By SeilavenaWilliams, Tulalip Housing Dept. Executive Assistant/Monitoring-Specialist
North West Indian Housing Association presented the 2014 Tribe of the Year Award to the Tulalip Tribes Housing Department on Wednesday, September 10, 2014.
Voted on by peers and all other tribal authorities in the northwest, Tulalip Tribes received this award in part for their innovative efforts in working strategies to deal with meth in Housing, creativity in collaborating with tenants on combating mold and mildew in homes, and the increased effort to efficiently get boarded up homes rehabilitated and rented.
A strong and proactive stand was taken by the Tulalip Tribes to ensure that low-income rental families are living in homes free and safe from methamphetamine contamination. Every vacant unit was tested and remediated as needed. Adults on the waiting list and adults moving into new units must now pass drug tests prior to being able to be housed. This system has proven itself to be beneficial to the overall health and welfare of the community.
The Tribe’s efforts and implementation strategies to provide safe, drug free housing to the community is highly commendable. The extensive rehabilitation measures needed to make homes safe and healthy places to live was a considerable investment by the Tribe.
The Tribe’s significant policy commitment and financial support makes the success of this initiative possible. Eleven members of the Housing Department’s Maintenance/Construction team received extensive training in CDL remediation and through the support and investment of the Tulalip Tribes, received their State certification. These staff members are now qualified as both workers and supervisors to remediate methamphetamine contamination.
Environmental exposures in homes are linked to respiratory health concerns in children. Disproportionate rates of pediatric asthma and respiratory tract infections occur in tribal communities. Tulalip Tribes innovative policy on mold and mildew, annual structural inspections, and education and outreach with their residents, including policy changes partner- shipping with residents to limit mold growth has improved the quality and life of housing stock. The policies on mold and mildew introduced in Tulalip are now being widely shared and used with other Tribes.
Due to both meth contamination and mold issues Tulalip had a significant number of vacant units. Tulalip Tribe invested in its Housing program by hiring an additional 12 temporary workers to fully restore the units and get them re-rented. Within an 8-month period Tulalip Tribes were able to restore over 70 of their vacant homes and have significantly lowered the number of boarded up housing units.
According to their website, NWIHA.org, North West Indian Housing Association consists of 38 Tribes, Tribal Housing Authorities and/or Tribally-Designated Housing Entities serving 3 Pacific Northwest states (and one THA in Southern Alaska). The Mission of the Northwest Indian Housing Association is to promote safe, sanitary, decent and affordable housing for Tribal members in the Pacific Northwest.
RAPID CITY, S.D. (CN) – Oglala Sioux claim in court that Jackson County, S.D., is obstructing Native Americans’ right to vote by refusing to set up a voter registration and balloting site on the remote Pine Ridge reservation.
Thomas Poor Bear, vice president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, and three other tribal members sued Jackson County and its Board of Commissioners on Sept. 18, in Federal Court.
Reservation residents have to travel at least 27 miles to the county seat in Kadoka to register and vote, which is twice as far as white residents travel, according to the complaint.
Poor Bear asks that Jackson County set up a satellite voting office in the reservation town of Wanblee.
Lack of transportation compounds the problem.
The Census Bureau reported that nearly one in four Native Americans in Jackson County has no access to a vehicle, but that every white household does.
According to the Oglala Lakota Nation website: “Many people walk to reach their destinations,” but distance between communities and harsh South Dakota weather often make this difficult or impossible.
“What we filed on Thursday really isn’t anything new – it’s just happening in a different way,” plaintiffs’ attorney Matthew Rappold said in an interview.
“The record speaks for itself in how the state government has tried to make the right to vote inaccessible to Native American people.”
In 2004, U.S. District Judge Karen Schreier detailed South Dakota’s long history of voting discrimination in a 144-page opinion in Bone Shirt vs. Hazeltine , which claimed that South Dakota redistricting diluted the impact of Native American votes.
Before 1924, Native Americans could vote only after “severing tribal relations,” Schreier wrote.
Even after the 1924 American Indian Citizenship Act gave Native Americans full citizenship rights, South Dakota continued to ban them from voting or holding office until the 1940s.
Native Americans in the part of the Pine Ridge Reservation now in Jackson County could not vote until 1983, because people from “unorganized counties” – counties attached to other counties for judicial purposes – were forbidden to vote.
