John B. Moore Documentary Studies Collaborative 815 North Broadway Saratoga Springs, NY 12866
Offices: Filene Hall, 2nd Floor
DocLab: Scribner Library 113
Kanatsiohareke
Spring 2021- present
A sustainable, living Onkwehon:we community grounded in Rotinonhsionni culture – its language, land, and social structure. Kanatsiohareke is a Mohawk community, re-established in 1993. The community promotes the development of a community based on the traditions, philosophy, and governance of the Haudenosaunee, and to contribute to the preservation of the culture of people as a framework for a blend of traditional native concerns with the best of the emerging new earth friendly, environmental ideologies that run parallel to these traditions.
Since 2021, MDOCS has been assisting in the digitization of the Kanatsiohareke archive. This includes audio cassettes, video material, photographs, documents, and more. During the Fall 2021 semester, Kanatsiohareke collaborated with Professor Jesse O’Connell’s “Documentary Editing” class. Students from the class worked primarily with materials from the archive, supplementing with new interviews of members of the extended Kanatsiohareke community. A memorandum of understanding was crafted between the organization, MDOCS, and students, centering all of the work in the mission of Kanatsiohareke: to reverse the impacts of the Carlisle Residential Schools.
In June 2022, Kanatsiohareke was awarded a Creatives Rebuild NY Artist Employment Grant! The grant supports a 2-year collaboration between Kanatsiohareke and Mohawk media artist Raienkonnis Edwards. The collaborators are conducting audio-visual interviews and capturing oral stories of Haudenosaunee elders who hold cultural knowledge that is critical to the preservation and future of the Six Nations tribes. Recordings about their traditional upbringing—shared online and via a community archive—will modernize and make more accessible the sharing of traditional teachings and storytelling.