This article implies all walls are built by colonizers and the only Native Americans involved were those who might have been hired as slaves.
However, I learned from other experts that many rock walls in New England were built by the indigenous people, particularly once confined in "praying villages," such as, those in Natick and Carlisle. The walls typically lead to marshes or bluffs and were treated more like paths than walls.
https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/new-england-stone-walls?fbclid=IwAR1QbZ2WITODR1buv7hKaWsfFmrdqjAobZWfK7XCe2OtqhUwDAN29_imBAU
Wednesday, March 20, 2019
Wednesday, November 28, 2018
Missionary Work is Colonialism is Violence
Please share this with your friends in the faith business. Missionary "work" is colonization and colonization is violence. I was attacked by a deranged preacher about a year ago, in Texas. They DO get physically violent when they can't convert us; and if not for the Standing Rock Vets (VeteransRespond) who stepped in between us when he put his hands on me, I would have ripped that Duck Dynasty beard right off his face. Stop defending that idiot missionary. He got what he deserved.
Self-defense is not violence ~ colonialism is.
Caitlin Lowery
November 24 at 7:32 AM
I used to be a missionary. I would go on short term mission trips to Eastern Europe or Africa for the sole purpose of “earning souls for Christ”. We kept count of the number of people we “saved”. We put on a play or volunteered for a little while to show our love for Jesus. Then after praying with them and adding their soul to the tally marks, we would never see them again.
I thought I was doing God’s work. But if I’m being honest, I was doing work that made me feel good. I would volunteer in an orphanage or help clean out a house, both tasks requiring that the people who lived there had to teach me what to do. This actually took their time away from their family or their work. Yet I believed I was serving them.
Ask me what their names were. I must have worked with and met hundreds of people. Do I remember who they were? Did I even attempt to keep in contact with them or show them that I still care after they’d been added to the notches in my cross? No. Not even once.
I prayed over their houses of worship, that they would repent and see that their faith was dead. Yet I never once sat down and asked to learn what they believed. Why did I assume that my faith was the right faith? Why did I assume that my presence was so precious that it would change their hearts and lives? Why did I assume that they were lost, living their beautiful content lives right where they were? Why did I assume their lives needed changing?
This is white supremacy. This is colonization. White people entering a foreign land under the guise of caring to turn people into followers of the white peoples god and life. Do not pretend colonization doesn’t happen anymore. It just lives under a new name: mission trip.
Do not victimize the missionary that was killed for not following the laws of the tribe he claimed to love. Do not demonize the tribe that simply tried to protect their children from disease and violence. If he cared he would have already known their beliefs and laws and would not have disrespected them. But he didn’t care. They were just going to be another notch on his cross.
If you’ve gone on mission trips before, and this feels like an attack, sit with that feeling for awhile. Is it good to help people? Yes. Is it good to insert yourself into someone else’s life without asking based on your own assumption that you are the most important person in the room? No. It’s time for us to reflect on that notion and change our ways.
Colonization needs to end.
Tuesday, November 20, 2018
Thanksgiving 2018 (some of the best articles ever!)
Thanksgiving is a celebration of colonization. Let’s acknowledge the movement of decolonization and reeducation happening right now in our country.
Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack of Settler Privilege
Peggy McIntosh first popularized the concept of white privilege in
her now-classic 1989 essay “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.”
The impact of her essay was due at least in part to its clarity and
readability; it broke down into a list of easy to understand ideas why white
people have unearned advantages in society based on their skin color. Not that
it was necessarily easy for white people to accept that they are in fact “more
equal” than others, but the essay opened up a conversation that has gained
serious traction in our social discourse, especially now when racism is on
full, unobstructed display in this Trumpian moment.
People who do not have ancestral connections to Native communities
are all either settlers or immigrants. People with ambiguous “Native ancestry,”
like Elizabeth Warren, are so disconnected from whatever Native roots they may
have had that they can no longer be considered Native. Settlers are people
whose ancestors who came to acquire recently dispossessed Indian lands, such as
recipients of the homesteads of the nineteenth century and earlier land
speculators. Immigrants are people who came later to cash in on the benefits of
American citizenship that didn’t necessarily include land (but might have if
they came with enough money to invest in American land). Most are settlers
(also “colonizers”) or immigrants by choice, with the exception of Blacks who
are descended from slaves who were settled here without their consent.
Settler Fragility: Why Settler Privilege
Is So Hard to Talk About
Settler fragility stems from settler privilege, which is similar
to white privilege in that it is systemic, structural, and based on white
supremacy, making it difficult to identify. Only in some ways, settler
privilege is far more covert and cunning. The reason is because of the
ubiquitous ways the US is normalized; that is, the US settler state is the
“water we swim in.” US citizens of all races and ethnic groups have been
indoctrinated their entire lives with messages designed to foster a sense of
national pride and belonging in the making of what has been called an “imagined
community,” which always occurs on Indigenous lands. Their citizenship and
their very identity are taken for granted without critical consciousness about
the US’s contradictory foundational structures and narratives.
Decolonizing Thanksgiving: A Toolkit for
Combatting Racism in Schools (this got 500 shares on my fb page)
Sample Letters to Send to your Child’s School
Resources for Educators and Families to Teach about Thanksgiving
& Native Peoples in a Socially Responsible Way
Children’s
Books about Native Peoples, Cultures, and Traditions
A Native Perspective on Thanksgiving
I
have been following the struggle of the Native American community since the
seventies. Several times, I even traveled Plymouth, Massachusetts with
activists from the International Action Center (IAC) to familiarize myself with
the native perspective on Thanksgiving, in particular. We visited the Wampanoag
tribe (the People of the Dawn), a community that is indigenous to the Plymouth
area.
During
this trip, I met Moonanum James, a co-leader of the United American Indians of
New England (UAINE). He explained that for Native Americans, Thanksgiving is
not a joyous holiday. Among other things, the UAINE is known for founding the
National Day of Mourning, which falls each year on Thanksgiving Day, as a way of
protesting the holiday. The origins of the Day of Mourning date back to 1970,
when Wamasutta Frank James, a member of the Wampanoag tribe, was invited by
Plymouth town officials to give a speech on Thanksgiving Day, but when
officials read a copy of it before the ceremony, they told him it was
prohibited. That’s because he had planned to speak at length about the violence
that occurred against native peoples.
Today,
the UAINE march around the town of Plymouth to protest the continued
misrepresentation and commercialization of their history. In 1997 they won a
court case against the town of Plymouth, which had arrested and pepper-sprayed
demonstrators, including children and elders. As part of the settlement, there
are plaques acknowledging Native history, including one plaque which is placed
on display where King Phillips’ head was on display for two decades, as well as
an educational fund to teach children in schools about native history.
Jaqueline
Keeler, of Dineh and Yankton Dakota heritage says Thanksgiving is really “a
U.S. celebration of early arrivals in a European invasion” that culminated in
the death of up to 30 million native people.
