According to a release by Amherst College it is the “most complete collection of Native American literature and history in existence,” and it’s now at the college’s Frost Library in Amherst, Massachusetts.
The collection includes items ranging from religious pamphlets from before the United States existed to first-edition crime by noted novelist Martin Cruz Smith.
“This collection is significant because it is a collection of works written by Native Americans,” College Librarian Bryn Geffert said in a story about the collection. “It presents a unique opportunity for Native American Studies scholars here at Amherst and elsewhere to mine the most complete collection ever compiled by a single collector.”
The Younghee Kim-Wait ’82 Pablo Eisenberg Collection, so named to honor the financial support of alumna Younghee Kim-Wait, who helped make acquiring the collection possible.
The 32 boxes holding some 1,500 volumes written from the 1700s to the 21st century astounded Native American Studies scholars at Amherst, who began the task of unpacking the boxes.
“Since the collection arrived, it is difficult to describe how it has felt—like suddenly being amidst a seemingly infinite living sea, a literary and intellectual tradition that I have been studying and teaching, immersed in, my whole life,” said Lisa Brooks, associate professor of English and American Studies at Amherst College, and co-chair of the Five Colleges Native American Indian Studies program, in the college’s story.
“It is one thing to know it exists, to write about the authors, the networks between them, to teach them in classes, to once in a while, hold a first edition, signed by the author, in your hands,” Brooks added. “It is another to experience that immersion, physically surrounded by these books—some of them hundreds of years old, in perfect condition—and to see that vast network all around you, to visibly see the connections between them, to hold one book after the other in your hands, the pages opening before you, inviting you to know, to understand more.”
It’s been emotional for Kiara Vigil, an assistant professor of American Studies at Amherst.
“I was brought to tears upon finding an original handbook of the Constitutional by-laws for the National Council of American Indians, created and founded by Gertrude Bonnin in 1926,” Vigil said in the story. “Bonnin’s life and writings are central to my first book on turn-of-the-20th-century Native intellectuals. As far as I know no other archival collection, including those that have Bonnin’s personal papers, have a copy of this particular document.”
Michael Kelly, director of archives and special collections at Amherst, says the collection has got it all—even hundreds of items you won’t find at Harvard or Yale.
“The comprehensive nature of the collection is what makes it special. We have the Native American authors you’ve heard of and for every Native American author you’ve heard of there are two dozen you haven’t heard of whose books we also now have,” Kelly said in the story.
And the collection is already being incorporated in the curriculum. Brooks plans on teaching a course focused on Native American literature and intellectual traditions, and Vigil is planning a seminar course called History of the Native Book.
Read the full story by Amherst College’s Peter Rooney, here.
WASHINGTON – In an interview with the Associated Press, President Obama joined the growing chorus of Americans calling for the Washington NFL Team to consider changing its name.
The President noted that the team name is offensive to a “sizeable group of people.” Obama also affirmed the “real and legitimate concerns” of Native peoples – and many others – calling for the team to drop the “R” word.
“President Obama’s remarks underscore the fact that has become increasingly obvious – the Washington franchise is on the wrong side of history,”
said NCAI President Jefferson Keel in a statement responding to the President’s remarks of support.
“The “R” word is a racial slur, deeply offensive to Native Americans. It originated in the bounty paid for Native body parts and human flesh. It does not honor Native peoples in any way and has no place in modern American society.”
“It’s 2013. It’s time for leadership at the Washington team to heed the growing chorus – from high school students to Commissioner Goodell, and now the President of the United States – and close the chapter on this offensive name,”
added NCAI Executive Director Jacqueline Pata.
Background on the 45 Year Effort to Urge the Washington Team to “Drop the R Word”
Removing the name and caricatures associated with the Washington football team and other denigrating sports teams and mascots has long been the position of NCAI, the nation’s oldest, largest, and most representative American Indian and Alaska Native organization serving the broad interests of the nation’s 566 tribal governments and the over 5.2 million Native peoples.
In a soon to be released background paper on the era of racist “Indian” sports mascots, the organization underscores the importance of dropping the “R” word and provides contemporary and historical background on the need to end the era of harmful and racist mascots. Among the key insights from the paper:
The Washington team’s name is part of the racist legacy of the franchise, most prominently represented by former owner George Preston Marshall’s hard fought campaign against racial integration.
