Born in 1940 as a member of the Flathead Nation, Jaune Quick-to-See Smith started her life on the Confederated Salish and Kootneai Reservation in Montana, with lineage from French, Shoshone, and Cree ancestors. Smith and her sister grew up primarily with their father in California and in several reservations in Washington State, after their mother abandoned them when Smith was two years of age. Smith was put to work at an early age to help out her family who struggled financially. Smith’s upbringing was not an easy one, as she was moved around between foster homes and public schools where she was ridiculed for being an American Indian. Though school and her childhood were both uncomfortable and complicated for Smith, she discovered the artistic …show more content…
By incorporating flowers and leaves such as roses and sunflowers, she references some of the beadwork that can be seen on Flathead clothing and in turn recognizes her grandmother Nellie Quick-to-See’s exceptional beadwork. Smith also incorporates an image of a turkey from a coloring book which she collages under the layers of text in order to comment on the stereotyped stories and tales of the Indians and Americans on what is now called Thanksgiving. Through the use of many other images such as an Indian man wearing an elaborate headdress, an attractive women, several newspaper clippings reading “Interior Secretary Signature Validates Gambling Compacts”, and imagery of advertisements involving Indians on horseback, Smith creates a strain between the different perceptions that people have on who Native American people …show more content…
In some of her earlier works, more notably Winds of Change (1992), Smith relies on symbols, reference to nature, patterns and colors, rather than text and recognizable imagery to tell her story. By using traditional native imagery in combination with contemporary native imagery, Smith refers to the fact that modern life does indeed exist on the reservation and it is not constrained to the past. In an interview with Smith she explains QUOTE: “My cultural heritage gives me in-depth and political content, a narrative in my work, a worldview as well as design elements that are based on nature,” Quick-to-See Smith said. “It also helps me to see the flip side of things, a particularly Native way of applying humor, which is part of
Shoemaker, Nancy. “ Native-American Women in History.” OAH Magazine of History , Vol. 9, No. 4, Native Americans (Summer, 1995), pp. 10-14. 17 Nov. 2013
Modern day Native American are widely known as stewards of the environment who fight for conservation and environmental issues. The position of the many Native American as environmentalists and conservationists is justified based on the perception that before European colonists arrived in the Americas, Native Americans had little to no effect on their environment as they lived in harmony with nature. This idea is challenged by Shepard Krech III in his work, The Ecological Indian. In The Ecological Indian, Krech argues that this image of the noble savage was an invented tradition that began in the early 1970’s, and that attempts to humanize Native Americans by attempting to portray them as they really were. Krech’s arguments are criticized by Darren J Ranco who in his response, claims that Krech fails to analyze the current state of Native American affairs, falls into the ‘trap’ of invented tradition, and accuses Krech of diminishing the power and influence of Native Americans in politics. This essay examines both arguments, but ultimately finds Krech to be more convincing as Krech’s
The story Navajo Lessons conveys the theme that “It is important to learn and appreciate your heritage.” This story is about a girl, Celine, and her brother that visit her grandmother on the Navajo reservation in Arizona. Celine arrives at a place in the middle of nowhere at her grandmother’s house and is not excited because she had better plans for the summer. Her family is encouraging her to deal with it and make something good out of it. Over time, Celine learns that this trip was worth it because she realized that it is important to learn and appreciate your heritage. Celine learned this in many ways, one of them being that she wanted to learn and listen to the stories that her grandmother was telling.
We turn back the clock as Welch draws on historical sources and Blackfeet cultural stories in order to explore the past of his ancestors. As a result, he provides a basis for a new understanding of the past and the forces that led to the deciding factor of the Plains Indian tribes. Although Fools Crow reflects the pressure to assimilate inflicted by the white colonizers on the Blackfeet tribes, it also portrays the influence of economic changes during this period. The prosperity created by the hide trade does not ultimately protect the tribe from massacre by the white soldiers. It does, however, effectively change the Blackfeet economy and women's place in their society. Thus, it sets the stage for the continued deterioration of their societal system. Although their economic value is decreased, women still represent an important cog in the economic structure. Indeed, women are central to the survival of the Blackfeet tribal community that Welch creates and in many ways this strength and centrality provide background for the strength of the women depicted in his more contemporary novels. Welch's examination of the past leads to a clearer understanding of the present Blackfeet world presented throughout his work.
Lives for Native Americans on reservations have never quite been easy. There are many struggles that most outsiders are completely oblivious about. In her book The Roundhouse, Louise Erdrich brings those problems to light. She gives her readers a feel of what it is like to be Native American by illustrating the struggles through the life of Joe, a 13-year-old Native American boy living on a North Dakota reservation. This book explores an avenue of advocacy against social injustices. The most observable plight Joe suffers is figuring out how to deal with the injustice acted against his mother, which has caused strife within his entire family and within himself.