Dina
Gilio-Whitaker Posted on Facebook 11/18/18
A
Thanksgiving letter
Dear
America,
Here
we are at this time of year where you pretend to love us Indians. You celebrate
a fictional story of Indians welcoming your bedraggled ancestors who came to
our shores uninvited, at least rightly claiming that we saved them from sure
starvation. Squanto was your hero, a man who turned against his own people for
his own benefit and whom the colonists desperately held onto anyway. Still, you
tell romantic stories of how Squanto saved your people and give that as
evidence for the Indigenous peoples fictitious warm welcome of people who cared
nothing of the fact that this was a populated land. For centuries they told
more tall tales about how this was a virgin wilderness, a land free for the
taking, divinely inspired by what appeared to us as a vengeful, mean god, a god
we did not recognize as the benevolent creator we knew.
Your
ancestors have used these stories of their own perceived superiority to justify
their plunder of our lands, the raping of our women, the killing of our babies,
the wholesale slaughter of our people, and now the trauma of those of us who
have survived the carnage. They wove it into a legal system that still
undermines our ownership, yes ownership, of our lands based on the fictitious
doctrine of discovery, in which (white) Europeans imagine themselves supreme
based on their colonizing religion. Yet most of you dont even know that this is
the foundation of your country, and if you do know it, you continue to justify
it in a million different ways so that you can feel righteous about living on a
land so violently appropriated in the name of your god whom you worship at the
altar you call democracy.
Well,
your ancestors were squeamish enough about killing us all off so that a small
fraction of us could physically survive. They needed us as a foil against their
own tyrannical, despotic relatives across the sea, as people to look toward for
what true freedom and liberty actually looked like, even while they
simultaneously reviled us for that freedom.
Even
though you look at us now and say you love us, you respect us, and what a shame
it was your ancestors did what they did to us, you were never completely
comfortable with our survival. The few of us who survived the American
holocaust fought like hell in countless ways and now our numbers are growing.
We have attained a measure of power in your institutions of capitalism and
so-called democracy. We are reclaiming our languages and cultures against the
never-ending onslaught of your vampire culture. We are not going away.
We
are the mirror to your own broken souls, exposing the ways your humanity has
failed and has failed so extremely that all life on the planet is now on a
death spiral, thanks to your supposedly superior culture. Our very existence is
a reminder of your hubris, your own unrelenting grandiosity. We may all go down
together in this sinking ship, but it is we who have been here since time
immemorial. It is we who understand the spirit of the land and who know how to
live in a relationship of respect for it. It is our ancestors whose spirits
peer through the veil of time and space, undoubtedly in sadness for what you
have done to our homelands. We will continue to survive despite you.
There
is no thanksgiving here for you. There is only thanks taking. We are not here
to make you feel better about your death culture. For this we do not apologize.
It is YOU who must get over it, and make things right, not us.
Just
my two cents worth as a surviving member of Indian country.
Thanksgiving Promotes Whitewashed History, So I
Organized Truthsgiving Instead
An
essential part of decolonizing Thanksgiving is to start educating our children
with the authentic history of this country. A book that re-examines basic
“truths” about Thanksgiving in an educational context is Rethinking Columbus:
The Next 500 Years. Considering that much of the Thanksgiving mythology is
based on sharing food, it is ideal to discuss the importance of Indigenous
first foods or food sovereignty with our children as well. The book Four
Seasons of Corn: A Winnebago Tradition discusses the traditional process of
growing and harvesting corn, de-commercializing what we eat, and promoting
culturally appropriate foods and agricultural systems of North America.
Decolonizing Thanksgiving: A Toolkit for Combatting Racism in Schools is a
quick read where more resources are listed; it even has sample letters that can
be sent to your children’s school concerning problematic Thanksgiving
activities.
Decolonizing Thanksgiving And Reviving Indigenous
Relationships to Food
Consider
the Nations who tended fruit and nut trees. Imagine the gardens of corn,
beans, squash, and sunflowers that were the ecological knowledge of the
Wampanoag- the very knowledge that saved the pilgrims from starvation. Consider
the songs, the kinship, the lineal seed keepers, and ceremonies that guided
Indigenous cosmologies, landscapes and people. Those sacred commitments left no
person hungry or without medicine or without worth. And now,
understand the deliberate effort of colonizers to disconnect Indigenous people
from our relationship to our traditional and ceremonial foodways- relationships
that made us whole. Understand the traumas of forced relocation, of slash
and burn campaigns from Haudenasaunee territory to Canyon de Chelly, our
hunting grounds deforested, waterways damned, and our individual and communal
indigeneity gradually outlawed. Consider the settler adage that “every buffalo
dead is an Indian gone.” Now fast forward to the American Indian
Religious Freedom Act of 1978, 486 years after the first attacks on our being,
and consider that it has only been forty years since we have “legally” been
allowed to restore our commitments to these lands. Forty years.
At Plimoth Plantation, Shedding Light On The First
Thanksgiving
Every
year, Plimoth Plantation holds a series of pre-Thanksgiving Harvest Feasts,
with 17th-century recipes and dining customs. There are spoons, but no forks -
some dishes are eaten with 3 fingers on the right hand. Men sling their napkins
over their shoulders. All the dishes are all based on 17-century English
recipes with things that were available in New England at the time. In addition
to mussels and turkey, there’s a native corn pudding, stewed pompion (or
pumpkin), and a pottage of cabbage, leeks and onions.
The
Harvest Feast is an approximate re-creation – with some 20th century
concessions – of how the Pilgrims’ may have celebrated the first Thanksgiving
in 1621. The familiar holiday we know today wouldn’t get that name for another
242 years. But the idea of pausing each year for a day of thanks and reflection
has endured ever since.
11 Thanksgiving 2018 Charity Ideas & Ways To
Give Back This Holiday Season
Giving
back can be as simple as making a monetary donation to an organization that's
working to make a difference. If you're in a position to do so, give some funds
to an nonprofit organization or other agency that's getting serious work done
on an issue you care about. Do some research on your own and use a third-party
site like CharityNavigator.org to help you find a super legit place to give.
Why These Native Americans Observe A National Day Of
Mourning Each Thanksgiving (video)
The Thanksgiving Tale We Tell Is a Harmful Lie. As a
Native American, I’ve Found a Better Way to Celebrate the Holiday
The
first official mention of a “Thanksgiving” celebration occurs in 1637, after
the colonists brutally massacre an entire Pequot village, then subsequently
celebrate their barbaric victory. Years later, President Washington first tried
to start a holiday of Thanksgiving in 1789, but this has nothing to do with
“Indians and settlers, instead it’s intended to be a public day of
“thanksgiving and prayer.” (That the phrase “Merciliess Savage Indians” is
written into the Declaration of Independence says everything we need to know
about how the founders of America viewed the Indigenous Peoples of this land.)
