Tanya Ball, Kaska Land Guardians

“My heart is on the land.”

Tanya Ball has been working with the Dane nan yḗ dāh Network (Kaska Land Guardians) in Lower Post, BC since 2014. Today, she is the Guardian Coordinator for the region, overseeing  everything from new guardian training to land management programs. Her favorite days on the job, though? The field work that takes her out on the land. Tanya is passionate about Indigenous guardianship because of the positive impacts she sees on communities, and views the opportunity to be on the land as a way to revive her First Nation’s culture and language. Through the residential schooling system, the Kaska language was nearly lost, but Tanya and the Kaska Land Guardian program are using language lessons, traditional knowledge holders, and these Elders to incorporate the Kaska language into their training, surveys, and data collection systems. 

Learn more about Tanya’s work in her video