Wilma Mankiller at CSU Sonoma

Wilma Mankiller

The Wilma Mankiller video was a clip from a presentation at a California college where Wilma visited.  She discussed what it is like to an American Indian today, and also addressed the false notions that many people still have concerning Native Americans.  It was interesting to hear her speak about all of the different ways in which tribal leaders are chosen by different tribes.  Wilma Mankiller herself was a Cherokee leader.  She talked about some tribes where the leaders are elected by the people, and others where a leading body is elected by the people first, and then that body elects the leading chairperson.  One fact that she brought up in this discussion, that I enjoyed learning, was that in the Onondaga tribes, to this day, women are in charge of electing a leader and only the women can take that position away.  

What stuck with me most after listening to Wilma Mankiller’s presentation was when she spoke about negative thoughts, and how that energy can eventually affect the person.  She was speaking about values at the time, and how she likes to maintain a positive attitude; without it, you won’t accomplish anything.  I agree with this point and respect her a lot for not relying on anger to make her voice heard in this loud world. 

Wilma Mankiller moved to San Francisco when she was young

I have really enjoyed learning about contemporary Native Americans through sources including Wilma Mankiller’s video and Anton Treuer’s book, Everything You Wanted to Know about Indians but Were Afraid to Ask.  Many people, including myself, are too quick to envision stereotypical or historic versions of different cultures, but never take the time to learn what those cultures and people have become.  It was good to hear it from Wilma, a Native American, that just because Native Americans drive cars, and don’t wear buckskin, and listen to ipods, it doesn’t mean that they do not think like Native Americans anymore.  Their tribal values are still very much a part of who they are.  Listening to Wilma Mankiller talk about what it is like to be an American Indian today was an eye-opening experience that I hope will stay with me after this course is finished.

Cite: CSU Sonoma. “Wilma Mankiller.” YouTube.com. Online video clip. YouTube, 6 Feb 2008. Web. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVLgwpHSYv0

Treuer, Anton. Everything You Wanted to Know about Indians but Were Afraid to Ask.  St. Paul: Borealis Books, 2012. Print.

M03: Web Resources-NAJA

I reviewed the NAJA website; NAJA stands for the Native American Journalists Association.  I had never heard of this organization before, so it was very interesting to sift through the site. 

NAJA was inspired by writings such as those found in The Cherokee Phoenix, a newspaper that started in 1828 (the first bilingual Native newspaper).  The actual association has been around since 1984, starting with a conference of thirty journalists at the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma.  Back then it was known as the Native American Press Association (NAPA), but in six years it had transformed into the Journalists Association.  The first meeting of the thirty original NAJA journalists was actually at Penn State one year before the gathering in Oklahoma, but the organization was not concrete until ’84.

The Cherokee Phoenix

Pamela M. Silas has been a part of NAJA for twenty-five years, and is now the executive director of the Association.  There is quite a bit of information on her as well due to her community leadership and influence in NAJA.   

The NAJA base is still the University of Oklahoma.  They have built the organization enough to be able to supply students with many resources, including scholarships and projects in media, as well as the community, the goal being to “enrich journalism and promote Native cultures.”  The website even contains information about upcoming conferences: they list dates, locations, and registration forms and information for people who are interested in getting involved. 

I was surprised and pleased to see that the site also has links to job listings and a legal hotline (for anyone with legal questions), two more ways in which the organization provides for the Native American community.      

The Beginning of NAJA

Module 02 - Tulalip Tribes Resource

In the Module 02 Cultural Based Online Resources section I discovered the link to the Tulalip cultural website.  The site is provided by the Hibulb Cultural Center and Natural History Preserve in Washington state.  The Tulalip tribes include the Snohomish, Snoqualmie, Skagit, Suiattle, Samish and Stillaguamish along with other allied tribes.

[When I read “Suiattle” I immediately thought “Seattle,” because it is Washington; it turns out that the Tulalip Reservation is about 30 miles away from Seattle (part of the mid-Puget Sound), but I wonder if one name affected the creation of the other.] 

This site contains many links to different aspects of the Hibulb Cultural Center.  There are short video clips (called the Tulalip History Minute) on the site that demonstrate various exhibits and treasured resources of the Center.  The first clip I watched told about the actual center which possesses two classrooms, a longhouse, a research library, certified collections and archeological repository, as well as having a permanent exhibit and temporary exhibit displayed.  The classrooms are used to teach the traditional language, Lushootseed, as well as other classes for basket making, beading and carving as a way to “try and bring back our culture.”

A couple of the videos showed exhibits from the Center, such as basketry (much of which is donated by families and is over a hundred years old) and photographs that they have.  There is a lot of history to be learned from this site about the Native American tribes on the West Coast.  Being from the East Coast, I loved learning more about tribes from that side of the United States. 

The Native American children were still taken away from their homes to go to boarding schools as they were all across the United States.  The video on early education provided me with knowledge about the boarding system that I had not known before; in 1907 the Tulalip boarding school contained two hundred students who were treated “as if they were in a military school.”  Not only were they subjected to inspections, and were punished for speaking their own languages, they had to work in the fields and sew their own clothes.  (This was apparently the government’s idea of teaching the children to be self-sufficient.) 

However, the people have not lost their culture entirely.  The site provides information on some of the ceremonies that are still part of Tulalip culture including the Salmon Ceremony to bless the fishing season in the summer, and the Winter Dances where all the tribes come together and the spiritual dancers perform traditional dances. 

What I also liked about this site is that many of the people in the old photographs, or who made the artifacts such as the baskets, are relatives of the people there now.  One woman pointed out her grandmother in a black-and-white picture from the boarding school.  This enhances the experience of learning about the Tulalip people and their history because the subjects of that history and the artifacts are not just random people; they share the blood of the people speaking about them which makes it more personal and real. 
I would really recommend checking this site out; there are so many different links with a ton of resources to learn more about the Tulalip.

Tulalip Tribes - Who We Are

Module 01 Web Resources

One of the valuable web resources available for Module 01 is the link to the US: Virtual Library that brought up the page for USA History; Native American Bibliography.  The perspective of this source seems to favor Native Americans, as far as not down-playing the struggles they have faced since their first contact with Europeans.  One source that shows this is a book by Kah-Ge-Ga-Gah-Bowh, George Coplin, called Indian Life and Indian History by an Indian Author; in the preface he states his wish for his words to aide in the relations and understandings between the “race of red-men” and the “pale-face.”  There is also a link to an article by the US Congress Joint Special Committee that further discusses the interactions of the US government and the tribes; this Condition of the Indian Tribes brings forth many of the issues the tribes are facing without sugarcoating too much.  This library provides information on the history of different tribes, and the relations between the Native Americans and the Europeans (as well as the United States government).  Another neat thing about this resource is that there are many links to articles about individual tribes; these pages give a lot of interesting information that is specific to certain tribes, such as Tales from the Totems of the Hidery where James Deans describes the life of the Hidery people, from houses to specific values to legends.  There are also links to resources specific to the Zuni, the Hopi, the Diné, the Iroquois and many more.   

First Peoples of North America

Just testing this out!