South Dakota’s Help America Vote Act task force supports the measure to place a voting office on the reservation, and has even reserved funds for Jackson County to do so, the complaint states.
Nonetheless, minutes from a County Commissioners’ meeting in June this year, cited in the complaint, state: “This would be an additional expense for Jackson County.”
Jackson County Auditor Vicki Williams, a defendant in the new case, declined to comment on the county’s position.
The Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in Southwestern South Dakota encompasses 11,000 square miles and spans three counties – Bennett, Shannon, and Jackson. It is home to more than 18,000, of which 88 percent are Native American, according to the 2010 census. The nationally famous Badlands of South Dakota also lie on Pine Ridge Reservation land.
About 39 percent of Native Americans live below the poverty line in Jackson County, which is nearly twice the percentage of whites, according to the Census Bureau’s 2006-2010 American Community Survey.
“Due … to the disparity in socio-economic status and the history of racial discrimination, Native American election turnout has historically been very low in South Dakota,” the complaint states, though South Dakota voter turnout is high overall.
Poor Bear wants Jackson County ordered to establish a satellite office on the reservation before the November elections, which will include gubernatorial candidates and constitutional amendments.
He claims there is “no justification” for not opening the satellite office, and that “the cost and burden on the county to designate a satellite office will be negligible in comparison to the irreparable harm that plaintiffs have already suffered, and will continue to suffer, as a result of the violation of their statutory and constitutional rights.”
Attorney Rappold, of Mission, S.D., said, “If we’re successful, and there are similar issues in other areas, this case would be something to tell the local folks: ‘You need to make sure you are doing things properly.'”
Tulalip Heritage Lady Hawks lose 2014-15 varsity volleyball season opener 0-3, to Highland Christian Knights with game 3 ending in an upsetting score, 25-27. The game was played at Heritage High School Gym on Thursday, September 18, 2014.
Pam James, co-founder of Native Strategies Photo/Shannon Kissinger
By Kyle Taylor Lucas, Tulalip News
This is the second story in a series on the intersection of chronic health and addiction issues and Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs among American Indians. The series focuses upon contributing factors of high ACE numbers and substance abuse and behavioral and health disparities in American Indians.
The ACEs Study became a reality due to a breakthrough from an unexpected source—an obesity clinic led in 1985 by Dr. Vincent Felitti, chief of Kaiser Permanente’s Department of Preventive Medicine, San Diego. Dr. Felitti was shocked when more than fifty percent of his patients dropped out of the study despite their desperate desire to lose weight. His refusal to give up on them led to individual interviews where he learned that a majority had experienced childhood sexual trauma. That led to a 25-year research project by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Kaiser Permanente. The landmark study linked childhood adversity to major chronic illness, social problems, and early death.
According to the CDC, “the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study is one of the largest investigations ever conducted to assess associations between childhood maltreatment and later-life health and well-being.” The study included more than 17,000 Health Maintenance Organization members who in routine physicals provided detailed information about childhood experiences of abuse, neglect, and family dysfunction. The ACEs Study links childhood trauma to social and emotional problems as well as chronic adult diseases such as disease, diabetes, depression, violence, being a victim of violence, and suicide.
Since the ACEs Study, hundreds of published scientific articles, workshops, and conferences have helped practitioners better understand the importance of reducing childhood adversity to overcome myriad social and health issues facing American society. See the ACEs questionnaire, here: http://www.acestudy.org/files/ACE_Score_Calculator.pdf. Learn more about the ACEs Study here: http://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/acestudy/
The ACEs research is of significant relevance to American Indian/Alaska Native (AIAN) communities beset with behavioral and physical health issues—disproportionately high as compared to the general population.
Unquestionably, any discussion of social and health disparities in Indian Country must include historic trauma, and the political and economic realities affecting American Indians and tribes. Research into epigenetics subsequent to the original ACEs Study indicates that historic trauma is likely one of the primary contributors to disparate behavioral and physical health issues affecting AIANs. Subsequent stories will more fully explore the physiological brain changes that result from childhood adversity.
Native Strategies – Addressing Historic Trauma in Native Communities
Tribal experts in the area of historic trauma emphasize that while the ACEs Study is important, it is also important to ensure concurrent address of historical trauma on AIANs and tribal communities.