It wasn’t until the writer Sarah Josepha Hale persuaded President Lincoln that
the Thanksgiving holiday was needed and could help heal the divided nation that
it was made official in 1863. But even that was not the story we are all taught
today. The inspiration for that was far more exclusionist.
Native Women Tell the Real History of Thanksgiving (video)
“It
was a brutal, brutal genocide that took place, and each Native person that’s
here is a survivor of that genocide”
100 Ways to Support—Not Appropriate From—Native People
THIS
IS SO RELEVANT. For those of you "get over it" folks, just remember,
we have no other place where our story should told but on these continents;
other people (dominant culture) controls our narrative and we have limited ways
to present counter narratives (the TRUTH); and more people know us through
stereotypes than by accurate cultural and historical information, among other
things. "Let’s start with 100 ways you and yours can be allies toward to
the Indigenous peoples of this continent—our ancestral land."
Unlearning the Doctrine of Discovery
The
doctrine of discovery was a Christian invention which justified dispossessing
indigenous peoples of their land, parceling it out among emerging
nation-states, and turning it into private property for settlers. In this
framework, indigenous peoples are left with either extermination or
assimilation.Besides merely saying “sorry,” what would it mean to concretely
repent for the doctrine of discovery? What would it look like to act against
it? The truth is that undoing the doctrine of discovery would destabilize our
entire western legal tradition. Our society is organized around private
property and various claims to national territory which have discovery as a
foundation. Take away discovery and society as it is currently built falls
apart.
Grief at Thanksgiving: Gratitude with a grain of salt
I’ll
go ahead an acknowledge the giant turkey in the room, Thanksgiving can be the
pits for people who are grieving. Many of the values, traditions, and messages
associated with the day, like warmth, comfort, gratitude, and family
togetherness, can feel in direct conflict with a grieving person’s actual
reality. If you are grieving, you probably know what I mean by this. Although
you may be hesitant to admit it in the face of all the festivities, the
’30-Days of Thankfulness’ challenges on Facebook, and Charlie Brown and his
dang pumpkin. But you’re amongst grief-friends here, and it’s okay to admit
that you’re feeling just a little (or a lot) less grateful than you’ve felt in
years past.
400
years later, natives who helped Pilgrims gain a voice
Plymouth,
Massachusetts, whose European settlers have come to symbolize American liberty
and grit, marks its quadricentennial in 2020 with a trans-Atlantic
commemoration that will put Native Americans’ unvarnished side of the story on
full display. Organizers are understandably cautious this time around. When the
350th anniversary of the Pilgrim landing was observed in 1970, state officials
disinvited a leader of the Wampanoag Nation — the Native American tribe that
helped the haggard newcomers survive their first bitter winter — after learning
his speech would bemoan the disease, racism and oppression that followed the
Pilgrims. But the emphasis is on highlighting the often-ignored history of the
Wampanoag and poking holes in the false narrative that Pilgrims and Indians
coexisted in peace and harmony.
When Native Americans Were Slaughtered in the Name of "Civilization"
Listed,
some of the most aggressive acts of genocide taken against indigenous
Americans.
Don’t Trash Thanksgiving. Decolonize It
But
we don’t have to reject the holiday completely. We can, and should, decolonize
and reinterpret it. The fact is, there is no one event from which the holiday
is derived. And around the world, other countries such as Canada, Liberia,
Netherlands, the Philippines, and Germany celebrate their own Thanksgiving on
different days. Some historians have documented that the tradition came
to the New World with the settlers. Some say the holiday was secular. Others
say it was religious. It has been observed on various dates throughout history.
In the late 1700s, George Washington declared November 26 a day of public thanksgiving and prayer. Seventy-four years later, Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving on the last Thursday in November to celebrate the Union’s military successes in Civil War. And in 1941, FDR signed a resolution changing the date from the last Thursday to the fourth Thursday of the month. Since then, many have chosen to replace the traditional celebration with ones that honor their sociopolitical or familial beliefs.
In some households, Pilgrims and “Indians” are never mentioned. Traditional American history is never mentioned. The day is about spending time with family, and of course the culinary delights prepared by the matriarchs of our families. My family would stand in a circle holding hands. We’d each share what we’re thankful for. My paternal grandmother would then pray and bless the food. For some it’s about giving thanks by giving back to those who don’t have families to spend time with, or a meal to eat. They go to church, visit hospitals, nursing homes, shelters, food pantries, or folks on the streets in their communities. Some sponsor dinners for families who are experiencing financial challenges.
“On
[this] holiday we sit down with a simple bowl of rice (which two-thirds of the
world population would have been happy to have) and we made lists of all the
things and people we’re thankful to have and to know.” Ultimately, within
our families and communities and schools, we should stop, reinterpret, and
repurpose traditions that are harmful, either in theory or practice. I
learned from my elders that when you know better, you should do better.
As we enter into this holiday, let’s acknowledge the movement of decolonization
and re-education happening in our country. We can observe and celebrate
with our families in ways that honor those who the day originally dishonored,
and those who continue to struggle under oppression.
As
A Native American, Here’s What I Want My Fellow Americans To Know About
Thanksgiving
If
I didn’t find my community, my Native family or my traditional support, I’d get
swallowed up by colonialism. I realized the holiday was lifted on some
imaginary pedestal as a joyous day of peace between two worlds, when historians
know the truth to be much more violent. So what
could I do, or bring to my family, that would reclaim the day in a way that was
both healing and power-giving? The first time I attended the
Alcatraz Sunrise Ceremony in San Francisco was in 2017. The Sunrise Ceremony is
a special event organized by the Muwekma Ohlone people of San Francisco and
other Bay Area Natives, to come together as a community in the darkness of
Thanksgiving morning and partake in the reclamation of the holiday for our
surviving people. There is always a large, warm bonfire in the center and a
circle of relatives and guests that surround it.
10 Native Activism Organizations to Show Your Support This Thanksgiving
When Native Americans Were Slaughtered in the Name of ‘Civilization’
The
Gnaddenhutten Massacre
Battle
of Tippecanoe
The
Creek War
Forced
Removal
Mankato
Executions
Sand
Creek Massacre
Custer’s
Campaigns
Wounded
Knee
Resilience
The Thanksgiving Tale We Tell Is a Harmful Lie. As a Native American, I’ve Found a Better Way to Celebrate the Holiday
Every
November, I get asked an unfortunate, loaded question: “You’re a Native
American—what do you eat on Thanksgiving?” My answer spans my lifetime. But our
families lived something different. My great grandfather helped fight off
General Custer at the Battle of Little Bighorn, alongside other Lakota and
Cheyenne, not even 100 years before my birth. I think about my great
grandfather’s lifetime, being born in the 1850s—toward the end of the genocides
that began in the 1600s across America, and stretching into the subtler but
still damaging years of assimilation efforts we have endured since. He saw
escalating conflicts between Lakota life as he knew it and the ever-emerging
immigrants from the east. He witnessed the disappearance of the bison, the loss
of the sacred Black Hills, the many broken promises made by the U.S., along
with atrocities like the Sand Creek and Wounded Knee Massacres. He saw his
children attend the boarding schools where they had their hair forcibly cut and
were punished for speaking their languages. I wonder what he thought about the
Thanksgiving story.
