Beadwork,

Beads in Law

Beads have been used to entrench, codify, and disseminate law since prior to the very first interactions between peoples Indigenous to Turtle Island and settlers who arrived and made claims to the space. I speak of course of wampum belts, often created out of beads made from quahog shells to allow law and commitments to be shared amongst community members when agreements were concluded between nations.

Over time, settlers, in espousing Eurocentric constructs of knowledge, prioritized the written word, effectively subjugating Indigenous knowledge systems and devaluing Indigenous understandings of law. Despite this shift in colonial narrative through the years, the historical record indicates that non-Indigenous contemporaries at the time understood the intellectual weight the wampum symbolized, carried, and communicated (Grey, 2017). The use of beadwork to codify law was a question of longevity and resiliency, and not a question of Indigenous nations lacking sophistication (Monture-Angus, 1999). By beading treaties, the principles were in fact elevated to a status above pen and ink (Monture-Angus, 1999).

Wampum belts are not a part of the story of the Métis Nation as I know it, and to my knowledge Métis beadwork has never been used to embody treaty at the time of negotiation in the same way as wampum belts. However, Métis beadwork can, and does, carry Indigenous knowledge in many forms. Métis beadwork can be used as a mnemonic device. As such, the work of modern Indigenous beadwork artists is considered a complement to "an important dimension to oral tradition, recording the beliefs of their people in a visual language of motifs and symbols" (Edge, 2011). Through this visual language, beadwork can be mobilized to convey stories and songs which many scholars and thought leaders remind us can, and do, carry law.