Thriving Indigenous Futures and Possibilities by John L. Reamer

Thriving Indigenous Futures and Possibilities

Living in a world that you weren’t supposed to make it in comes off as a bit of a paradox at first, doesn’t it? When I say that, I’m referring to Indigenous people, in particular the genocide and horrors that we have faced from the first contact to this very day. In today’s age, just being alive is enough to say that we’ve made it to a better future, but we continue to keep thriving, Indigenous people are continuing to pursue even greater heights for ourselves as we create more, achieve more, and overall continue to push against a belief that we are a dying people.

In the reading, "Postcards from the Apocalypse" by Rebecca Roanhorse, the author starts off her piece by discussing early gifts she received from her birth mother who was a member of the Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo from Northern New Mexico. The first of the two gifts were a VHS tape titled Surviving Columbus: The Story of the Pueblo People which was a video entailing what Indigenous Peoples endured from the Spanish people at the first contact up until the near genocide of Indigenous people. This gift served as a reminder that we are still here. Indigenous people are still here, whether colonial society wants to believe that or not. It is far easier for people to believe Indigenous people are extinct, rather than coming to terms of what we have been through, and the fact that we are still here and beyond resilient. The second of the two gifts was a CD of songs by Cree singer/songwriter Buffy Sainte-Marie, this gift served as medicine. Through common tradition, songs carry power within Indigenous cultures, as there is prayer songs, hunting songs, war songs, and the list goes on. It is apparent oral tradition holds substantial value to these cultures.

The biggest take away from the first reading is a repeating theme that I have heard throughout this quarter in my American Indian Studies classes, and that is that the greatest way to pave the way for a thriving future is to embrace your culture every day, never letting societal norms cut the ties you have to who you really are, and to challenge the norm every single day in an effort to resist. With the gift of a VHS to always remind her daughter of what her people had already overcome, a source of strength, and reference for any time she may feel like Indigenous people aren’t strong enough. The gift of the CD is passing on of songs in a sense, in many cultures songs are passed down throughout families and practiced normally, I speak from experience, in Neah Bay I grew up in a traditional chief family on my mother’s side so we were heavily involved within family song and dance, which is often saved for ceremonial purposes (Name giving potlatch / Memorial potlatch), so the practice of passing down music rings home with me when considering what it means to build towards a thriving Indigenous future.

When I decided to look online for another source that backed my idea of tradition and culture playing key roles in successful future, and I came across the Native Hope organization which is a Native ran group who focuses on bringing injustices done against us to the light, and united Native people through the practice of storytelling. Throughout Native Country it is common belief that the storyteller is always a vital role within the community, often as stories carry traditional values, customs, and beliefs within them. The storyteller is the conveyer of knowledge as the stories are passed down from generation to generation through word of mouth, without them the knowledge could possibly be lost forever. An old film called Dreamkeeper goes into detail on this as it is about an elder storyteller and his grandson, as they are on a journey to gathering of the nations and his grandfather insists he learns the value of story.

The point I am dancing around is that storytelling also holds a major role in thriving Indigenous futures, as it serves as a form of practicing everyday culture, keeping it alive, as that is what I’ve been taught is culture, it isn’t something you can buy, take, or see, it’s something you do, it’s something you’re believe in, it holds value to you, so you must continue to do it.

The short film that we watched was Noah Baker’s The Sixth World (2012), which was a movie about a future space mission towards the planet Mars with the intent to colonize the planet for our own. The twist in the film comes in when the two that are piloting the space mission are introduced, both of them being astronauts, one being a Caucasian male, the other being a Navajo Nation woman. The idea of an Indigenous going off to colonize another planet holds humor right? Oh, I forgot, corn is the staple crop for the mission.

The film has a scene in it where the Native American woman named Tazbah Redhouse is gifted a Navajo space flag from a fellow Navajo member who holds the title of general. The General is then introduced to the corn that will be growing on the ship, which he notices has no husks on the corn as it was modified to grow without to reduce by product, he claims this is odd as the whole corn has full use to Indigenous people, and it would be of use on Mars. The male astronaut does not value the elder’s knowledge and blows him off, eventually leading to their mission almost failing in mid space until Redhouse uses the power of her people’s traditional corn rather than the modified corn, and prayer to guide them through the heavy trial. This short film had a clear message that it was trying to display, the message that Indigenous people also hold valuable knowledge towards a thriving future for everyone, even if they may be against common belief.

When taking a look at all the sources together, it needs to be understood that Indigenous people are the catalyst in which we can create an idealistic future society, as it is the things we’ve done, and will continue to do, that will pave the steps for those after us to continue to follow as well. Within our cultural practices, to our beliefs, who we are goes hand-in-hand with idea of resiliency itself, we aren’t savages, we’re survivors, which is something to hold onto, because obviously the things that those before us practiced help us be here today, so we must continue to those things to be a part of it.

Bibliography

Hope, Native. “Native Hope - About.” Native Hope - About, .

“The Sixth World.” SnagFilms Watch Free Streaming Movies Online, .

Roanhorse, Rebecca. “Postcards from the Apocalypse.” Uncanny Magazine, .

Hodge, Felicia Schanche, et al. “Utilizing Traditional Storytelling to Promote Wellness in American Indian Communities.” Journal of Transcultural Nursing : Official Journal of the Transcultural Nursing Society, U.S. National Library of Medicine, Jan. 2002, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3098048/.

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© Copyright John L. Reamer, 2019