Peratrovich and company: Standing up for centuries

I heard a great question posed to a group from the ANDORE project - a group gathered to promote dialogue on racial equity that I've been pleased to be involved with.

She asked about Elizabeth Peratrovich Day (today!): "Why does this day matter to you?"

I answered with what I've always felt, that it is a day to remember we stand on the shoulders of giants, and that we have a responsibility to continue their hard work.

But then I was doing a write-up tonight for a class I'm taking, and most of it was focused on a narrative of an early 19th century Native man. I came across this passage:

"Who stood up in those days, and since, to plead Indian rights? Was it the friend of the Indian? No, it was his enemies who rose - his enemies, to judge and pass sentence."

I wonder if this man, Apess, could envision a future in which a little Tlingit woman would stand before a political body and, not plead, but demand Indian rights? That she might shine their own hypocrisy in their face.

However terrible the circumstances were 150 years ago for Native people, because of those who did stand up, in Elizabeth Peratrovich's time, they were better. Not perfect, but men and women continued to fight, and because of them, in my own time circumstances are better still for Native people. So how can we not continue to stand up? How much better will it be for our own children if I do?

Celebrating Banned Books Week

Yay! What could make me happy to read a list of banned books Alaska Dispatch posted?

A book I've been wanting to read by an author I love is on there - "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian" by Sherman Alexie.

Each year during Banned Books Week I try to read at least one of the "most banned" books of the moment. Though honestly, it's not much of a challenge. EVERY good book seems to be banned - I've read five of the top ten in the article!

Sherman Alexie has got to be one of the most well-known Native authors anyways - if not THE most well-known - and I've loved everything I've read by him, even when I've disagreed with it. This book has been on my own list for a bit (and seems to have been on the banned books list for a bit too!) - looking forward to it!

Maybe it's obvious to those who celebrate this week, but there are plenty of books on many lists that have been banned that I don't like, offend me, and that I just plain disagree with. When it comes to Native people in literature, the list of books with stereotypes and innacuracies is MUCH longer than the list of books with accurate portrayals of Native history, culture and people. Yet, I don't deny anyone the right to read them - and we do major harm to the idea that we are a free thinking society by eliminating all that we disagree with.

If you really want to help a child do their best in this world, make sure they are well-taught and have a loving heart, and are able to look at things with an open mind and a critical eye. You don't do this by giving them only that which won't challenge them, won't bring them a new perspective, and won't interest them.

Arrest the parents or work with them?

I thought this article by Timothy Aqukkasuk Argetsinger in Alaska Dispatch was great - "Uqaġupta naalaġniuruksraurusi: When we talk, you listen." It's about the recent issue regarding legal action taken against parents for truant students.

While I think there is risk to then excuse some of the parental action (or inaction) regarding ensuring kids are at school, where they might actually be just negligent, he has great points that are almost never addressed. Specifically, he cites examples in which indigenous culture is worked with Western education for success, rather than a power struggle.

In any case, I can only imagine what he proposes is radical and maybe a little scary to some, but what he's really talking about is getting back to how things were done for millenia. I encourage you to read the WHOLE article before judging!

"Don't be a tool" - or - Dialogue about racial equity in Alaska

A few weeks ago, I was waiting in my car for my sister to come out of a grocery store, window down, and two young men, both white, were having a loud discussion about race. I tried (not very hard) to not listen, but as I was in the middle of the unnerving project I’ll describe in a bit, bad manners took over. They discussed different racial problems, whether minorities should be “blaming” everything on race, whether affirmative action was right, and one was vehement that the “Native Pride” hats were racist in nature. What struck me was – they probably would be talking a bit differently if I was part of the discussion. Or even if they knew I was listening.

I don’t mean to say they were racist for discussing this, or that they would for sure even curb away from what they were saying. But the nature of racial dialogue in Anchorage is such that with the entrance of a (somewhat opinionated) Native woman into the conversation, I’m pretty sure there would be either a) holding back from all true opinions out of not wanting to stir something up that can’t be taken back, or b) a blood bath.

Okay, I’m SURE we could remain civil. But experience tells me when people of different races radically disagree about race relations in Anchorage, the conversations don’t generally go all rainbows and bunnies.

I began this blog over three years ago, and one of my first posts was about an incident that happened downtown. A group of us, all Native, were downtown for an event, and were suddenly, and without provocation, verbally abused by a loud, angry man. The comments were ugly, and racist. But my concern was not as much the man, but the reaction of our group:

(We were) A group of young, professional Native people, mostly women, who have every right to be proud of themselves and their accomplishments. Our reaction? We lowered our heads, we didn't meet each other in the eye, we dare not look at another person in the crowd, for the shame of it… We didn't yell back, we didn't argue, we didn't console or comfort each other, we didn't talk about.

Aside from the fact that I just annoyingly quoted myself, in three years, I realize I still haven’t answered for myself the questions I was pondering in the post. Why was this our reaction? What can be done?

But a recent experience has made me look at this in a new way. I was invited to participate in a project hosted by First Alaskans – a project to start a dialogue about racial equity. To start many dialogues, actually, in many different communities around Alaska. I went in to be trained as a host of some of these dialogues, with a large group of supporters.