Native organizations and tribal nations have undertaken a sustained 45 year campaign to get Washington to change the name – since the team’s name was registered as a trademark.
President Obama joins the DC Mayor and City Council, leaders in Congress, and state governments around the country who have called for an end to racist “Indian” mascots.
There is a growing sense from the NFL itself that considering a name change is warranted. This year alone, Rodger Goodell has noted that “if one person is offended we have to listen” and has responded to racial language by Riley Cooper (who used the “N word”) by calling it “obviously wrong, insensitive, and unacceptable.” Also, former Washington Hall of Famers Art Monk and Darrell Green said a name change “deserves and warrants conversation” because it is offensive to Native peoples.
There is a diverse and growing chorus of organizations standing against the racist name and sporting teams (from high school to college) dropping the “R” word.
Walking the trail to Pratt Lake right now is kind of like walking through a fairy tale. Maybe something like “Alice in Wonderland,” with plenty of crazy toadstools growing everywhere.
I hiked the trail on Saturday, and I’ve never seen so many mushrooms in my life. The recent rains also mean there are many lovely waterfalls, some big and some small, along the way.
My friend and I went out for an 8-mile hike and it ended up being more like 11. We couldn’t resist wandering a bit farther.
Pratt Lake is off I-90. It’s easily accessible; the trailhead is barely off of the interstate. You can clearly hear the road from the parking area. That’s the bad news. The good news is it doesn’t take too long to get down there and the trail isn’t yet buried in snow.
The best news is that the trail is glorious with color right now. (And if you check the weather forecast, you’ll see that a few days later this week look promising for hiking.)
When you start out, you get the lovely browns and greens of a Northwest forest. As you climb, you’ll find more and more mushrooms in many shades of brown, red, orange, yellow and white. I may have gotten carried away taking mushroom photos. As you get higher, you’ll start to see excellent fall color. The vine maples are really putting on a show right now.
By the time you reach the ridge top, at about 4 miles, you’ll be able to see Mount Rainier on a clear day. You can also see the top of the higher peaks nearby are dusted in snow.
The trail splits at about 4 miles. One way (to the left) heads toward Island Lake. The other heads toward Pratt Lake.
If you head toward Island Lake, you will find a lovely lunch spots among an open area of rocks. If you keep going, you’ll get even better views of Mount Rainier.
If you head toward Pratt Lake, you’ll have to drop down (And that means, of course, you’ll have to come up). After hiking down about three-quarters of a mile or so, you’ll be rewarded by hillsides covered in glorious fall colors.
This is not a hard hike. The trail climbs nearly nonstop for about four miles and 2,300 feet, but the trail is wide and the grade is gentle. If you continue down to Pratt Lake, you’ll add another 1.5 miles one-way to your trip. This trail is narrower and steeper. You don’t need to go all the way to the bottom to enjoy the fall colors, though.
The trail is on Forest Service land. You can still hike it, though. As of Saturday, the privy was even still unlocked. (Bring your own TP.) You should probably still display a NW Forest Pass, although it’s unclear if anyone is checking for them.
Directions: To get to the trailhead, head east on I-90 to exit 47. Take a left at the end of the exit. Cross the freeway and then turn left at the T intersection. The trailhead is just a minute or so down the road.
On Sept. 30, 2013, Anna M. Hatch left to be with the good Lord and her loving husband. She was a homemaker for the first twenty years of her marriage, then worked for twenty years at the Tulalip Smoke Shop. Anna leaves behind a brother, Earl (Moxy) Renecker (Bernice-D); a sister, Isabelle Legg (James); three daughters, Karen Bayne (Hatch), Vicki Hatch-Jablonski (Steve), Gloria Hatch (Steve); a grandson, Punkies (Buck-Jones-Hatch), who lived with her since he was born; Isabelle Cervantes and Anna Leigh Hatch who lived with her too; her other grandchildren, Tressa, Anderson (Kenneth M.), Jamen Anderson, Tever Anderson, Jessica Anderson (Luther), Anthony “Tony” Reese (Sarah) and Linzee Jablonski; and 10 great-grandchildren; Anna was preceded in death by her husband, Verle Hatch, of 60 years who passed away in April; brother, Henry (Hank) Gobin who passed in April; her mother, Isabelle Walker Brown; father, Henry Gobin Sr.; and siblings, Shirley, Emery, Daryl, Frank and John. A visitation will be held Wednesday, October 2, 2013 at 1:00 p.m. at Schaefer-Shipman Funeral Home with a service following at the home at 6 p.m. Funeral services will be held Thursday, October 3, 2013 at 10 a.m. at the Tulalip Gym with a burial following at Mission Beach Cemetery. Arrangements entrusted to Schaefer-Shipman Funeral Home – See more at: http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/heraldnet/obituary.aspx?n=anna-m-hatch&pid=167298265&fhid=2242#sthash.QUNbIKlY.dpuf
This Date in Native History: The often misguided and misrepresented spiritual representation of traditional Native practices broke into mainstream media on October 8, 2009 when James Arthur Ray, a 53-year-old “self-help guru,” saw tragedy strike his latest retreat.
