This is the prologue to the podcast "Listening to Fire Knowledges in and around the Okanagan Valley." The Okanagan Valley of the southern interior of British Columbia has been shaped by fire for millennia: by cultural burning by First Nations communities, by lightning fires, and by patterns of settler-colonial burning and fire suppression. In the wake of large and severe wildfire seasons and predictions of worsening wildfires fueled by climate change, there are calls for both interdisciplinary problem-solving among fire experts and for more public engagement to transform how we live with fire in British Columbia. Understanding the history of fire in this place can contribute to better fire use, management, and response that accounts for human and more-than-human ecological health and recognizes multiple forms of important fire expertise. This podcast series explores the ways that fire history informs present and future ways of living with and understanding fire in and around this Valley.“Listening to Fire Knowledges in and around the Okanagan Valley” was created by Judith Burr as her master's thesis project in the Digital Arts & Humanities theme of the Interdisciplinary Graduate Studies program at the University of British Columbia Okanagan. This work was supported by UBC-Okanagan’s feminist digital humanities lab, the AMP Lab. This project was also supported in part by the Government of Canada’s New Frontiers in Research Fund (NFRF) through UBC Okanagan’s “Living with Wildfire” Project. This podcast was created on the unceded territory of the Syilx Okanagan Nation.SHOW NOTESThe music in this episode is from Blue Dot Sessions, and you can find specific tracks cited in the transcript: https://www.sessions.blue/Aseem Sharma, Piyush Jain, Mike Flannigan, and John Abatzoglou, “Perspectives on the June 2021 heatwave and wildfires,” June 2, 2021, https://www.canadawildfire.org/heatwave; Michaels, Kathy. “32 Okanagan residents died from heat wave: BC Coroner’s Office.” Global News, November 1, 2021, https://globalnews.ca/news/8340607/okanagan-residents-died-heat-wave-bc-coroners-office. BC Wildfire Service, “Wildfires of Note,” Accessed April 2022 at http://bcfireinfo.for.gov.bc.ca.“BC Coroners Service confirms 2 deaths in Lytton wildfire.” CBC News, July 3, 2021, https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/lytton-wildfire-sat-update-1.6089367. Ball, David. “B.C. admits communications with First Nations during Lytton fire 'didn't live up to expectations'.” CBC News, July 4, 2021, https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/bc-first-nations-communications-gaps-1.6089869.Chad Pawson, “Dozens of Okanagan residents cope with the news their homes have been lost to wildfire,” CBC News, August 17, 2021, https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/dozens-of-okanagan-residents-cope-with-the-news-their-homes-have-been-lost-to-wildfire-1.6144478. “Fire Perimeters – Historical.” Statistics and Geospatial Data. BC Wildfire Service. Available at https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/safety/wildfire-status/about-bcws/wildfire-statistics.Ellen Simmons, “British Columbia’s Indigenous People: The Burning Issue,” Journal of Ecosystems and Management, FORREX Forum for Research and Extension in Natural Resources, 13, no. 2 (2012): 1–2, https://jem-online.org/forrex/index.php/jem/article/download/200/466/2021.; Don Gayton, “Fire-Maintained Ecosystems and the Effects of Forest Ingrowth,” Province of British Columbia Ministry of Forests, Nelson Forest Region, December 1996, https://www.for.gov.bc.ca/hfd/pubs/docs/scv/SCV692.pdf.As one example of the vibrancy of place-specific fire knowledge, Indigenous fire stewardship knowledge is highly specific to places and an active form of good fire use in those places: Victor Steffensen, Fire Country: How Indigenous Fire Management Could Help Save Australia (Sydney: Hardie Grant Travel, 2020), https://www.hardiegrant.com/au/publishing/bookfinder/book/fire-country-by-victor-steffensen/9781741177268; Jared Dahl Aldern and Ron Goode, “The Stories Hold Water: Learning and Burning in North Fork Mono Homelands,” Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society 3, no. 3 (2014): 26–51. Also, scientific studies of fire history often make the point that local or ecosystem-specific understandings of fire history are important for planning how best to manage fire-prone landscapes: Emily K. Heyerdahl, Ken Lertzman, and Carmen M. Wong, “Mixed-Severity Fire Regimes in Dry Forests of Southern Interior British Columbia, Canada,” Canadian Journal of Forest Research 42, no. 1 (January 2012): 88–98.; Alexandra Pogue, “Humans, Climate and an Ignitions-Limited Fire Regime at Vaseux Lake” (Master of Science in Forestry, The University of British Columbia, 2017), https://open.library.ubc.ca/soa/cIRcle/collections/ubctheses/24/items/1.0343231.Judee Burr, “Re-Kindling the Flame: Indigenous Communities and Fire Management ...
