A past national president of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada will be the featured speaker at the Nanaimo Astronomy Society’s first meeting of 2024.
Charles Ennis, a member of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada’s Sunshine Coast centre, will give a talk called the ‘Importance of Ethnoastronomy’ at a meeting Thursday, Jan. 25.
Ennis is founder of the World Asterisms Project and an active astronomy educator and ethnoastronomer, and has written, hosted, directed and produced videos such as Eastlink TV’s Night Lights, RASC’s Insider’s Guide to the Galaxy, the short Bravo documentary Starry Nights and other YouTube videos about astronomy.
People around the world come from a variety of social, educational, and cultural backgrounds, which means that even though they are all looking up at the same stars, they see different patterns, noted an event press release. Even within a culture there will be differences. Throughout millennia, people have used the sky as calendars, divination systems, for navigation, weather prediction and as a place to honour their deities, ancestors, or their cultures.
The World Asterisms Project – asterisms are stars that have been identified and named – was started in 2021 by the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada’s inclusivity and diversity committee to celebrate sky cultures of the world and continues to grow as the naming of the stars progresses and as ethnoastronomers and researchers investigate old records, interview elders and recover previously lost sky cultures.
“We are stewards of these records…” Ennis said in the release. “We are doing our best to avoid exonyms and use the names these people use for themselves. We are identifying the asterisms here and whenever possible directing people to representatives of the cultures involved for information on the sky stories or dream lines related to those asterisms.”
Following Ennis’s presentation, NAS president Chris Boar will give a general introduction to eclipses and talk about the upcoming North American total solar eclipse, April 8, that will be visible in Nanaimo.
Ennis gives his presentation online at the Nanaimo Astronomy Society’s meeting Thursday, Jan. 25, at 7 p.m. at the Beban Park social centre. Non-members are invited to attend their first meeting for free. To learn more, visit www.nanaimoastronomy.com.
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