Re: [Paddlewise] ACA Greenland certification

From: Jack Martin <jcmartin43_at_radix.net>
Date: Wed, 7 Jul 1999 07:38:19 -0400
An interesting thread.  We seem to be concerned --- justifiably --- that the
ACA or BCU or any other "accreditation" group will finally discover "the"
Greenlandic technique in paddling and patent it for sale.  The real problem,
from my experience, is that there does not seem to *be* any one accepted,
standard Greenlandic technique --- at least not in Greenland.

I remember first watching Maligiaq at the DelMarVa meeting last fall and
wondering how someone with so much recognition within the Greenland paddling
community could have such a terrible Greenland stroke!  But "terrible" by
whose standards?  My guess is that there is a continuum of paddling styles
in Greenland, and Maligiaq represents just one beautiful point on that
continuum; by inference, there may be lots of other styles of paddling
within the Greenland communities, nots superior or inferior to the style
Maligiaq showed us, which all fall within true Greenland strokes.  Why
should we, as a worldwide paddling community, even attempt to stardardize,
package, wholesale and retail some self-styled "Greenland style" when it
appears that there is such a diversity of style and technique at the source?

Jack Martin


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Received on Wed Jul 07 1999 - 04:41:56 PDT

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