How to Support Indigenous People on Thanksgiving
https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/zmdmb8/how-to-celebrate-thanksgiving-on-stolen-land?utm_campaign=sharebutton&fbclid=IwAR0_9pGvvLJDwMiL0TVmYuSrbxhB9ZBEI55Yxwn9BziRkybjEo33aV3MmWI
Here are some ideas for what to do on Thanksgiving instead of showing your gratitude for colonizers.
While there’s no harm in taking the time to be grateful for your loved ones, here’s what you can do instead of extending that thanks to pilgrims, the Founding Fathers, or any other colonizers.
Here are some ideas for what to do on Thanksgiving instead of showing your gratitude for colonizers.
While there’s no harm in taking the time to be grateful for your loved ones, here’s what you can do instead of extending that thanks to pilgrims, the Founding Fathers, or any other colonizers.
- Find out which tribe(s) are indigenous to your area, and what they’ve endured so that you could live there. Online maps like Native Land and this one on Native Languages can help. Once you know whose land you live on, read up on the history of that tribe as written by them to get the full picture of where you live, and extend your thanks and appreciation, either in words or money, to said tribe.
- As you remember the Wampanoag people, who allegedly sat down to feast with pilgrims in the early 1600s, understand that not all Indigenous people are the same. Many prefer to refer to themselves not as “Native American” or “Indigenous,” but specifically by their tribe’s name. Each tribe has its own set of traditions, practices, and beliefs. To learn more about the nuances and designations that Indigenous people use to refer to themselves, read this.
- Thanksgiving preparation can take a lot of time. Instead of interpreting this as making the most time-consuming, extravagant recipes you can find, spend more effort reading about the history of the country as a whole as told by indigenous people. Exiled in the Land of the Free: Democracy, Indian Nations, and the U.S. Constitution by Oren Lyons is a good place to start. If your histories of North America have all come from white men, you’re not getting the full picture.
- Your knowledge and support are nice, but put your money where your mouth is, if you have the means. Instead of spending money on a new outfit to impress your family or an expensive bakery dessert, allocate some of that money to local organizations like the Bay Area American Indian Two-Spirits (BAAITS) or national ones like The American Indian College Fund, anything helps. You can find a list of organizations catering to Indigenous people here.
- Consume, and more importantly purchase, art, books, and goods by Indigenous people. Ask yourself which Thanksgiving dinner ingredients you can get from indigenous sources, then use this list of Native-owned businesses to find them. Instead of doing the Black Friday thing, gift a book or piece of art by an indigenous author to a loved one to show them your appreciation. I recommend Every Day Is a Good Day: Reflections by Contemporary Indigenous Women by Wilma Mankiller and Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko. You can find a list of great books by indigenous people here and recommendations from the First Nations Development Institute here. You can buy Indigenous art online at websites like Shumakolowa.
- From putting the first man on the moon to fighting for our environment, we have infinite reasons to be thankful for indigenous women. Show your gratitude towards them this Thanksgiving by donating to organizations that stand up for them, like the National Indigenous Women’s Resource Center and the Coalition to Stop Violence Against Native Women. (According to the Indian Law Resource Center, “More than four in five American Indian and Alaska Native women have experienced violence, and more than one in two have experienced sexual violence.”)
link to article for 5 more ideas.
On Indigenous People’s Day, a Look at the Movement to Revive Native Foodways and How Western Science Might Support—For a Change
http://www.foodsolutionsne.org/blog/indigenous-people%E2%80%99s-day-look-movement-revive-native-foodways-and-how-western-science-might?fbclid=IwAR0bjfKnfO8HiNULAWUfYKTZZlasgD-JMbnDn66sjVKJIvCyqgkbIbnCu7U
Such efforts to reclaim food sovereignty as a way to recover health, in all its dimensions, among the nation’s survivors of a traumatic campaign of Native American genocide is gaining momentum, and particularly so among the TCU network, known colloquially as “Native American Land Grant Colleges and Universities,” or even more eccentrically, the “1994s.” Ironies are plentiful in explanation. As Europeans colonized North America from the east coast westward, they established infrastructure and institutions to facilitate their settlement project.
On Indigenous People’s Day, a Look at the Movement to Revive Native Foodways and How Western Science Might Support—For a Change
http://www.foodsolutionsne.org/blog/indigenous-people%E2%80%99s-day-look-movement-revive-native-foodways-and-how-western-science-might?fbclid=IwAR0bjfKnfO8HiNULAWUfYKTZZlasgD-JMbnDn66sjVKJIvCyqgkbIbnCu7U
First Nations in Sports (in the News)
Robert
Wood Johnson Foundation: We honored sports teams with racist mascots. Not
anymore.
Though one might not think of racism and discrimination
as factors in health, the clear science tells us otherwise. They impact the
physical, emotional and psychological health of people, especially
children. More specifically, research
shows deep psychological consequences caused by the perpetuation of American
Indian stereotypes — whether they are deemed “offensive” or not. As University
of Washington researcher Stephanie Fryberg and colleagues found, “American
Indian mascots are harmful because they remind American Indians of the limited
ways others see them and, in this way, constrain how they can see themselves.”
Tomahawk
Chops and Native American Mascots: In Europe, Teams Don’t See a Problem
For years, these teams were insulated from the vigorous
discussion about the use of this type of imagery by sports teams in the United
States, where critics long ago deemed the practice offensive and anachronistic.
This year, the Cleveland Indians announced that they would stop using their
Chief Wahoo logo on their uniforms beginning in 2019, continuing a decades-long
trend in which thousands of such references have disappeared from the American
sports landscape.
Native
American lacrosse teams kicked out of S.D. league amid racial tension
Lacrosse is considered America's oldest sport — an
important part of Native American cultures long before the arrival of
Europeans. It's still used to teach Native youth about culture, values and life
skills like keeping emotions under control. It can also be a path to college
for players who often come from impoverished reservations.
Lacrosse is considered America's oldest sport — an
important part of Native American cultures long before the arrival of
Europeans. It's still used to teach Native youth about culture, values and life
skills like keeping emotions under control. It can also be a path to college
for players who often come from impoverished reservations.
The primarily Native teams expelled from the Dakota
league — Susbeca and 7 Flames are the others — say they were kicked out after
asking the league to address their allegations. They provided copies of letters
they said they sent to the league and to U.S. Lacrosse in 2016 and 2017, detailing
the cellphone-toting parent incident and other specific instances of racial
slurs and overly rough play.