Ray, a controversial spiritual leader, offered sweats in a sweat lodge to those willing to shell out almost copy0,000 for a week in Sedona, Arizona. Tragedy struck when three of the participants died, two in the lodge and one in a nearby hospital following a week in a coma.
Ray drew the ire of Indian country from the start as the ceremony he was selling bore little if any resemblance to an actual sweat lodge ceremony.
Indian Country Today Media Network West Coast Editor Valerie Taliman wrote an award-winning opinion piece where she stated, “It was a bastardized version of a sacred ceremony sold by a multimillionaire who charged people $9,695 a pop for his ‘Spiritual Warrior’ retreat in Sedona, Arizona.”
In June of 2011 Ray was found guilty of negligent homicide in the three deaths. The victims participated in the “Spiritual Warrior” retreat, where 18 people were hospitalized for burns, respiratory arrest, kidney failure, loss of consciousness and dehydration.
Taliman was quoted by CNN following the tragedy as saying, “What right does Ray have to mimic, mangle, and manipulate Native ceremonies that have been carefully handed down among indigenous cultures over millennia? Ray does not own any rights to Native spirituality, because they are owned collectively by Indigenous Peoples and cannot be sold.”
Ray however is one of many who Taliman also referred to as a “huckster posing as the real thing” and was only found guilty of a crime when the loss of life occurred.
Following the guilty charge Ray was sentenced to two years in prison and ordered to pay $57,000 in restitution to the families of the victims—he was released from prison on parole on July 12 of this year.
Poverty is a root cause of crime, and without solving the poverty issue it may not be possible to solve the violent crime issues plaguing Indian reservations. Where there are high rates of poverty, so there are high rates of crime. The official poverty rate for individual Indians in the United States on reservations is 29.4 percent, compared to the U.S. national average of 15.3 percent. The reservation poverty rate for Indian families on reservations is 36 percent, compared to the national average of 9.2 percent. Urban Indians have a poverty rate of 22 percent, which is better than reservation poverty rates. Some of the worst poverty rates are on reservations in the states of Washington, California, Wisconsin, Michigan, North Dakota, South Dakota, Arizona and New Mexico, where poverty rates often are higher than 60 percent.
Poverty is associated with low income, high unemployment, poor health, substandard housing, lack of market opportunities, and low educational achievement. Cycles of poverty are extremely difficult to break and tend to last over generations.
Poverty is closely related to social distress. Impoverished persons are more likely to be engaged in underground economy, use drugs and alcohol, which, in turn are highly associatied with violent crimes, domestic violence, and high crime rates.
In 2009, rapes in Indian country outpaced the total in Detroit, which is one of the most violent cities in the United States. Violent crime in Indian country increased during the 2000 to 2010 decade. Over the same decade, national violent crime rates fell, while Indian country violent crime rose by 29 percent.
Murder rates in Indian country increased 41 percent between 2000 and 2009. Nevertheless, federal funding for police and courts serving Indian country declined during the same period. While the decline in federal funding of public safety in Indian country may account for the rise in violent crimes, the funding decline does not account for the persistence of high rates of violent crime. More police, courts and jails will only partially address the fundamental issues of violence associated with poverty and social distress.
