Honouring an elder
Edie Frederick ensured her langugae has a future
Lheidli T’enneh elder and language teacher Edie Frederick has died, as has another elder and language holder, her mother, Josie Paul.
Musician and elder-in-training Kym Gouchie writes:
Our community has lost 2 elders within less than a week. A mother and daughter who were our dear friends. They were language keepers and knowledge holders. They were matriarchs in our nation and the backbones of their families. Josie Paul was my Mom’s neighbour for the past 35 years. My Mom called her Mrs Gray and she called my Mom Mrs Brown. Josie was 92 years old. Her daughter Edie Frederick was my friend and langauge mentor. We worked closely together on translations for my recent children’s album. She worked tirelessly in the schools teaching the Lheidli dialect and sharing stories of long ago. Yesterday, she was riding in a taxi that was involved in an accident here in Prince George. Our nation is in a state of shock and sadness. Lheidli T'enneh will never be the same.
The loss in our community is massive. We have lost two powerhouses for our culture and language. We must as lheidli people honour these two matriarchs by using our language and sharing our cultural knowledge with one another. My aunties have left an amazing legacy for our people. My love is with Edie Frederick family tonight.
Jason Morgan of Carrier Sekani Family Services:
I would like to express my heartfelt sympathies to the Paul and Frederick families on the loss of Josie and Edie Frederick. I had the pleasure of working with Edie for several years during my tenure at Lheidli T'enneh First Nation. Her passion for language revitalization was remarkable. I greatly admired Edie's dedication to her community's language and her expertise as a fluent speaker.
Her impact on education will be profoundly missed. A memorable moment was her instruction of 'Oh Canada' in the Lheidli language at the Canada Winter Games' opening ceremonies, a groundbreaking moment that highlighted and showcased the community and language nationally.
The official Exploration Place post:
The Exploration Place sends our deepest and most heartfelt sympathies to friends, family, and the entire Lheidli T’enneh community on the loss of respected Elders and knowledge holders Josie Paul and Edith Frederick.
The dedication to language revitalization that both Josie and Edie showed was remarkable. It was an honour to work so closely with them.
In particular, Edie was instrumental in the opening of Hodul’eh-a: A Place of Learning and continued to be a huge supporter of the museum afterwards when she joined the Board of Directors in 2017.
We always admired and appreciated Edie’s commitment to language revitalization and her passion for sharing Lheidli T’enneh culture and history.
Josie and Edie’s altruistic impacts and contributions to the community and in particular, The Exploration Place, will not be forgotten. Their passion will remain an inspiration to all that knew them.
Snachailya
Megan Tipler:
I am deeply saddened to learn of the passing of Edie Frederick. During my short time at UNBC, she left a lasting impression on me and so many others.
Edie was a guiding force in the effort to revitalize the Lheidli T’enneh Translation Initiative. I remember so clearly the day everyone came together for the first time in years — her energy was contagious as we worked through the Dakelh translations for each of the spaces on campus. She made insightful changes, explaining each one with such care and depth. After about an hour and a half of writing on the whiteboard, she gently asked, “Would it be okay if we took a little break?” Of course, we were all eager to accommodate her and amazed by her passion. She led and taught us every step of the way.
After every meeting, people remarked how fortunate they felt to sit, to listen, and to learn from her. When we finalized the revised list, she made one simple request: to review it with her mother. It spoke volumes about the importance of family and tradition in everything she did.
I am heartbroken that Edie won’t witness the completion of the project, but I hope that UNBC continues down the path she and her mother helped lay for the university.
May she rest in peace, reunited with her husband and mother. My deepest condolences to her family, friends, and all who were touched by her presence here on Earth.
Such tragic news, made even more so because this woman was always so full of love and life, and a desire to teach, to improve others, to lift them up. That work now must pass from teacher to students. Don't let her down.
Rest in peace, Edie Frederick, reunited now with your mother and your beloved Robert.
There are many, many more tributes and more to come and they are all deserved. As you may gather from the above, Edie Frederick was possibly the dominant force in ensuring that after decades of repression, the Dakelh language. which has been in this space since time immorial, would not disappear. In this day and age it’s easy to take for granted that everyone in town knows the name “Lheidli T’enneh”, that it’s taught in schools, that there are land acknowledgements, that there are Dakelh words here and there throughout public buildings, but that wasn’t the case when I was growing up, which as I’m still under 40, really isn’t all that long ago.
A huge part of why things changed is Edie Frederick making it so — I would run into her in all sorts of places, from the college to the university to various elementary schools to political events to art galleries, and every time she was making the presence of her language and her culture known.
These links and videos cover just a tiny portion of her work, which was continuing up until the time of her death.
Experiential UNBC Course Leads to Cultural Milestone for Northern BC First Nation;
Lheidli Elder Edie Frederick Puppet Performance @ BC Culture Days Shadow Puppet Language Workshop.
I cannot, unfortunately, at this time find a performance of O Canada performed in Dakelh - a translation project she undertook for the hosting of the Canada Winter Games in 2015, so I’m sure a copy exists and I will share when it surfaces. I interviewed her about that performance in advance, and wrote this of it in my old blog:
She told me she always spoke Dakelh with her grandmother, but eventually people stopped speaking it. She paused. They took us to the schools, she said. Going from there to this moment is incredibly meaningful.
When I heard a bunch of kids on a national stage singing the national anthem in a language this country nearl eliminated, I got tears in my eyes. I know she did, too, because she posted about it — as she did years later when it was sung at an elementary school where Dakelh language learning is part of the core curriculum.
This link to the Lheidli T’enneh language resource page is her pinned post on Facebook, where she would often post thoughts and videos about all sorts of things, including language. One of the links there is Nusedh Yoh Elementary, where it is written “Under the guidance of Lheidli Elder Edie Frederick, Nusdeh Yoh Elementary School has been working to ensure that the local Dakelh language is learned and remembered by the next generation.” It is full of videos and resources she helped create to keep the language alive.
We owe her an incredible debt of gratitude and, as Toya Fader’s post said, we also owe it to her that her work not disappear with her.
News roundup:
Expect some bad traffic between the Hart and the rest of the city for a while.
Logging giant Canfor considers sale of more northern B.C. assets.
2019 death of woman in PG to be subject of Coroner’s Inquest.
College of New Caledonia dental hygiene students looking for patients.
School cellphone restrictions seeing mostly positive feedback.
Foam, soft plastics and glass now accepted at local recycling sites.
Six show rooster are up for adoption at the PG Animal Rescue.
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