One of those experts is Pam James who is co-founder of Native Strategies, a non-profit organization established with her husband and partner, Gordon James, in 2009. Pam is a member of the Colville Confederated Tribes and Gordon is a Skokomish Tribal member. The two have been consulting on historic trauma and Native wellness in tribal communities for the past thirty years. Pam earned a B.A. Degree in Psychology and Native American Studies from The Evergreen State College and a BHA in community health from the University of Washington.
“Until we established our non-profit, we did freelance consulting. We worked with the Native Wellness organization, sought grant funding, and wrote a wellness book. Then we used our book to write a curriculum that we’ve applied in our work,” said James.
The non-profit allows better access to funding and resources to further their work empowering tribal people and communities. “We are able to provide training and technical assistance absent tribal politics,” said James who noted they are also free to be creative in designing a broad array of programs, training, services, and technical assistance. “We’ve helped several organizations start their own non-profits. We do a lot of grant writing. We do workshops around historical trauma, parenting, healthy relationships, and government-to-government training. We also do planning and program evaluations and help organizations get into compliance.”
James said one of the most sensitive and impactful of their workshops is healthy workplace training. “We look at it holistically, at interpersonal relationships, family relationships, and relationships to all things–earth and to all creation.” She asks, “How do you create a healthy workplace? You can’t do that until you begin to address the historic trauma.” In their work, James said they help to rewire the brain for positive impact, noting, “Behavior is just a habit. We have to change the habit. I do it from a cultural perspective and I blend in humor.”
However, James is mindful of her approach. She said, “every workshop, every training I do, people get triggered,” so she is careful with her audience. They try to unlearn negative behaviors. In the communities, she finds, “Though it doesn’t work, people do the same thing over and over again expecting a different result.” She said their training “takes people back to that value system that our people always had, treating people with honor and respect. We have a roadmap that asks, “What do you want in your life, spiritually, emotionally, and how do you start creating the life you want?”” She said repetitiveness in practice and training is critical and noted the impossibility of creating change in a workshop or two.
Asked whether training the trainer is part of their work, James replied that it was and that it is essential. “We help train the trainer for tribes so that they can teach it themselves. First, we do community training, then a three-day “train the trainer” workshop, and then we come back in 3-6 months to assist them with their first training. It’s very sensitive. What do you do when someone gets triggered? We help to prepare them.”
About their generational trauma and wellness work, James added, “In our training, we’re opening awareness. The second step is intervention. How do we implement and make change? The third step is continuing education and putting it into practice. It is developing new ways of coping, replacing behaviors, and doing it on a consistent basis. It’s a theory and it’s ongoing.”
However, she said, “Most of our tribal communities are in crisis mode by the time they call. I urge them to call us before that.” She noted three stages—prevention, emergent, and intervention. “I urge them to look at those areas and ask, “How do we get to the place where we’re doing prevention rather than intervention?” Tribes have to start looking at this type of training as ongoing. Just like computer classes. This is not a one-time shot.”
In their training, James said they often support eight-week parenting classes. However, she recommends to clients, “Before we do that, let’s do a healthy relationship class!” Again, she says it is a matter of steps, mentally, emotionally, and educationally. “First of all, we start with the parents to help them learn how to interact with each other. We are in a society that wants a quick fix, but there is no quick fix. It’s about awareness, learning new skills and behaviors, and then we have to practice, practice, practice. It’s not about the end result it’s the journey.”
James said she attended one of Laura Porter’s workshops on ACEs and thought, “Wow, this would have been great to know years ago! Oh my gosh, I wish we had been involved.” To date, only a few tribes have engaged with the state’s research work around the CDC ACEs Study and measurements. James believes “ACEs is one piece of the puzzle, one piece of the process for Native people.” She said her non-profit is looking at funding opportunities to develop a curricula based on their 30 years of work. They plan to work with an advisory team of Native people and the curricula will be designed for implementation by tribal communities, and culturally appropriate to their needs.
Specific to generational historic trauma, James believes “The ACEs information doesn’t go far enough. The State is a very good example of a sense of guilt. They don’t really want to acknowledge it. It’s painful to acknowledge what was done to Native people. There is a lot of effort being made to change it, but it’s still there.”