"Racism kind of goes across the board with all
sports," he said. "It's the attitude and belief that people in the
Dakotas have always had to the indigenous population, for hundreds of
years."
Palestinian
Group Asks Iroquois Nationals to Withdraw from Lacrosse Championships in Israel
Because they have similar issues of colonization
Monday, November 12, 2018
First Nations in the News 2018
Indigenous women kept from seeing
their newborn babies until agreeing to sterilization, says lawyer
https://www.cbc.ca/radio/thecurrent/the-current-for-november-13-2018-1.4902679/indigenous-women-kept-from-seeing-their-newborn-babies-until-agreeing-to-sterilization-says-lawyer-1.4902693?fbclid=IwAR04ZVvBJpbEZdK-hBrqmSBMrT1mUTWwDv2wVbbCUdAXeGH7-jH7B3DM1Is
Sterilizations
happened as recently as 2017, Saskatchewan lawsuit alleges
Cherokee citizenship determined by
Dawes Rolls, not DNA
https://www.tahlequahdailypress.com/news/local_news/cherokee-citizenship-determined-by-dawes-rolls-not-dna/article_4a41fca2-3b65-5413-837c-9fcdf99efa7a.html?fbclid=IwAR2ZfHutuW4sTgYSLGWn_SM0xF7xUM0htLLgeRzfZw_QzUW_msxsptwrjsI
Cherokee
Nation citizenship is a legal determination based on a person's ability to
trace his or her ancestry back to the Dawes Rolls. These lists were created by
the U.S. Dawes Commission when the Five Civilized Tribes - Cherokee, Chickasaw,
Choctaw, Muscogee Creek and Seminole - were forced to agree to a land allotment
plan. For those who would like to become citizen of the Cherokee Nation,
finding an ancestor on the Dawes Rolls is the only way.
"If a
mom and dad are already enrolled and they're just enrolling their children, all
of the legwork has been done, and we don't have to go very far," said
Derrick Vann, interim tribal registrar. "The paperwork has already been
done, the child has their birth certificate, so stamp it and go on to the next
one - that one's already complete."A treaty between the U.S. and Cherokee
Nation in 1866 stated that all African-American slaves who were taken as
property by the tribe would become citizens. But in 2007, the tribe held a
special election, and citizens voted to exclude the Cherokee Freedmen
descendants from citizenship unless they met the "Cherokee by blood"
requirement.
In August
2017, a U.S. District Court judge ruled that descendants of the Cherokee
Freedmen do have the right to tribal citizenship. However, because generations
of Freedmen descendants never applied to for Cherokee Nation membership, it
takes more paperwork to prove their claims.
Thursday,
CN Secretary of State Chuck Hoskin Jr. said people should understand the
existence of the Cherokee Nation is a result of "our people enduring the
Trail of Tears, and rebuilding a society, and rebuilding a government in what
is now northeast Oklahoma." "It's more than simply having a DNA test
that indicates you may have North or South American Native blood," said
Hoskin. "It is about your connection to a people that have had a
continuous presence on the continent as an identifiable tribe in a continuous
government to government relationship with the U.S. Those things are important,
so it's way beyond simply family lore or having some DNA test."
Indigenous Feminism: Healing the
World of Patriarchy and White Supremacy
Changing
Women Initiative: “We are focused on developing a culturally centered
reproductive wellness and birth center. By creating a physical space for education
and healing for Native American women, we will reclaim cultural identities
through birth and motherhood that has been shaped through our cultures”
Indigenous
Goddess Gang: Colonial tactics like divide and conquer and patriarchy have
impacted women by pitting us against one another. There is a narrative that is
fed to women that we must compete with each other for everything; a man’s love,
for validation, in beauty, in success, and this is normalized to nausium by the
media. This way of thinking is based on a patriarchal belief that women aren’t
enough or that we are somehow lesser than. Patriarchy also works to have women
believe that we belong in certain roles, that we must obey and so on. In Indian
country, through colonization some of our matrilineal societies have been
turned into patriarchal societies, and these patterns and behaviors play out
and destory families and relationships. To challenge this entire system, the
Indigenous Goddess Gang has formed a collective of femme Indigenous artists, writers,
thought leaders, designers, and activists to not just lift up the voices and
the incredible work of Indigneous femmes and queer folks, but also to
revitalize and build sisterhood as a form of resistance to patriarchy.
Native
Women Lead: As I mentioned Indigenous or tribal communities are not void of
patriarchy. In fact, native women experience a unique challenge when it comes
to patriarchy because there is often cultural or traditional beliefs that
surround these dynamics between men and women, so it becomes extremely
sensitive for us to assert our power as women. Outside of our communities,
native women experience a drastic gap when it comes to equal pay. September
27th marks #NativeWomensEqualPay Day and what this day represents is that on
average Native women are paid 57% of what white men are paid. To transform this
status quo and to empower women to be leaders, not only in our communities but
also in the business sector, the project Native Women Lead has been founded by
a group of native women business owners and social entrepreneurs.
Did Colonists Give Infected Blankets
to Native Americans as Biological Warfare?
North
American colonists’ warfare against Native Americans often was horrifyingly
brutal. But one method they appear to have used shocks even more than all the
bloody slaughter: The gifting of blankets and linens contaminated with
smallpox. The virus causes a disease that can inflict disfiguring scars,
blindness and death. The tactic constitutes a crude form of biological
warfare—but accounts of the colonists using it are actually few.
Repatriation Comic (How to explain
NAGPRA to students)
Dina
Gilio-Whitaker Posted on Facebook 11/12/18
A bit of a
long post here, on the topic of changing historical narratives in K-12
education. I have been engaged in a project I was invited into a year and a
half ago. ICivics is an educational non-profit founded by Justice Sandra Day
O’Connor that creates online games for kids to supplement US civics education.
Their newest game is called the Ratification Game, which as its name implies is
about the ratification of the constitution. The project directors wrote an NEH
grant to fund the creation of the game.
I was asked
to participate for my expertise in Native studies; not that I'm an expert in
Native history of that era, but since they asked I said yes. They got the
grant, and we have been in the design stages for months now, which includes
designing topics, characters, dialogues, stuff like that. I have spent months
boning up on Native history during that time period, including a thorough
understanding of the "Iroquois influence theory." Those familiar with
it know it is quite controversial.
The game
designers made sure to include a diverse group of characters, including women,
Blacks, and NA's. It was good that they wanted to include Native perspectives,
even though Natives weren't technically part of the US at the time. We actually
decided to create two Native characters--actual historical Native
people--representative of both southern and Northern Native groups, since the
experiences of those groups were so diverse. One of the characters is Molly
Brant, whose perspective as a Mohawk woman is very telling. The other character
is Alexander MacGillivary, the Creek warrior and political leader.