A recent study on high violent crime rates in U.S. cities points to the relations between poverty and violent crime. The 10 cities with the highest violent crime rates all had poverty rates over 20 percent, while the cities with the worst violent crime rates had poverty rates from 30 to 41 percent. On a per capita basis, cities provide more funds to police, courts, and jails than Indian reservations.
U.S. cities and counties also pride themselves on having better trained police, courts, and incarceration facilities. The two worse cities for violent crimes were Flint, Michigan, and Detroit, Michigan. Flint has a poverty rate of 40.3 percent and Detroit’s poverty rate is 40.9 percent. These statistics suggest that much of the violent crime on Indian reservations is highly associated with poverty, and increase funding of public safety, by itself, may not significantly curtail violent crime and improve public safety.
Indian reservations with poverty rates above 30 percent are particularly at risk. High rates of violent crime on reservations can be expected on reservations like Pine Ridge and San Carlos, which both have poverty rates over 50 percent. High rates of poverty combined with justice discrimination and cultural marginalization may account for higher rates of violent crime on Indian reservations than the rest of the nation. More investment in police, courts and public safety are necessary, but not sufficient for reducing crime and restoring healthy tribal communities.
More police and courts may help contain violent crimes, but do not address the root causes of crime. Solving the poverty issues in Indian country is only a partial solution. Federal Indian policies, and tribal governments need to meet the challenges of providing college education for tribal youth, achieve market sustainability, provide jobs to tribal members, restore individual health, improve housing, support cultural renewal, and reestablish the exercise the inherent powers of tribal governments. High crime rates are symptoms of deeper social and cultural distress, and there will be no solution to high rates of crime without solving the causes of distress.
SWINOMISH INDIAN RESERVATION – The Swinomish Indian Tribal Community learned Thursday that the Washington State Supreme Court ruled in the Tribe’s favor in a challenge to the Skagit River Instream Flow Rule amendments adopted in 2006 by the Washington Department of Ecology.
The Court’s October 3 decision concludes that Ecology department’s 2006 Skagit Rule amendments are invalid because they are inconsistent with Washington State’s laws to protect minimum instream flows for fish and other environmental values.
“This decision is a huge victory for Swinomish, for salmon, and for the water that salmon need to survive. Ecology had a choice to do the right thing or the wrong thing in 2006, and unfortunately, it chose to do the wrong thing. The Court’s decision vindicates the Tribe’s position and confirms that Ecology cannot make an ‘end run’ around laws that protect instream flows for fish,”
said Swinomish Tribal Chairman Brian Cladoosby.
The 2006 Rule amendments radically changed Ecology department’s original rule, which was adopted in 2001. The 2001 Skagit Instream Flow Rule established minimum instream flow levels for the Skagit River and several important tributaries.
“We spent years collaborating on what became the 2001 Rule with the City of Anacortes, the Public Utility District, Skagit County, Upper Skagit and Sauk-Suiattle Tribes and the State of Washington. The result of those efforts was a good rule based on sound science. Our collective agreement provided certainty for agriculture, for the Cities, for the County and for the Tribes for decades to come,”
Cladoosby continued.
In 2004, Skagit County sued Ecology department challenging the 2001 Rule. Multiparty discussions ensued as the Swinomish and other tribes, water purveyors, and the State tried to resolve the County’s complaints. Eventually, Ecology and the County settled the County’s lawsuit without consulting any of the other parties to the negotiation. In return for Skagit County agreeing to drop its lawsuit, Ecology department agreed to adopt the 2006 Rule Amendments.
The 2006 Rule amendments created 27 “reservations” of water for future out-of-stream use for a wide variety of purposes despite the fact that the senior minimum instream flow right established in 2001 is frequently unmet.
In 2008, the Tribe and the City of Anacortes (the “City”) filed a lawsuit challenging the 2006 Rule amendments. The Tribe and City contended that Ecology’s decision to create the reservations exceeded Ecology department’s authority.
Today, the Washington State Supreme Court agreed that:
“Ecology’s Amended Rule, which made 27 reservations of water for out-of-stream year-round non-interruptible beneficial uses in the Skagit River basin and which would impair minimum flows set by administrative rule, exceeded Ecology’s authority because it is inconsistent with the plain language of the statute and is inconsistent with the entire statutory scheme. The Amended Rule is invalid.”