ACEs and Physiological Rewiring of the Developing Brain
Asked about her knowledge of current scientific research on the relationship of childhood adversity and epigenetics—the study of physiological brain changes and potential application to the study of historic trauma in Native communities, James becomes animated. She noted a weeklong workshop she attended with Dr. Bruce Perry, the author of “The Boy Who was Raised as a Dog” and “Born for Love.” She said, “What an amazing man. His focus has been trauma.” She said he validated the tribal community’s long assertions of unresolved multigenerational trauma, and that the brain is actually hard-wired for empathy, but things happen to the brain when babies and children experience adversity and trauma.
James discussed the work of Dr. Patricia K. Kuhl who of the University of Washington, whose trainings she has attended. She co-authored the book, “The Scientist in the Crib.”
At one workshop, Dr. Kuhl presented studies of two children’s brains from newborn to age three–one child from a happy home and the other from a neglected home. They conducted CAT scans at ages 3, 6, and 9 months. At the beginning, their brains were identical, but by the time they were nine months old, the brain of the neglected child was visibly shrinking. Considered in the context of social and health disparities and life chances for AIANs, this is quite remarkable. The above study demonstrated that disparities begin in the crib, but as the ACEs Study and ensuing research has shown, it is intergenerational, and even in the womb. If the mother and father have high ACE scores based upon their own childhood adversity, the children are also likely to have high ACE scores unless there is intervention.
James is optimistic. She said that although the research shows adversity is generational, “It also validates that we can reverse it. It doesn’t have to be permanent. Some of it might be, but we can reverse much of it. Our ancestors adapted. We learned how to adapt for our environment; it is human nature to survive. Those are the pieces that are not happening in our community.”
Family and Community Roles and Traditions
Lamenting the negative impacts of technology, James said, “Televisions, iPads, Xboxes are the babysitters of today. They are impacting how our children develop, how their brains develop. Technology has disconnected us as people.” She grew up in Inchelium where they did not have a telephone until 1978. “All the grandmothers and everyone would come together, bring old clothes, and make quilts. They lined them with old army blankets. There was a spiritual part of that. Every newborn received a quilt. We’re not doing those kinds of activities that inspire and help our children to learn about community.” James is concerned that technology today limits human contact important to a sense of being part of something greater and of the responsibility accompanying it.
Another significant hurdle is overcoming the lateral violence that is a symptom of ACEs. James said that in her counseling work, she discovered, “We get addicted to pity, to negativity, and we become chaos junkies.” She believes people have forgotten about how just to be. “The Vision Quest taught us how to be alone, to be one with nature, to be alone physically and mentally. It taught us how to control our mind, our spirit, and our bodies.” She thinks some of those teachings can be built into the curricula to teach people how to, again, “sit quietly with themselves, to sit and listen.”
Applying the ACEs Study and Measurements to Native Wellness
James’ family of origin was not unlike many Native homes. She and her eight brothers and sisters grew up with domestic violence, alcoholism, and physical and sexual abuse. She began doing this work in 1986 when the Seattle Indian Health Board received a federal grant to put together a curriculum. She was among 40 chosen from different tribes to participate in a two-week intensive training that was life changing for her. “They stripped us spiritually and emotionally. We had to address our own trauma. We could not help others until we worked on ourselves and healed ourselves. There was no college that could give me what that training did!”
In the training, Jane Middelton-Moz, an internationally known speaker and author with decades of experience in childhood trauma and community intervention took part in the training. She addressed the pain of adult children of alcoholics (ACoA), a topic about which she has written extensively. “It was basically an ACE’s study done with Native people and it was all about the trauma.” James recounted Middleton-Moz’s journey to Germany where she worked with holocaust survivors and her later study of American Indian tribes. She discovered that they had developed the same trauma characteristics. “She was a psychotherapist and I felt blessed to have the opportunity to be mentored by her.” James noted that their work has essentially taken Middleton-Moz’s study of ACoA and applied it to multi-generational trauma among tribal communities.
Asked how the new research on childhood adversity can help Native communities, James said, “The ACEs Study is good in that it gives us the validation and affirms what we’ve known. This is what has been happening in our communities for hundreds of years.” She noted the mental and physical health issues evidenced by high juvenile suicide rates, 638 percent higher incidence of alcoholism than the general population, addiction, and disparate social, and health issues in Indian Country are all traceable to generational trauma and adverse childhood experiences.