Anyway, in
this process, perhaps inevitably I've collided with the usual triumphalist,
exceptionalist rhetoric so characteristic of K-12 US historiography. Some of
the rhetoric includes pro-constitutional "insights" that "A
stronger unified nation would be more successful at engaging (and pacifying)
the native tribes throughout the nation" and "A strong and unified
government with a national military could be used against all
threats- foreign or domestic."
threats- foreign or domestic."
Obviously
there are huge problems with this kind of language. So I had to break it down
for them:
"One
of the biggest sins of conventional American history-telling, especially at the
K-12 levels, is the sanitizing of US violence against Indian nations in order
to present a more palatable story, in the interest of building a sense of
patriotism and civic pride. Simply including Indians in the story of
constitutional ratification is not enough to balance this out this kind of
historiography. In this game, we have an opportunity to do a better job at
presenting a more fair and accurate portrayal of the way the US in actuality
handled its Indian relations. Remember, it was Indians whose lands were
invaded. They didn't ask for Europeans to come to their lands and live with
them. It was they who were defending themselves against relentless encroachment
into their territories, sparking unwanted violence on both sides, especially as
MacGillivary's perspective demonstrates, and Molly Brant's revelation that her
people were pushed out of their homelands. Yet the conventional histories are
typically written with terms reflecting the justification of American
imperialism such as the US's need to "pacify" the Indians; Indians
are the prime "domestic or foreign threats" to the republic of the
moment.
'A stronger
unified nation would be more successful at engaging (and pacifying) the native
tribes throughout the nation' really means the ability to 'be more successful
at dispossessing Indians of all their land throughout the continent by any
means necessary,' and it was no secret in this particular era that continental
domination was the endgame. Let's not sugar-coat that. There is nothing
honorable about it, especially within a conversation whose core tenets are
supposedly democracy, liberty, and 'all men being created equal.' The phrase
'foreign or domestic threats' really translates, on one level, to 'Indian
tribes are impediments to US expansion (i.e. imperialism)'. Let's be honest
about it.
I think we
should not back down from language that reflects a different but more accurate
narrative, about violent, imperialistic US aggression, as the conversations
with Brant and MacGillivary imply. I don't doubt the possibility this will
raise conflict with many of the people on your team, but I do want to be heard
on this. I am deeply uncomfortable with the phrase "A strong and unified
government with a national military could be used against all threats- foreign
or domestic." This ignores the fact that in reality, the US was a far
bigger threat to the Indigenous populations."
We'll see
how this plays out. I've had moments of wondering "why oh why did I agree
to this project?" But in the long run I suppose it is about the
possibility to help shift educational narratives and de-sanitize them.
I am a
strong Métis womxn. If there ever comes a time when I disappear and I go for
groceries and don’t return, or when I go to raise my fist in solidarity and
don’t return... please know: I would never voluntarily leave my sons, my
companion, my family. I would not be out partying or doing drugs. I would not
die by suicide. I am an activist and therefore more likely to suffer violence
at the hands of the Police State. I am more likely to be targeted by racists
and/or Industrial interests who favor the status quo. They will continue to try
to silence me. If I ever DO NOT return home...know that someone took me against
my will. Don’t make excuses as to WHY I might have not returned home, because
it is a lie. Look for me. Please.
Being a Native womxn, there’s a target on my back. I feel it! Far too many of our Native womxn are disappearing. 💔 #whoismissing
#nomorestolensisters #nomoremurderedmothers
*Edited*
*Copy & Paste*
Being a Native womxn, there’s a target on my back. I feel it! Far too many of our Native womxn are disappearing. 💔 #whoismissing
#nomorestolensisters #nomoremurderedmothers
*Edited*
*Copy & Paste*
Dear
White People: Here’s how to be a REAL ally instead of just playing one on
social media
1. LISTEN when marginalized people are talking
2. Don’t dismiss lived experiences that are unfamiliar to
you
3. Stop taking attacks on white supremacy personal
4. Acknowledge your own internal biases so you can
dismantle them
5. Speak up when other white people act like donkeys
10
things every white teacher should know when talking about race
1. Racism is not necessarily about holding hate in your
heart toward other people or consciously believing you are superior because
you’re white.
2. There is no such thing as reverse racism.
3. There are different rules for white people and people
of color when talking about race.
4. It is not racist (nor is it “creating division”) for
people of color to talk about how they experience the world differently than
white people. Colorblindness is not a thing to aspire to.
5. If you have been told that it IS racist to see or talk
about color, that was probably in a situation where you were pointing out race
in a completely irrelevant context.
6. Use descriptors of race that are both inclusive and
empowering.
7. Develop a listen-first ethic when a conversation turns
to race, rather than insisting that race is irrelevant.
8. You can prevent knee-jerk defensiveness by actively
working to de-center your experiences as a white person in conversations about
race.
9. When someone hits a sore spot and you realize you’ve
said, done, or felt something that you didn’t realize could be insensitive,
avoid rationalizing your actions.
10. The solution is not to “stop making everything about
race” and just all come together as one. We have to be anti-racism, not
anti-talking-about-race.
How
Can We Build Anti-Racist White Educators?
1. White people have a
responsibility to work with other white people to build anti-racist identities
and practices. It is not the burden of people of
color to do that work for us. We can (and should) talk critically about racism
and white supremacy, even if there isn’t a person of color in the room.
2. True anti-racism training must be
ongoing, and it must involve networks to support us in this practice.
If we are going to confront racism and white supremacy in our lives and work,
we are going to have to get uncomfortable and deeply question long-held
beliefs. We’ll need to build and maintain relationships with other folks in the
work with us. While one-off implicit bias trainings are a useful step, they are
not enough. The work of building identities and practices that push back
against white supremacy in our society must be an ongoing process.
3. This work must be accountable to
the people of color who find themselves targeted by racism on a daily basis.
Though we as white people can challenge each other, this work should not and
cannot be divorced from the experiences of people of color. We must be open and
transparent about this work and these conversations with our colleagues of
color.
4. Humility must be central to this
work. We must learn from and listen to people of color,
especially our colleagues and students. We should also approach our work with
fellow white educators from the perspective of fellow learners, rather than as
experts.
5. Talking about racism and white
supremacy isn’t enough—conversation alone won’t change the oppressive
conditions people of color face daily. However, discussion
is an essential part of this work. Anti-blackness is something that we have
learned over the course of our lives, and unlearning will take a lot of
introspection and conversation.
How Well-Intentioned White Families Can Perpetuate Racism
Hagerman is a sociologist at Mississippi State
University, and her new book, White Kids: Growing Up With Privilege in a
Racially Divided America, summarizes the two years of research she did talking
to and observing upper-middle-class white families in an unidentified
midwestern city and its suburbs. To examine how white children learn about
race, she followed 36 of them between the ages of 10 and 13, interviewing them
as well as watching them do homework, play video games, and otherwise go about
their days.