Here’s where my heart rate starts to rise.

It wasn’t actually the group itself that made me nervous. I think partly from posting here over the years, and partly because I just talk about race a lot with friends as I try to answer my own question, I was pretty comfortable the first day we got together. It was a day to share our own stories, our own ideas about race in Alaska.

 As we went around the large circle for several hours, each person taking a turn, it was at times heartbreaking, at times infuriating, at times inspiring. There were many occasions I could relate to the speaker, and many more that sparked ever more questions.

It was the two days after the initial meeting where I started to wonder what I’d gotten myself into.

In a much smaller group, it started getting a little more real about us hosting these discussions, and here’s where I start to have imaginary dialogues, hosted by me, in which I get run out of town or alternately start a proverbial fire in a community that leads to paintballing and race riots (it’s part of my process.)

While we were being trained, I discovered several people had similar fears.

“How do I walk by these people in the store if this goes wrong?”

“My community is not going to like this kind of talk.”

Yet, we’ve seen that positive outcomes CAN come from racial dialogue. A year ago to the week, I posted about First Alaskans’ effort in a pretty public racial dialogue. Julie O’Malley said it best, but in short, there was some ugly racial comments said about Native women over three years ago by two local radio DJs. The reaction was swift, angry, accusatory, and I don’t know that anyone was happy with the outcome.

But an effort when different racial comments were made by different local DJs was... well, markedly different. Instead of anger, education. Instead of calls to pull ads, a call to talk. The outcome? Much, much better for everyone.

Said O'Malley, "And I left the press conference wishing that more conversations about race in Anchorage could end that way. Because we’d all be better for it."

So, my neurosis about being run out of town pitchfork-style aside, after meeting these empowering, strong, open people, after some truly thought-provoking dialogue led by First Alaskans, after voicing my own fears and hopes (and more fears,) I can’t answer a single question I posed over three years ago with any authority. But I have a little more hope that, with talking, with compassion, with incredible patience, we can turn the direction of racial equity in the state.

Though the two gentlemen outside the grocery store already had it said pretty succinctly:

“But don’t you think some people just really hate people from different races?”

“Yeah… if you’re a total tool.”

He probably won’t be hosting a dialogue, but I really want to hear more of what he has to say.

Does keeping Native languages alive even matter? Part 3

I've loved seeing the great comments left by my previous two posts on the question of language revitilzation and extinction. Here's the third installment in this subject I could go on and on (and seemingly have) about, and discussion of the many arguments I've heard against keeping Native languages alive:

"We're all Americans now!" - or "Why do we have to dwell on the past?"

This is possibly one of the more frustrating arguments for me, personally, mostly because it's not an argument with anything except an attitude of "This is how I want it to be" behind it, and not trying to understand what's actually going on.

While the oft-cited "Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it" comes to mind, it is a woman who was in the same school my grandmother was that I think of when this is the argument.

You see, I was pretty hard-headed myself about language, only in a different way. I did not think much of my grandparents "giving up" their language. I mean, in exactly one generation, they'd "decided" to give it up. They chose to not pass it on to their children, who in turn could NOT pass it on to me!

But then I heard this woman tell her story, the story of what happened when she went to school. She said what I'd heard before, but I'd never heard it from someone who experienced it, much less someone who experienced it in the same school, at the same time as my grandma. These children, five and six years old, were beaten for speaking Tlingit. They were whipped if they uttered it. Try to imagine yourself at five years old, speaking how you speak at home, and getting hit.

But then she said, "The smart ones got hit the most." And they learned to undo it the fastest.

The "smart ones" - the natural leaders, the ones not afraid to speak out... at least at first. These are the ones most cruelly treated, and the ones who were most dead-set on not passing on that kind of cruelty to their children.

Could you, having gone through this experience, have sent your five year old to kindergarten knowing how to speak the language you were beaten for speaking? I don't know that I would.

It is in this light I remember that the past is not irrelevant. And forgive me if it also brings to mind a certain animated movie in which there may or may not have been big musical numbers with warthogs and hyenas. Remember in the "Lion King" when Simba tells the monkey it's in the past, and the monkey whacks him on the head? Yeah, the past still hurts.

Okay, searing political insight it may not be, but I would hope the next person who talks about forgetting the past or "just being American" keeps in mind how hurtful those comments can be. I'm proud to be American, and I think speaking the tongue that was spoken here for millenia is an incredibly patriotic thing to do. I wish I knew more, I wish I was committed enough to be bilingual, and I don't see how my nation could be anything but benefitted by me and my children and my children's children being the same.

And how can I forget the past that brought me to where I am today? Why would I want to? What's more, why would we, as a nation want to forget that? If it makes you uncomfortable, if it makes you sad, or feel ashamed - fine. It makes me feel those things too. But if we forget the things that make us uncomfortable, we must also forget that which makes us proud, and comforted, and passionate. The brief discomfort I may feel by remembering all the true history of our not-so-distant past is a small price to pay for that.