However, James believes the survey mechanisms must be appropriate. She said, “The reality is that a lot of times when so-called experts go in and do the surveys, the tribal members don’t tell the whole truth.” Tribal communities are tight-knit and everyone knows everyone and their business. It may be that a special survey mechanism is necessary for tribal communities. James said, “It will be difficult to get reliable data if the members don’t trust enough to give accurate information, to tell the whole truth.”
Those involved in tribal wellness have said for years, and James echoes this, that it is important to put the disparate social and health issues in Indian Country into context. “We have people who have suffered such trauma in their lifetimes, in their parents, and grandparent’s lives!” said James.
People forget that generations of American Indians experienced breaks in the family unit caused by the government’s forcible removal of children placed into Indian boarding schools. Indian children were deprived of parental nurturing; many were physically and sexually abused. They did not learn how to parent and nurture their children, but at adulthood, they were returned to the reservation to start their own families and the same cycle was repeated.
In their workshops, James stresses traditions. “We’ve adopted behaviors that were not ours traditionally. Instead, we go back to the medicine wheel, it teaches you everything—body and mind. When you look at what is happening with our communities, we’ve lost touch with all of the ceremonies, languages, and the practices that kept us resilient. There is a veneer of positivity, but underneath there’s all this pain.”
Clearly passionate about her work, James makes the call, “Someone has to be the voice of our children, someone has to stand up and take the arrows, stand up and say this is not what our ancestors wanted. I really believe this is the core work if we can get it into our communities, we’re going to change, and it has to take place for our survival.”
Integration of ACEs Research in Tribal Family Services and Other Programs
As Sherry Guzman, Mental Health Manager in the Tulalip Family Services Department said, about the ACEs Study, “Most tribes were very leery at first, but I went forward with it because I saw the value of it. It enabled me to see the difference in average of Washington State versus Tulalip Tribes. I like the ACEs model because it gives a base to compare something to.” She, too, felt the ACEs measurements validated what she and others in Indian Country have advocated—that unresolved generational trauma is a significant contributor to social and health disparities among tribes.
Guzman’s department has scheduled an all-staff meeting focused upon the ACEs Study and Tulalip’s work with the statewide network a few years ago. They hope to re-establish a dialogue and consider the future direction the Tribe may take in applying the ACEs Study and measurements in its programs.
In communities utilizing the ACEs measurement across the nation, the subsequent application of community resilience building has consistently demonstrated success in lowering of ACE scores in community members, which in turn helps build stronger and more resilient communities. Imagine the possibilities if communities invested in families on the front end, supporting pre-natal work, pre-school and all day kindergarten, rather than building juvenile detention centers and adult prisons.
At least twenty-one states have communities actively engaged in ACEs work.
Future stories in this series look at that work and new developments in ACEs research, including neurobiology, epigenetics, and the developing brain. Also featured will be tribal organizations applying similar intervention and measurements to address generational trauma. Because ACEs extend beyond the nuclear family to educational and child welfare policies, and to racism in social, police, courts, and other institutions controlling the lives of Indians, those intersections are reviewed along with the economics. Finally, the series will explore the potential of ACEs measurement in prevention and for building resiliency for American Indian people and tribes.
Kyle Taylor Lucas is a freelance journalist and speaker. She is a member of The Tulalip Tribes and can be reached at KyleTaylorLucas@msn.com / Linkedin: http://www.linkedin.com/in/kyletaylorlucas / 360.259.0535 cell
It was a morning of music, dance, speeches, a little rain and a lot of protest as the Canadian Museum for Human Rights officially opened in Winnipeg.
“With the placement of this final stone, at the heart of our circle, it is with great pleasure that we now declare open the Canadian Museum for Human Rights,” Gov. Gen. David Johnston stated as the centre stone — part of a circle of hand-gathered stones from national parks and national historic sites — was set in place during the opening ceremony Friday.
Inside the event, hundreds of dignitaries gathered and heard speeches about the genesis and purpose of the $351-million museum.
Meanwhileoutside, dozens of protesters used the media spotlight to bring attention to issues of murdered and missing women, First Nations water rights, the disappearing traditional lifestyle of First Nations and the Palestinian conflict.
“What happens when these guys over here, with their suits and ties and their outfits, destroy everything?” one First Nations protester yelled.