But the best answer I can really give is that the micro
level potentially could shape what goes on at the institutional or structural
level. I really think—and this might sound kind of crazy—that white parents,
and parents in general, need to understand that all children are worthy of
their consideration. This idea that your own child is the most important
thing—that’s something we could try to rethink. When affluent white parents are
making these decisions about parenting, they could consider in some way at
least how their decisions will affect not only their kid, but other kids. This
might mean a parent votes for policies that would lead to the best possible
outcome for as many kids as possible, but might be less advantageous for their
own child. My overall point is that in this moment when being a good citizen
conflicts with being a good parent, I think that most white parents choose to
be good parents, when, sometimes at the very least, they should choose to be
good citizens.
Six
irrefutable pieces of evidence that prove climate change is real
How
our colonial past altered the ecobalance of an entire planet
Most scientists accept that humanity is now influencing
our planet in ways that match geological forces such as tectonic plate
movements. We are mining the planet’s surface, acidifying our oceans, creating
new rock layers laced with plastic; and exterminating many species. The
consequences of all these actions will be detectable in rocks for millions of
years. This new epoch has been named the Anthropocene. However, scientists disagree about the date
on which the Anthropocene began. Some say it started with the explosion of the
first atomic bombs, events that triggered a technological revolution while also
leaving radioactive records in Earth’s rocks. Others say it is more recent in
origin and point to plastics that now cover the planet and which, mixed with
rocks, are forming their own distinct geological layers. Either way, the
Anthropocene’s origins are viewed as being relatively recent.
This is the marker – in 1610 – that really defines the
Anthropocene, argue Lewis and Maslin. And it was not just the movement of
pathogens by colonialists that triggered the event. So did plants and
animals. Within decades of the discovery
of America, Europeans were eating its potatoes and tomatoes, while China and
India were consuming its peppers. These imports also had a profound impact. “In
China, for example, the arrival of maize allowed drier lands to be farmed,
driving new waves of deforestation and a large population increase,” say the
authors.
Standing
Rock Sioux Tribe Welcomes Home NBA All-Star Kyrie Irving
The family connection to Irving comes from the White
Mountain family (also known as Mountain) of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. The
White Mountain family comes from the Bear Soldier District, on the South Dakota
side of the reservation. His late mother, Elizabeth Ann Larson, was adopted out
of the Tribe when she was a child. Irving’s grandmother is the late, Meredith
Marie Mountain, who is a citizen of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe. His
great-grandfather is Moses Mountain and great-grandmother is Edith
Morisette-Mountain. During the Standing
Rock resistance to the Dakota Access pipeline, Irving gave his support to the
Water Protectors.
Non-Native
Albuquerque Man Given Six-month Sentence for Selling Fake American Indian
Jewelry
343
years ago on Aug. 30, the Massachusetts Bay Colony issued an order that
resulted in the incarceration of Native-Americans. Some want to make sure that
blot on Massachusetts history is never forgotten.
Official recognition of Native-American internment is
long overdue, McCann said, especially in light of this year’s U.S. Supreme
Court decision that overturned a decision that upheld the constitutionality of
Japanese-American internment.
How
a new wave of Indigenous cinema is changing the narrative of Canada
https://www.cbc.ca/news/indigenous/indigenous-film-panel-jackson-arnaquq-baril-wente-mccue-1.4704637
Let's start with an old question, the "Dances with
Wolves" question. Do films about Indigenous people need to be made by the
community, or is it good enough to have content out there in theatres? Lisa
Jackson: Indigenous films need to be made by Indigenous people, and I'll tell
you why. When Dance With Wolves came out — even though it was a white man here
to save the Indigenous community and there were problematic things about that
movie — Indigenous people were so happy to see themselves portrayed for once as
not murderous or oversimplified, that they flocked to that movie. Now, in 2018,
we have many more Indigenous filmmakers and many more stories to tell. we're at
a point now where so many films have been made about us, without us, that
they're just telling the same stories over and over again.
Forgotten
Women: The conversation of murdered and missing native women is not one North
America wants to have - but it must
Massachusetts
tribe dealt 'tremendous blow' by feds
The decision says the tribe doesn't qualify because it
wasn't under federal jurisdiction when the Indian Reorganization Act was passed
in 1934. The Cape Cod tribe received
federal recognition in 2007. The
department took about 300 acres into trust for the tribe in 2015, but a federal
judge ordered the agency to reconsider the decision in 2016 after local
residents sued.
Why
I’m Not a Shaman, and Neither Are You
1. Are you indigenous, and/or are you in authentic
relationship with indigenous people/s?
2. Are you part of an intact tribe?
3. Are you aware of cultural appropriation, and your
privilege as a white person in benefiting from it?
4. Are you a shaman or medicine person?
5. How do you honor your responsibility to be in right
relationship with all beings?
6. What medicines of the earth do you work with, and what
shamanic techniques do you use?
7. How were you called to shamanic work?
I’ve heard many white new age folks try to say that the
word ‘shaman’ is universal, but let’s face it: the term “shaman” comes with an
implied sense that connects a person using it to the power and authenticity
modern people attribute to their idea of indigenous cultures. In fact, that’s
largely what draws modern people to wanting to use it. Tribal connotations are
exotic for many white people, and carry a nostalgia for a simpler but purer
time, much like ideas of Native American people as ‘noble savages.’ So when
white people call themselves ‘shamans’, they are generally cashing in on the
apparent authenticity other white people associate with Native cultures (and
let’s remember, there are hundreds of distinct Native cultures out there, not a
generic ‘Native American’ etc.), BUT generally without any real relationship to
them, or respect for the current lives and struggles of the peoples within
them. Ironically, usually white folks using this term are often not connected
to the indigenous practices or ancestral ways of their own peoples, let alone
the ones they’re appropriating from.
Podcast
putting Native American musicians back into the story
Donald
Trump Says ‘Our Ancestors Tamed a Continent' and ‘We Are Not Going to Apologize
for America’
The
Long History of Child-Snatching
African-Americans were not alone in suffering
separations. Starting in 1879, tens of thousands of Native Americans were
required to leave their families and attend boarding schools. Richard Pratt, an
Army officer who founded the first one, the Carlisle Indian Industrial School,
in Pennsylvania, summarized his philosophy this way: “A great general has said
that the only good Indian is a dead one. In a sense, I agree with the
sentiment, but only in this: that all the Indian there is in the race should be
dead.” He declared, “Kill the Indian in him, and save the man.”
Honoring
33 Native Tribes who Served As Code Talkers to Save the U.S
In 2000, Navajo Code Talkers were honored with
Congressional Gold Medals for their services in developing and implementing
their traditional Dine’ language as a secretive code of communication on the
battle fields in both WWI and WWII.
