The impacts of rising sea levels are variable along this shore, in that while the entire PNW coast is tectonically rising, the local rate of rise in the land varies in comparison with the eustatic rise in sea level, with some stretches of shore being submergent while others are emergent. Of concern, wave buoy measurements have documented that the storm-generated wave heights have been increasing since at least the 1980s, and research underway has found climate controls on the levels of storm surges. The beach morphology plays an important role, particularly rip current embayments that act to localize the sites of maximum property impacts.
The PNW is noted for its extreme waves, with measured significant wave heights during winter storms having reached 15 m, combining with tides elevated by a surge to erode both foredunes and sea cliffs. Pacific Northwest (PNW), the ocean shores of Washington, Oregon and Northern California, experience property impacts ranging from the erosion and flooding that occur during the hours to days of an extreme winter storm, on a decadal time scale with the erosion processes enhanced by strong El Niños, and with the expectation of future increased hazards associated with the global rise in sea level and the possibility that storm intensities and their generated waves will continue in the future. “One of the 100 most important books on British Columbia.The coast of the U.S. Christon Archer, Professor of History, Calgary After careful re-evaluation of the historical and anthropological sources, Jim McDowell has concluded that ritual consumption of human flesh and corpse-eating - particularly as Franz Boas reported among the Kwakiutl hamatsa societies - persisted into our era.” “A controversial yet strangely compelling topic. Whereas the early explorers abhorred the gustatory cannibalism they believed they were observing, McDowell reveals that the ritual cannibalism of the hamatsa has much to teach the West in its present spiritual uncertainty and confusion.Ĭlick here to read an excerpt from the introduction to Hamatsa. Presenting the most complete discussion of the hamatsa to date, McDowell demonstrates the spiritual profundity of the ceremony (which continues today in various forms) and its intended purpose in coping with the dark forces of the world. McDowell then revisits the ground-breaking work of Franz Boas and other anthropologists to reinterpret cannibalism as it was practised in the secret hamatsa ceremony - ritual cannibalism designed to strengthen and perpetuate Native communities. Now, using an interdisciplinary, cross-cultural approach, historian Jim McDowell offers a comprehensive study of cannibalism on the coast.īeginning with the many supposed “man-eating” incidents recorded by European and American explorers and traders who visited Nootka Sound between 17, McDowell shows how the accounts were coloured by a “cannibal complex” among the Western observers. So heated has the topic become that many scholars have hesitated to engage in the debate. History, Native Studies, Pacific Northwest Coastįor more the 200 years, controversy has simmered over the subject of cannibalism on the Pacific Northwest Coast.Hamatsa The Enigma of Cannibalism on the Pacific Northwest Coast by Jim McDowell
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