‘You have to shine a light in some dark corners in Canada’s history because we have to know, I think, where we came from to know where we’re going.’— Stuart Murray, museum president and CEO
As strains of O Canada rang out, it mixed with songs of First Nations women protesting and was punctuated by a woman yelling, “Your museum is a lie.”
One of the first groups to arrive brought their message of the struggle of Palestinian people in Gaza.
They said they feel overlooked and will continue to push in the hopes that eventually they will be featured in the museum.
The protesters said they were upset the issue is not being recognized at the museum, even though they have met with museum representatives over the past couple of years to have it featured in one of the galleries.
Other protesters called on the museum to recognize what they said was the historical “genocide” committed against First Nations by the Canadian government. They drummed, performed ceremonial smudges, chanted and carried placards.
Buffy Sainte-Marie told reporters on Friday afternoon that Canada and the Canadian Museum for Human Rights should be using the term ‘genocide’ to describe the residential school experience. (Jillian Taylor/CBC)
Their sentiments were echoed by legendary Canadian musician Buffy Sainte-Marie, who is performing at the museum’s opening concert Saturday night.
Sainte-Marie told reporters that Canada and the human rights museum should use the term “genocide” to describe the residential school experience.
“I think the museum needs to be much more honest, much more bold and much better informed,” she told reporters Friday afternoon.
“I don’t really think that some of the museum people are truly aware of what our history has been.”
Sainte-Marie admitted that she hadn’t seen all the galleries in the museum yet, but added that her expectations were not high.
Group cancels performance
Saturday’s concert was supposed to feature First Nations DJ group A Tribe Called Red, but the group pulled out on Thursday, citing concerns about how the museum portrays aboriginal issues.
“We feel it was necessary to cancel our performance because of the museum’s misrepresentation and downplay of the genocide that was experienced by indigenous people in Canada by refusing to name it genocide,” the group said in a statement Friday.
“Until this is rectified, we’ll support the museum from a distance.”
Museum president and CEO Stuart Murray said the museum will and should spark protest and debate. The vision for the museum has always been to allow people to voice their opinions, he said.
“The Canadian Museum for Human Rights will open doors for conversations we haven’t had before. Not all of these conversations will be easy. We accept that but we will not shy away,” he said.
Officials said they are open to talking to different groups and will update the museum’s content as human rights issues unfold around the world.
‘The journey is finally beginning’
In addition to the opposition from protesters, the museum has faced construction delays leading up to Friday morning’s grand opening ceremony, which began with an indigenous blessing led by elders, including a First Nations prayer, a Métis prayer and the lighting of an Inuit qulliq, or oil lamp.
The ceremony was attended by numerous dignitaries including the Governor General and former Manitoba premier Gary Doer, who is now Canada’s ambassador to the United States.
Current Manitoba Premier Greg Selinger, Winnipeg Mayor Sam Katz and the museum’s national campaign chair, Gail Asper, spoke at the event, while the program also featured special performances from Canadian vocal quartet the Tenors, YouTube singing star Maria Aragon and Winnipeg singer-songwriter and fiddle player Sierra Noble.
Asper paid tribute to her late parents, Babs and Israel Asper, who were the driving forces behind the museum.
“Neither my father Israel nor my mother Babs [is] here alive to celebrate with us, but I know they would be filled with gratitude and joy that the journey is finally beginning, this beautiful journey of education and, most importantly, action,” Asper said during the ceremony.
A children’s dance finale, representing Canada’s next generation of human rights leaders, concluded the opening ceremonies program.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper wasn’t in attendance. A spokesperson said his schedule did not permit him to be there.
Heritage Minister Shelly Glover, who attended the opening ceremony, said the museum is an important space.
“This is a museum that will provide information and an educational opportunity to so many Canadians, and it’ll make you proud to be a Canadian,” she said.
When asked about the protesters outside, Glover said she would like people to take a look at the museum before judging what’s inside.
Lightning rod for protests, questions
The country’s new national museum is located next to the Forks National Historic Site, where the Red and the Assiniboine rivers meet in downtown Winnipeg.
Designed by world-renowned architect Antoine Predock, the museum with its Tower of Hope and sweeping windows forms a new silhouette on the city’s skyline.
The museum has been a lightning rod for protests, and some academics say they’re concerned the content may be susceptible to interference by governments, donors and special interest groups.
“The most important concern is not the concern of individual communities who are disputing the exact manner in which their wrongs have been depicted, but rather the overall issue of independence,” said Michael Marrus, an expert on international human rights at the University of Toronto.
