nation.

In 1996, Terri-Lynn Williams and Robert Davidson celebrated their wedding with a traditional ceremony, the first in over a century that was legalized under Haida law. This book provides an intimate photographic window into that momentous day and marks the resurgence of a tradition that was nearly lost to colonial forces.

Relying on recorded knowledge their ancestors had shared with ethnographers and anthropologists, and the few details living Elders could recall about the tradition of guud ‘iina Gihl (“becoming married”) in the time before the arrival of Christian missionaries, the couple carefully planned out a seven-part celebration. It involved a canoe procession, ceremony, feast, dancing, and dowry payment, signifying the coming together of two people, two families, and two clans. The occasion is lovingly and painstakingly recounted through imagery and text in this fascinating tribute to a resilient culture and the unbreakable bonds of love and family.

Additional Information
128 pages | 8.75" x 10.50"| Hardcover 

This teaching memoir by an Indigenous spirit talker includes stories about the author’s reconnection with his Mi’kmaq heritage along with techniques for connecting to Spirit and developing your own intuition and psychic abilities.

In this teaching memoir, Shawn Leonard shares his personal story of developing his abilities as a spirit talker, revealing incredible stories from his childhood to the present. Along the way, he shares experiences he has had with elders from his aboriginal tribe, the Mi’kmaq, and his journey learning more about his heritage.

Shawn incorporates the beautiful spiritual practices of the Mi’kmaq, like talking circles, pipe ceremonies, cleansing herbal medicines, and more. He shares fantastic stories of times when he has communicated with Spirit and when he has been able to connect others to Spirit. Here, he will also reveal how the reader can grow in their own spirituality through prayer and meditation; grow in their connection to Spirit through dreams, spirit guides, totem animals, and loved ones in Spirit; and grow and develop their own intuition and psychic abilities through clairsentience, clairvoyance, clairaudience, and claircognizance.

Additional Information
264 pages | 5.50" x 8.50" | Paperback

A collaboration exploring the importance of the Ojibway-Anishinabe worldview, use of ceremony, and language in living a good life, attaining true reconciliation, and resisting the notions of indigenization and colonialization inherent in Western institutions.

Indigenization within the academy and the idea of truth and reconciliation within Canada have been seen as the remedy to correct the relationship between Indigenous Peoples and Canadian society. While honourable, these actions are difficult to achieve given the Western nature of institutions in Canada and the collective memory of its citizens, and the burden of proof has always been the responsibility of Anishinabeg.

Authors Makwa Ogimaa (Jerry Fontaine) and Ka-pi-ta-aht (Don McCaskill) tell their di-bah-ji-mo-wi-nan (Stories of personal experience) to provide insight into the cultural, political, social, and academic events of the past fifty years of Ojibway-Anishinabe resistance in Canada. They suggest that Ojibway-Anishinabe i-zhi-chi-gay-win zhigo kayn-dah-so-win (Ways of doing and knowing) can provide an alternative way of living and thriving in the world. This distinctive worldview — as well as Ojibway-Anishinabe values, language, and ceremonial practices — can provide an alternative to Western political and academic institutions and peel away the layers of colonialism, violence, and injustice, speaking truth and leading to true reconciliation.

Reviews
"Fontaine and McCaskill write in a way our own Indigenous People can understand and feel; their passion is tangible." — Graham Hingangaroa Smith, Distinguished Professor, Massey University - NZ

"There are multiple ways to inhabit our deepest principles. There are also many ways to honor land and our elders by embodying the teachings of both. Here is life found in kindness, loving, and truth. How do we access healing and how do we share this healing with others? Reading this book is one way. Tears of gratitude are for you both, Jerry Fontaine and Don McCaskill. Mahalo nui no ko ?ike nahenahe. Thank you for this mutual emergence shaped as much by friendship as it is by ?ike kupuna - elder knowledge. What is within these pages are ceremonial gifts offered to all who will take the time to connect with what is inevitable about our collective evolution." — Manulani Aluli Meyer, University of Hawai‘i

Additional Information
328 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | Paperback

Long known as the Cannibal Dance, the Hamat̓sa is among the most important hereditary prerogatives of the Kwakwa̱ka̱ꞌwakw of British Columbia. Writing the Hamat̓sa offers a critical survey of attempts to record, describe, and interpret the dance under shifting colonial policy. In the late nineteenth century, as anthropologists arrived to document the practice, colonial agents were pursuing its eradication and Kwakwa̱ka̱ꞌwakw were adapting it to ensure its survival. In the process, the dance – with dramatic choreography, magnificent bird masks, and an aura of cannibalism – entered a vast and variegated library of ethnographic texts.

Drawing on close, contextualized reading of published texts, extensive archival research, and fieldwork, Aaron Glass analyses key examples of overlapping genres over four centuries: the exploration journal, the territorial survey, the missionary polemic, settler journalism, government reports, anthropological works (especially by Franz Boas and George Hunt), poetry, fiction, and Indigenous (auto)biography.