“We would have preferred to work together to find a solution to everyone’s water needs as we did prior to the original 2001 Rule,”
observed Cladoosby,
“but, Ecology chose to go it alone with the County and we were left without any option other than calling the problems with the 2006 Rule amendments to the attention of a court. If we had not acted, the stream flows needed to support our diminishing salmon stocks would have been further impacted.”
The Swinomish Indian Tribal Community is a federally recognized Indian Tribe with approximately 900 members. Swinomish is a signatory to the 1855 Treaty of Point Elliott, which guarantees the Tribe’s treaty fishing rights. Its 10,000 acre reservation is located 65 miles North of Seattle, Washington on Fidalgo Island and includes approximately 3,000 acres of tidelands.
President Barack Obama recently announced the fifth White House Tribal Nations Conference this year will be held November 13 at the Department of Interior.
President Obama will host the conference that will give leaders from 566 federally recognized tribes the opportunity to interact directly with the president and members of the White House Council on Native American Affairs.
A representative from each of the 566 tribes will be invited to share their concerns and help improve the government-to-government relationship.
In an interview with the Associated Press, President Obama said that if he were Dan Snyder, owner of the Washington D.C. NFL franchise, he would consider changing the football team’s name.
“If I were the owner of a team and I knew that there was a name of my team–even if it had a storied history–that was offending a sizeable group of people, I’d think about changing it,” Obama said to the AP.
Snyder, the Redskins owner, has said that he would never change the team’s name, but has been urged by Native American leaders, media outlets and U.S. lawmakers to change it. This is the first time that the president has publicly weighed in on the name-change debate.
Last month, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, who previously agreed with Snyder, shifted his stance on the issue slightly, saying that those who are offended by the name should be considered. “All these mascots and team names related to Native Americans, Native Americans feel pretty strongly about it,” Obama told the AP. “And I don’t know whether our attachment to a particular name should override the real legitimate concerns that people have about these things.”
U.S. colleges and universities have changed mascot names that were offensive to Native Americans. According to the AP, St. John University changed its name from the Redmen to the Red Storm, Marquette is the Golden Eagles instead of the Warriors and Stanford University was the Indians, now they’re the Cardinals.
Obama also said he understands that fans have a long-standing attachment to their team and they don’t “mean offense” by supporting them. “I don’t want to detract from the wonderful Redskins fans that are here. They love their team and rightly so.”
NFL owners are meeting in Washington on Monday for their fall meetings and a protest against the team name is planned.
“The President has heard and given voice to the major national Native organizations, parents, educators and students who have long called for an end to race-based stereotypes in sports,”said Suzan Shown Harjo, a Native American policy advocate who is the lead plaintiff in the trademark challenge to the Washington Redskins name.”These public slurs — even when used by enthusiastic fans who have no ill intent — cause harm and injury to our young people and can no longer be tolerated in polite society.”
Obama said he doesn’t have a direct stake in the Redskins name debate because he is not a team owner, according to USAToday.com. But he hinted that it was an interest of his.
“Maybe after I leave the presidency,” Obama said. “I think it would be a lot of fun.”
Citing the 1987 Proxmire Act, which enables the United States to prosecute acts of genocide, the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe has asked the federal government to file suit against the state of South Dakota for crimes against tribal children. The tribe’s homeland is in the prairies and badlands of North and South Dakota; one of its most revered leaders was Sitting Bull, who is said to have prayed Native forces to victory at the Battle of the Little Bighorn.
Standing Rock’s tribal council urged the United States to take action in a September 17 resolution claiming that South Dakota has been taking its children into care and adopting them out of the tribe illegally, in violation of the Indian Child Welfare Act. The resolution was passed the day after a child-welfare advocate informed the council that a young tribal member whom the state’s Department of Social Services (DSS) had placed with a white adoptive couple was homeless on the streets of Aberdeen, South Dakota.
The advocate, Shirley Schwab, recalled tracking down the 18-year-old. “When she came into the Burger King where we’d agreed to meet, I saw that her life had been reduced to what she could fit into a small blue duffel bag. No driver’s license, no money, no cell phone, little more than the clothes on her back.”
“When she turned 18, she exercised her right to live on her own,” said the teen’s adoptive mother, Wendy Larson Mette. “As far as I knew, she was living with friends, going to school.”