Glover said at the opening ceremony that the museum “must present a balanced and factually accurate account of both the good as well as the bad.”
Murray said the museum has not been subject to any interference, and the content does expose Canada’s human rights failures.
“You have to shine a light in some dark corners in Canada’s history because we have to know, I think, where we came from to know where we’re going,” he said.
This 400-year-old pine dugout canoe will be on display Sept. 27, 2014, through May 2015 at the Chickasaw Cultural Center as part of “Dugout Canoes: Padding through the Americas.”
SULPHUR, Okla. – In spring 2000, a group of Florida high school students stumbled on the largest treasure trove of ancient dugout canoes ever discovered.
It is believed the Eastside High School students discovered 101 canoes. Some of the vessels are fully intact. Many are mere remnants. When radiocarbon dating was completed, scientists estimated the age of the vessels varied between 500 and 5,000 years old.
What emerged from the discovery is “Dugout Canoes: Paddling through the Americas,” a landmark exhibition to be hosted by the Chickasaw Nation at its expansive Cultural Center in Sulphur from Saturday, Sept. 27, 2014, through May 6, 2015.
The world-class exhibit will open on the same day as the 54th Annual Chickasaw Meeting and 26th Annual Chickasaw Festival gets underway throughout several sites in the 13-country tribal territory.
Dugout canoes were metaphorical pickup trucks for Native Americans. They transported food, family, tribal members, warriors and trade goods. The vessels made travel of great distances possible for Native people.
While none of the 101 dugout canoes discovered by the Gainesville, Florida, students in drought-stricken Newnans Lake 14 years ago will be displayed, ancient vessels recovered from other sites in America may be viewed, studied and researched.
The exhibition tells how infinitely important canoes were to Native Americans; how they were crafted sans modern tools and the exhaustive effort it required to build one seaworthy and with stability.
A 2011 article in The Wall Street Journal makes it clear unearthing the 101 dugout canoes from Newnans Lake would have destroyed the precious crafts. For hundreds of years, the site was covered with ample amounts of water and then exposed to the elements during periods of drought. This see-saw effect degraded the Southern hard pine canoes. In order to fully save them, an inordinately expensive process must be undertaken.
Today, according to the Journal, the dugout canoes are submerged in about 5 feet of water, encased in a protective layer of mud.
A magnificent dugout, almost 19 feet long, will be on display. It was discovered near Gainesville and is the show’s centerpiece that dates to approximately 400 years ago. It is made of pine and has a slightly raised bow and stern. A paddle was discovered with it. Other ancient examples of dugout canoes will be available for viewing.
The exhibit, with various artifacts, shows how Native Americans hunted and fished from the vessels and how they used them for other purposes.
Photos and short videos will also show the high school students’ Newnans Lake excavation and research, how vessels contained in the exhibit were preserved so they could be presented to the public and methods used to construct them by ancient people.
“Dugout Canoes: Paddling through the Americas” will be open to Chickasaw Cultural Center patrons during normal business hours.
The Cultural Center opens at 10 a.m. Monday through Saturday and at noon on Sundays. It closes daily at 5 p.m. The center is closed on all federally-recognized holidays.
Damn, that was big! The People’s Climate March in New York City on Sunday brought out record crowds.
An official count conducted at the People’s Climate March in New York City showed that over 310,000 people participated in the largest climate rally in history — more than tripling pre-march estimates of 100,000. …
Shattering expectations, this official attendee count makes the People’s Climate March New York City’s largest social demonstration in the last decade. Well above the 50,000 who attended Forward on Climate in 2013 and the 80,000 who attended the 2009 march at the Copenhagen climate talks, the 310,000 attendees at today’s demonstration have set world history just days before a UN Summit bringing world leaders together to discuss tangible action on climate change. …
Relying on a crowd density analysis formula developed by a professor of game theory and complex systems at Carnegie Mellon University, the official attendee count calculates the average density of the march crowd over specific intervals, factoring in the surface area covered by the crowd and the speed and duration of the march.
September 19, 2014 – SNOHOMISH COUNTY, Wash. – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has confirmed the presence of enterovirus D68 (EV-D68) in Washington state, including Snohomish and King Counties. The CDC testing confirmed that two children, one from Snohomish County and one from King County who had been hospitalized at Seattle Children’s Hospital has respiratory illness associated with EV-D68.