“However, many Americans do not know that members of nearly 32 other
Indian tribes served as codetalkers in World War I and World War II and have
never been formally recognized for their service to our country,” said Chairman
of the Committee on Indian Affairs Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell of Colorado
at the Senate Hearing on Code Talkers
During this hearing on the “Contributions of Native American Code
Talkers in American Military History, Senator Campbell lists 32 other tribes to
serve as code talkers during both the Pacific and European campaigns as;
Comanche, Cheyenne, Cherokee, Osage, Lakota, Dakota, Chippewa, Oneida, Sac and
Fox, Meskwaki, Hopi, Assiniboine, Kiowa, Pawnee, Akwesasne, Menominee, Creek,
Cree Seminole Tribes and Other unlisted tribes...
White
Ally Toolkit
If anti-racism allies are going to change any minds,
empathetic listening will likely be important.But, the anti-racism movement
should not expect POCs to empathetically listen to white racism skeptics.White
people are in a much better position to execute listening-based strategy with
people who are skeptical about whether racism is real.
Columbus Day is a celebration of the erasure of Indigenous peoples like
me from the story of American colonisation
By the age of six, I came to realise that I was not
welcome in my own country. Indigenous Peoples Day, the holiday that has
replaced Columbus Day in dozens of American states and cities, is a first step
in addressing this harm. The day offers Americans a chance to examine their
history from a more truthful perspective, one not coated with the veneer of
American exceptionalism. Read more:
https://metro.co.uk/2018/10/08/columbus-day-is-a-celebration-of-the-erasure-of-indigenous-peoples-like-me-from-the-story-of-american-colonisation-8016315/?ito=cbshareTwitter:
https://twitter.com/MetroUK | Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MetroUK/
Why
don’t anti-Indian groups count as hate groups?
Anti-American Indian groups have received little-to-no
public scrutiny, compared to their anti-black and anti-Latino counterparts. Yet
the number of hate crimes against Native Americans in 2016 was 4 percent
nationwide, even though Indigenous people represent around 2 percent of the
population. The Southern Poverty Law Center, a leading civil rights
organization that monitors hate groups, does not include anti-American Indian
groups in its annual accounting of hate groups, currently at 954 nationwide. A
Southern Poverty Law Center representative told High Country News that they
will examine whether CERA “fall in line with our hate group criteria as we work
on finalizing our 2018 count.”
This
Essay Was Not Built On an Ancient Indian Burial Ground
Horror
Aesthetics within Indigenous cinema as pushback against colonial violence
The Indian burial ground motif, heavily featured in
horror film cycles of the 1970s and 1980s, is an example of how mainstream
cinema renders Indigenous people both hyper visible and invisible. This
contradiction is what Michelle H Raheja refers to in her book Reservation
Reelism as “the violence of invisibility”.
THIS
IS A GREAT ARTICLE Native American Is Not My Race—It's Who I Am
Elizabeth
Warren may feel vindicated about her ancestry, but defining Native American
identity by race often results in dangerous challenges to Indigenous rights and
sovereignty.
As a Cherokee citizen, a Blackfeet descendant, and a
mixed-race woman, I’m tired of measuring my identity. Non-Native strangers
demand my pedigree upon meeting me, asking “How much Native American are you?”
Or, they say, “Hm, you don’t look Native American,” their eyes narrowing at my
light skin. Their words give voice to a blood quantum system they couldn’t name
themselves: Historically in the United States, blood quantum is the problematic
legal metric that defines Native people based on the fraction of their “blood”
that can be traced to Native ancestors. To much of the world, my worth as a
Native woman only extends to the fraction of my ancestors that I can trace to
government enrollment lists or through flawed genetic science.
This public debate about the validity of Indigenous
relationships based on phenotype or genetics has created frustration among some
Native people. Several Native writers have opined on how to more accurately
label Warren’s Native identity, including some saying she is not, in fact,
Native, which “is about belonging to a community,” as Julian NoiseCat writes in
HuffPo. The Cherokee Nation has also issued a statement clarifying that “Using
a DNA test to lay claim to any connection to the Cherokee Nation or any tribal
nation, even vaguely, is inappropriate and wrong.”
Identity, especially as it relates to communities of
color, has long been regulated by the settler state. Colonial leaders of a
young United States, dependent in many ways upon the labor of enslaved people,
had an interest in recognizing as many people as Black as possible; the
resulting policy was the one-drop rule, which meant any amount of African
ancestry rendered someone Black by definition. Meanwhile, the US government
used an alternative system, aimed at discounting Native American identity.
Unsurprisingly, White Americans benefited from discrediting Native identity at the
same time they did enforcing Blackness: When the developing US government
expanded into Indigenous nations, it signed treaties that created lasting
obligations between the American government and the descendants of those
tribes. As a result, the US developed a vested interest in defining the
smallest number of Native individuals as possible in order to reduce its legal
burden. Native Americans were then subjected to the blood quantum policy. As
Native identity became defined by fractions, it is unsurprising that mail-in
DNA kits presented additional challenges for Native communities.
International
Commission Investigates and Will Monitor Violence Against Indigenous Women in
the U.S. – High Level of Violence Against Alaska Native Women Astonishing
“Many indigenous women in the United States disappear,
are murdered, or experiencedomestic violence, sexual assault, and other forms
of gender-based violence at alarmingly highrates,” said said Lucy R. Simpson,
Executive Director of the National Indigenous Women’sResource Center. “The
murder rate for indigenous women is ten times the national rate onsome
reservations.” Federal officials have recognized that Native Americans are a
vulnerablepopulation to human trafficking yet hard data is scant. “Oil and gas
development on and neartribal lands also raises the already high risk that
indigenous women will become victims ofviolence, murder, and sex trafficking,”
added Simpson. “The U.S. must not ignore its humanrights obligations to respond
to, investigate, and address these increasing cases of missing andmurdered and
sex trafficked indigenous women with due diligence.”
I
Refuse To Let My Kid Dress Like Black Panther For Halloween & Here's Why
A February 2018 article in The New York Times explores
various sides of the issue, and it's clear that the debate about white kids
dressing as Black Panther is far from black and white. For some, it's yet
another example of cultural appropriation. White people have been borrowing
(and outright stealing) the costumes, music, food, ideas, religious traditions,
and innovations of other cultures since the beginning of recorded history. My
white kids are over-represented in the media, have virtually endless options to
choose from, and, honestly, can probably benefit from hearing the word,
"no" once in a while.
In the end, I decided that I was not OK with my son
choosing to be Black Panther for Halloween. You might disagree with me and
that's OK. I mean, for the record, my husband does. But I think it's time to
let kids in the Black community have something wonderful to themselves. My
white kids are over-represented in the media, have virtually endless options to
choose from, and, honestly, can probably benefit from hearing the word,
"no" once in a while. Maybe, in a future where there are more black
superheroes, I might feel differently, but for now my answer stands.
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