Going beyond postcolonial critiques of representation that often ignore Indigenous agency in the ethnographic encounter, Writing the Hamat̓sa focuses on forms of textual mediation and Indigenous response that helped transform the ceremony from a set of specific performances into a generalized cultural icon. This meticulous work illuminates how Indigenous people contribute to, contest, and repurpose texts in the process of fashioning modern identities under settler colonialism.

This comprehensive critical survey of ethnographic literature on the Hamat̓sa ceremony will be an invaluable resource for scholars and students of the Northwest Coast in a range of disciplines – Indigenous studies, anthropology and history of anthropology, ethnohistory, BC studies, art history, museum studies, and material culture – as well as for Kwakwa̱ka̱ꞌwakw/Indigenous readers.

Educator Information
Table of Contents

Foreword / Chief William Cranmer/T̓łlakwagila (ꞌNa̱mg̱is Nation)

Prologue: Points of Arrival and Departure

Introduction: From Writing Culture to the Intercultural History of Ethnography

1 A Complex Cannibal: Colonialism, Modernity and the Hamat̓sa

2 Discursive Cannibals:The Textual Dynamics of Settler Colonialism, 1786–1893

3 The Foundations of All Future Researches: The Work of Franz Boas and George Hunt, 1886–1966

4 Reading, Rewriting, and Writing Against: Changing Anthropological Theory, 1896–1997

5 From Index to Icon: (Auto)Biography and Popular Culture, 1941–2012

6 Reading Culture, Consuming Ethnography

Afterword: Between This World and That / Andy Everson/Tanis (K̕ómoks Nation)

Appendices

Glossary

Notes; References; Index

Additional Information
512 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | 28 b&w photos, 2 maps | Paperback

Returning to Ceremony is the follow-up to Chantal Fiola’s award-winning Rekindling the Sacred Fire and continues her ground-breaking examination of Métis spirituality, debunking stereotypes such as “all Métis people are Catholic,” and “Métis people do not go to ceremonies.” Fiola finds that, among the Métis, spirituality exists on a continuum of Indigenous and Christian traditions, and that Métis spirituality includes ceremonies. For some Métis, it is a historical continuation of the relationships their ancestral communities have had with ceremonies since time immemorial, and for others, it is a homecoming—a return to ceremony after some time away.

Fiola employs a Métis-specific and community-centred methodology to gather evidence from archives, priests’ correspondence, oral history, storytelling, and literature. With assistance from six Métis community researchers, Fiola listened to stories and experiences shared by thirty-two Métis from six Manitoba Métis communities that are at the heart of this book. They offer insight into their families’ relationships with land, community, culture, and religion, including factors that inhibit or nurture connection to ceremonies such as sweat lodge, Sundance, and the Midewiwin. Valuable profiles emerge for six historic Red River Métis communities (Duck Bay, Camperville, St Laurent, St François-Xavier, Ste Anne, and Lorette), providing a clearer understanding of identity, culture, and spirituality that uphold Métis Nation sovereignty.

Reviews
"Grounded in the communities of her home territory, Chantal Fiola brings critical insider knowledge, insight and analysis to the topic of Metis spirituality. The combination of historical background with contemporary voice offers an understanding of the Metis spirit that will nurture the nation and enlighten the broader public." — Kim Anderson

“Returning to Ceremony is a courageous book given the tensions surrounding religious affiliation in the Metis community. It is a challenging topic that has been dealt with sensitively, with balance and candour."— Blair Stonechild

“The most profound truth in the universe is this: that we are all one drum and we need each other.” —Richard Wagamese, One Drum

A posthumous volume of stories and ceremonies -- and a fitting tribute to Richard Wagamese's spiritual and literacy legacy. 

Fans of Richard Wagamese’s writing will be heartened by the news that the bestselling author left behind a manuscript he’d been working on until shortly before his death in 2017. One Drum welcomes readers to unite in ceremony to heal themselves and bring harmony to their lives and communities.

In One Drum, Wagamese wrote, “I am not a shaman. Nor am I an elder, a pipe carrier, or a celebrated traditionalist. I am merely one who has trudged the same path many of this human family has—the path of the seeker, called forward by a yearning I have not always understood.”

One Drum draws from the foundational teachings of Ojibway tradition, the Grandfather Teachings. Focusing specifically on the lessons of humility, respect and courage, the volume contains simple ceremonies that anyone anywhere can do, alone or in a group, to foster harmony and connection. Wagamese believed that there is a shaman in each of us, and we are all teachers and in the world of the spirit there is no right way or wrong way.

Writing of neglect, abuse and loss of identity, Wagamese recalled living on the street, going to jail, drinking too much, feeling rootless and afraid, and then the feeling of hope he gained from connecting with the spiritual ways of his people. He expressed the belief that ceremony has the power to unify and to heal for people of all backgrounds. “When that happens,” he wrote, “we truly become one song and one drum beating together in a common purpose—and we are on the path to being healed.”

Additional Information
160 pages | 5.50" x 8.00"

Indigenous perspectives much older than the nation itself shared through maps, artwork, history and culture.