Schwab said a fellow Aberdeen resident had contacted her about the teen’s plight because of Schwab’s prior knowledge of the girl. Public court records show that in 2010, the teen and her siblings reported that their adoptive father, Richard Mette, had sexually and physically abused them for more than a decade. A deputy state’s attorney initiated a law-enforcement investigation. Police visited Richard and Wendy Larson Mette’s house and found sex toys and stacks of pornographic magazines and videotapes in bedrooms and common areas. The children were moved to another home. Schwab became their court-appointed special advocate.
DSS appears to have been long aware that this was a problem household. As early as 2001, Richard and Wendy signed an agreement, now a court document, with DSS. In the agreement, the couple, who are divorced, promised DSS officials to lock up their pornography and stop “swatting, spanking, kicking and tickling” the foster children placed with them. DSS later allowed the couple to adopt most of the children.
When asked if she believed her children had been sexually abused, Larson Mette said, “I fully believe and support my children in this accusation.” She said she found her ex-husband’s treatment of the children “horrifying,” but said that over the years, she had never noticed any indications of the sexual abuse, including related injuries or behavioral changes: “What are perceived to be the obvious signs were not there. They had great attendance in school.”
Larson Mette called the 2010 police report accurate in terms of “room location or quantity” of pornography, but claimed that over the years she had personally seen only some of the material.
Court records and local media reports show that South Dakota cut a deal with the father, who is now serving the relatively light sentence of 15 years for child rape. The state dropped cruelty charges against Larson Mette, and despite allegations that she had tolerated the sexual abuse, returned the children to her.
The state then undertook to discredit publicly the children and their advocates. This included a retaliatory prosecution of Schwab and the deputy state’s attorney, who were fully acquitted at trial. Court documents and sworn testimony show state criminal investigators took the teen and her younger siblings to a basement interrogation room in order to get them to recant the abuse claims. The children were interrogated individually, without an adult present on their behalf. They wept and said they were frightened, but none recanted.
“When I met the 18-year-old and saw what her life had become after such trauma, I was devastated,” said Schwab. “I could hardly breathe.”
Within a few days of Schwab contacting Standing Rock, the tribe had flown the teen to safety with tribal kin out of state. “Our chairman said, ‘She’s our relative, get the plane ticket now,’” recalled tribal councilwoman Phyllis Young, who added that adoptive and foster parents have been known to turn children away after they turn 18 and government subsidies end.
Young said that three Standing Rock children remain in the Larson Mette home, and the tribe is very concerned about their safety; as a result, it will sue for custody. The councilwoman noted that in recent years Standing Rock children have been victims in notorious and widely reported South Dakota cases involving sexual abuse by white adoptive fathers, all of whom are serving time.
“If they file, I will do whatever is necessary,” said Larson Mette. “My children are happy. I love them, they love me. We are trying desperately to put our lives back together and move forward.” She called that a “fair” representation of their situation.
In addition to moving to protect young tribal members, Standing Rock has requested that the South and North Dakota Congressional delegations hold hearings on Indian child welfare. The tribe has also contacted the United Nations about submitting material for the United States’ upcoming human-rights review.
Importantly, the tribe is working with the federal government to develop its own child-welfare infrastructure. This will help solve a problem that tribes and Indian-child-welfare advocates have long decried—South Dakota’s habit of taking Native children into custody and placing them in white households and white-run group homes, thereby undermining tribal culture and sovereignty. The Oglala and Rosebud Sioux tribes and the American Civil Liberties Union recently sued the state in a related matter.
“This all epitomizes the state of South Dakota’s total disregard for Native children,” said Schwab.
Neither South Dakota’s attorney general nor DSS director replied to requests for comments on any of these matters.
“The language of the Standing Rock tribal council resolution is both specific and global,” said Young. “We act on behalf of this teen and her siblings, and for all Native children who have been taken from their tribal communities.” The Proxmire Act includes reparations, she said, and the tribe wants the children’s reparations to include lifelong therapy for the abuse they have suffered.
“What is happening to our children is like war crimes,” Young continued. “We heard terrible things at hearings we just held at Standing Rock. Over the years, many Indian women have asked me to help get their children back. Some of our children the state has in its custody right now are Sitting Bull descendents. This has historic dimensions. We at Standing Rock are taking this to the limit.”