Does keeping Native languages alive even matter? Part 2

I posted the other day about Native languages and the ongoing conversation I hear about whether it is even of any value to do so. With as many "reasons" as others come up with on how it is not any value, I've split up my own discussion into several parts:

"We're all going to one language anyways"

Whether that is true or not (and it's certainly not happening in anyone's lifetime alive now,) the value of having these languages not only not go extinct, but thrive, is sadly losing potency as the years wear on. This is, quite simply, because each year we're losing more and more people who know what is behind the language.

There are many, many words and phrases in any language that are not simply a way to say the same thing in any language. There are ideas, thoughts, values, philosophies - whole religions - that you can only talk about comprehensively in a certain language. My mom talks about my grandpa (whose first language was English, I might add) who would struggle to impart a Tlingit philosophy or value he learned growing up, but would throw up his hands with a, "There's no way to say that in English!"

A Tlingit teacher I had talked about one word - just ONE word - in Tlingit, "Eetoowoo" (and yikes, I think I just hacked up that spelling!) It is translated in English as "sorrow." But I can still hear her voice as she tried to explain what it really meant - it was more than sorrow. It was a deep, deep sadness that the whole body, the whole being, was involved in. Not a word, or even meaning, we have in the English language. I still don't know what she meant.

I've heard people say they can experience a culture by visiting it, by attending a dance, by reading about it - therefore why not just all speak the same language as the language isn't a part of it?

But culture isn't about attending a play or viewing a piece of art. It literally makes up who a person is.

If you think language isn't important to a culture, I challenge you to learn another language fluently. Use this language, and only this language, to your children, and forbid them to speak English. Then tell me the stories your father told have the same weight. Tell me the songs your mother sang to you can be passed on. Tell me the jokes you've giggled at since you were in high school translate to this language, and your favorite books make as much sense. I gaurantee you MUCH will be lost. Even if you're able to capture big chunks of it, there's no way to translate a whole culture into a different language in one generation.

Now try and think of this as a large group of people trying to do the same thing. Values, stories, philosophies, songs - we've already lost so much. But if we can literally speak the same language as those who can still teach it before it's too late, it won't all be gone.

Does keeping Native languages alive even matter?

The threat of extinction for many (nearly all) Alaska Native languages has received some attention lately, much do to the release of an updates Alaska Native languages map.

I'll leave some others (here, Talking Alaska) to talk about the why and what is going on.

What I get concerned with, whenever this topic comes up and the inevitable backlash of negative commentary, is the idea that the languages should be kept alive at all. Honestly, the idea that it was acceptable, or even preferred, that these languages go extinct was foreign to me until about the age of 15. That was the first time I heard a rant from a peer on "preserving" English as the only American language. Despite the fact that ironies abound when talking about "preserving" the native language of the land (English? Really?) - it is an all-too-common sentiment I've heard expressed.

Other reasons I've heard for letting it go - it's natural selection for it to go extinct, children who learn another language other than English first struggle with learning at a pace with others, there's no value to having different languages, we're spending too much on trying to save languages... though all too frequently the argument just boils down to "we're all American now! Why do we have to dwell on the past?"

I want to address each of these reasons, so I'm going to address a different one each day.

Natural Selection - or "All cultures/languages change"

The above statement is true. Languages and cultures change, and a sign of a dying culture is one trying not to change at all.

But an organic evolution is quite different than a forced extinction. Ask some dinosaurs if they would prefer to evolve into some birds over a few thousand millenia, or if they would like a meteor dropped on their heads. To put it in more human terms, would you prefer to grow out of your job and get promoted, or would you prefer to be fired?

For the most part, what happened to the Native languages of the Americas wasn't a natural evolution. What happened was traumatic, invasive and left no room for real adaptation. In both cases above, true evolution happens over a longer period of time and there is a chosen adjustment to changing environments - choosing what is deemed "better". And in both cases, asteroid or firing, a forced change is fairly terrible to experience and "only the strong survive" doesn't neccessarily apply. Too much of that depends on chance and what the invasive element chooses.

I had a great Tlingit teacher who talked to us about a common Tlingit expression I heard growing up. When someone says "Gunalcheesh" (thank you) - the response is often "Ho ho!" (you're welcome.) I really did hear this often.

What a surprise to learn it didn't mean what I think it meant over 20 years later! "Gunalcheesh ho ho" actually is one phrase, and is used to emphasize the thank you - like "Thank you VERY much." There is no phrase commonly said, traditionally, to respond to thank you, as there is in English. But the "young kids" as she said (she meant my parents generation!) were changing this, and this new kind of word was emerging.

To a language, she said, this is a great thing. It shows the language is alive, and adapting. The "young kids" were choosing to change this on their own, because it suited the younger culture more, and it brought two languages together.

THAT is "natural selection."

What happened here was trauma. It was forced change. It was not an evolution, but something ripped out by the roots. This isn't an effort to place blame, but to emphasize that there is nothing "natural" about being beaten for speaking a language, or being told to speak a foreign language in your own home. It also isn't totally extinct yet for all the languages. And until it is, why would we ever prevent those from fighting that fight?

Next: Is there any real value to knowing these languages?