The Royal Canadian Geographical Society, in partnership with Canada's national Indigenous organizations, has created a groundbreaking four-volume atlas that shares the experiences, perspectives, and histories of First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples. It's an ambitious and unprecedented project inspired by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's Calls to Action. Exploring themes of language, demographics, economy, environment and culture, with in-depth coverage of treaties and residential schools, these are stories of Canada's Indigenous Peoples, told in detailed maps and rich narratives.

This extraordinary project offers Canada a step on the path toward understanding.

The volumes contain more than 48 pages of reference maps, content from more than 50 Indigenous writers; hundreds of historical and contemporary photographs and a glossary of Indigenous terms, timelines, map of Indigenous languages, and frequently asked questions. All packaged together in a beautifully designed protective slipcase.

Educator Information
Recommended for ages 13+.

The Indigenous Peoples Atlas of Canada includes a four volume print atlas, an online atlas, an app, and more!

Additional Information
322 pages | 10.50" x 12.87"

Essential Song: Three Decades of Northern Cree Music, a study of subarctic Cree hunting songs, is the first detailed ethnomusicology of the northern Cree of Quebec and Manitoba. The result of more than two decades spent in the North learning from the Cree, Lynn Whidden’s account discusses the tradition of the hunting songs, their meanings and origins, and their importance to the hunt. She also examines women’s songs, and traces the impact of social change—including the introduction of hymns, Gospel tunes, and country music—on the song traditions of these communities.

The book also explores the introduction of powwow song into the subarctic and the Crees struggle to maintain their Aboriginal heritage—to find a kind of song that, like the hunting songs, can serve as a spiritual guide and force.

Including profiles of the hunters and their songs and accompanied (online) by original audio tracks of more than fifty Cree hunting songs, Essential Song makes an important contribution to ethnomusicology, social history, and Aboriginal studies.

Awards

• ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year Award, Bronze Pize, Music Category

Educator Information
Audio files available on Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/user-276681310/sets/essential-song-three-decades. 

Additional Information
192 pages | 6.00" x 9.00"

This comprehensive guide to the sacred plants traditionally used by Native Americans and other Indigenous peoples presents 14 significant plants, with information on their properties, growing conditions, and medicinal applications (incense cedar, red cedar, copal, juniper, lavender, mugwort, osha, pinon, white sage, desert sage, sweet grass, ceremonial tabacco, red willow bark and yerba santa). Descriptions of Native American ceremonies and rituals in which these plants play a central role are included.

William Beynon was born in 1888 in Victoria to a Welsh father and a Tsimshian mother. He was an accomplished ethnographer and had a long career documenting the traditions of the Tsimshian, Nisga'a, and Gitksan. In 1945 he attended and actively participated in five days of potlatches and totem pole raisings at Gitksan village of Gitsegukla. There he compiled four notebooks containing detailed and often verbatim information about the events he witnessed. For over 50 years these notebooks have seen limited circulation among specialists, who have long recognized them as the most perceptive and complete account of potlatching ever recorded.

In Potlatch at Gitsegukla the almost 200 pages of the notebooks are published for the first time. Sketches and a selection of photographs taken by Beynon are also included (augmented by photographs taken by Wilson Duff in 1952). In addition to meticulously transcribing and annotating the text of the notebooks, Margaret Anderson and Marjorie Halpin provide a comprehensive introduction that puts Beynon's account into a Gitskan cultural perspective, as well as extensive appendices listing names, places, and Gitskan terms in the notebooks. There is also an excellent timeline of key events in Gitskan history by James McDonald and Jennifer Joseph.

William Beynon's notebooks are among the most significant written records of Northwest coast potlatching and are an unsurpassed resource documenting these activities among the Gitskan. This rare, first-hand, ethnographic account of a potlatch reveals the wonderful complexities of the events that took place in Gitsegukla in 1945.

Additional Information
296 pages | 6.00" x 9.00" | Paperback 

“There are ancient secrets and lessons hidden in nature. If you seek for guidance, you will discover truth.” —Bobby Lake-Thom

Much of the ancient knowledge that has been passed down from Native American medicine men, or shamans is in danger of being lost. Bobby Lake-Thom, a Native American healer known as Medicine Grizzly Bear, has sought to preserve this powerful heritage by sharing his wisdom and experience learning from the world around us. The result is Spirits of the Earth, an extraordinary compilation of legends and rituals about nature’s ever-present signs. From the birds that soar above us to the insincts beneath our feet, Bobby Lake-Thom shows how the creatures of the earth can aid us in healing and self-knowledge.

What does it mean if a hawk appears in a dream? What are the symbolic interpretations of a deer, a skunk, a raccoon? Lake-Thom, who has studied with the elders of many tribes, explains the significance of animal figures as manifestations of good or evil, and shows how we can develop our own powers of awareness and intuition. The first book of its kind, this practical and enlightening resource includes dozens of fashinating animal myths and legends, as well as exercises and activities that draw upon animal powers for guidance, healing, wisdom, and the expansion of spiritual influences in our lifes. You’ll discover here:

- How animals, birds, and insects act as signs and omens
- The significance of vision quests
- How to make and use a medicine wheel
- The role of spirit symbols—and how they affect the unconscious
- Excercises for creative dreaming
- The power of the earth-healing ceremony
- How to increase your spiritual strength and create sacred spaces
- And more