“The spread of EV-D68 reminds us how important it is to get back to basics: washing hands, covering coughs, & staying home when ill,” said Dr. Gary Goldbaum, MD, MPH, Director and Health Officer of the Snohomish Health District. “And although here is no vaccine for this virus, with flu season approaching, we also need to get vaccinated in order to protect all of us.”
The results of the testing also show that EV-D68 is not alone in causing serious respiratory illness. The tests indicated that a variety of common cold viruses that cause uncomplicated infections in most children can cause severe disease in asthmatics and those with underlying lung diseases.
Many people who get sick from EV-D68 have only mild symptoms, like runny nose or coughing with or without fever. Parents should be watchful for any signs of wheezing or worsening asthma and seek medical help promptly if breathing difficulty occurs. Children and adults with asthma should be sure to take their medications as prescribed and have an asthma control plan with their health care provider. They should contact their healthcare provider promptly if asthma symptoms worsen even after taking medication.
There is no specific treatment or vaccine for EV-D68 infections. Testing is done to determine when the virus is present in the community, but is not helpful for individual patients and is not needed or available in non-hospitalized cases.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Researchers have been scrambling for more than a year to make sense of a strange disease that’s causing West Coast starfish to die by the millions.
Now it looks like help could be coming from Congress.
U.S. Rep. Denny Heck from Olympia introduced a bill Thursday that would dedicate federal funds for researching the epidemic, which has now spread along North America’s Pacific coast from Alaska to Mexico and in some places on the East Coast as well.
The disease has hit more than 20 species of West Coast starfish. Scientists are calling it the largest marine disease outbreak ever recorded.
Drew Harvell, a marine epidemiologist at Cornell University, has been studying the outbreaks in Puget Sound and is leading nationwide efforts to understand the epidemic. She says this legislation is critical because tracking marine disease outbreaks is so challenging.
“Disease outbreaks — they’re like lightning strikes. They occur unpredictably and rapidly,” Harvell says. “To identify their causative microorganisms or stop them from spreading requires significant scientific investigations on really short notice.”
The proposed legislation would establish a plan for declaring and responding to the sea star disease outbreaks as well as future marine disease emergencies.
Harvell says increased funding could speed up the search for what’s causing the disease and for ways to prevent starfish from permanently vanishing from North American coastlines.
“It will allow scientists like me to leverage rapid funding and come up with proactive measures to protect our valuable marine fisheries and biodiversity,” Harvell says.
TULSA, Okla. – The ninth annual Cherokee Art Market will feature 150 inspirational and elite Native American artists from across the nation Oct. 11-12 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the Sequoyah Convention Center at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Tulsa.
Admission is $5 per person.
The finest Native American artwork, representing more than 45 different tribes, will be displayed and sold at the Cherokee Art Market. Pieces include beadwork, pottery, painting, basketry, sculptures and textiles. Guests can also enjoy a variety of cultural and art demonstrations.
“Year in and year out, the Cherokee Art Market has proven to be one of the most prestigious Indian art shows in the country,” said Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Bill John Baker. “Every year our market continues to grow bigger and better. The Cherokee Art Market is a second-to-none showcase featuring world-class artisans in a variety of mediums.”
As part of the two-day event, there will be public demonstrations from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. each day. Demonstrations include jewelry stamp work technique, katsina doll making, pottery, painting and basket weaving.
Alvin Marshall’s sculpture, ‘A Little Girl’s Dream,’ was named Best of Show at the eighth annual Cherokee Art Market.
An awards reception will be held in The Sky Room on Friday, Oct. 10, at 7 p.m. in honor of the Cherokee Art Market prizewinners, with $75,000 in overall prize money awarded across 22 categories. The public is welcome to attend the awards reception for $25 per person. Tickets will be available for purchase at the door.
The Cherokee Nation Foundation will also host its live art auction at the reception to raise funds for scholarships for Cherokee youth. Artists interested in donating should call the foundation at 918-207-0950.
“Best of Show” for the eighth annual Cherokee Art Market went to Alvin Marshall for his sculpture “A Little Girl’s Dream.”
Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Tulsa is located off Interstate 44 at exit 240. For more information, visit www.hardrockcasinotulsa.com or call (800) 760-6700.