Jerilynn Webster; also known as ‘JB The First Lady’, is an Indigenous Vancouver based beat-boxer, hip-hop artist, activist, aboriginal youth educator and a single mother (News, CBC). Jerilynn is a proud Indigenous member of the Nuxalk and Cayuga (Six) Nation (Jb the First Lady) who immensely contributes to her community. She was born in Moosejaw, Saskatchewan in an impoverished ‘single-parent, Christian home” (Warner). Upon her arrival to Vancouver; at the age of 14, she was flooded by a culture-shock of experienced racism and discrimination as people negatively labelled her with elements of her race and culture (Hong). It was after this incident that she began to become aware of the profound issues living in a white-dominated city. She often attended the friendship centre where she felt at home and began her own career as an emcee, director and actor (Hong). She also began recording in a studio called KAYA (Knowledge Aboriginal Youth Association) (Hong). Seeing that her childhood memories restricted her from listening to music with the exception of Christian or ‘50s music (Warner), in her lyrics, Jerilynn delivers messages of racism, discrimination, effects of residential schooling, female empowerment, female experiences, and other politicized topics (JB The First Lady). Jerilynn states, “Using my words to go upwards/ not backwards”, she strives to empower, motivate and encourage the Native culture to fulfill their dreams and achieve the unachievable(Jb the First Lady). More importantly, Jerilynn’s motive is to “...capture the moment and the environment that we’re in, but come with a female perspective”(News, CBC). Thus, drawing on feminist and intersectional theories, this paper will highlight JB The First lady’s demonstration o...
Jim had a rough childhood. His mother and father had 11 children, six of which died at an early age. He had a very close relationship with his brother; they did everything together. They hunted, fished, played sports, and rode horses, and when pneumonia took the life of young Charles; Jim was heartbroken. Due to his death, Jim fell into a depression. He lost interest in athletics and his schooling, and constantly ran away from school. In 1898, his father, who was of European descent, sent him to Haskell Indian Junior College; a government managed boarding school located about 300 miles away from home in Lawrence, Kansas. This school took in young Native Americans and tried to “civilize” them. Jim was not permitted to speak his native Sac and Fox language and was forced to let go of his Indian traditions. Jim still held dear to his heritage despite these circumstances. It was here where he first wa...
Duane Champagne in Social Change and Cultural Continuity Among Native Nations explains that there has never been one definitive world view that comprises any one Native American culture, as there is no such thing as one “Native community” (2007:10). However, there are certain commonalities in the ways of seeing and experiencing the world that many Native communities and their religions seem to share.
Jaune Quick-to-see Smith is an instrumental and influential modern day artist due to her Native American Background, her medium, and her vision. Her piece Indian Country Today is one that represents who she is as an artist as well as where she came from and where she hopes her people will go. Throughout her life, Quick-to-see Smith overcame racism and oppression from within her community and from outside of it, while connecting with her familial artistic past to become the artist she is today. Her work Indian Country Today is an influential piece stemming from her people’s history, current situation within the United States, as well as her hopes for the future of her people. This piece is dramatic and captivating, creating a sense of unity within the Native American community while acknowledging that these nations continue to be unrecognized by the larger American community, something Quick-to-see Smith feels needs to be remedied.
On his way to the reservation he stops at a trading post the final stop before arriving at the reservation. He examined the various Native American knick-knacks, trinkets, and at one point he tries on a headdress that. He goes on to questions whether any Native American would have these items in their home.
As a result, both films represent Native Americans from the point of view of non-Native directors. Despite the fact that they made use of the fabricated stereotypes in their illustrations of the indigenous people, their portrayal was revolutionary in its own times. Each of the films adds in their own way a new approach to the representation of indigenous people, their stories unfolding in a different way. These differences make one look at the indigenous not only as one dimensional beings but as multifaceted beings, as Dunbar says, “they are just like us.” This is finally a sense of fairness and respect by the non-native populations to the Native Indians.
In our day and age where our youth are becoming more aware of the history of the country and the people who inhabit it, the culture of Native Americans has become more accessible and sparks an interest in many people young and old. Recent events, like the Dakota Access Pipeline, grab the attention of people, both protesters and supporters, as the Sioux tribe and their allies refuse to stay quiet and fight to protect their land and their water. Many Native people are unashamed of their heritage, proud of their culture and their ancestors. There is pride in being Native, and their connection with their culture may be just as important today as it was in the 1800’s and before, proving that the boarding school’s ultimate goal of complete Native assimilation to western culture has
Pages one to sixty- nine in Indian From The Inside: Native American Philosophy and Cultural Renewal by Dennis McPherson and J. Douglas Rabb, provides the beginning of an in-depth analysis of Native American cultural philosophy. It also states the ways in which western perspective has played a role in our understanding of Native American culture and similarities between Western culture and Native American culture. The section of reading can be divided into three lenses. The first section focus is on the theoretical understanding of self in respect to the space around us. The second section provides a historical background into the relationship between Native Americans and British colonial power. The last section focus is on the affiliation of otherworldliness that exist between
Nevertheless, in the author’s note, Dunbar-Ortiz promises to provide a unique perspective that she did not gain from secondary texts, sources, or even her own formal education but rather from outside the academy. Furthermore, in her introduction, she claims her work to “be a history of the United States from an Indigenous peoples’ perspective but there is no such thing as a collective Indigenous peoples’ perspective (13).” She states in the next paragraph that her focus is to discuss the colonist settler state, but the previous statement raises flags for how and why she attempts to write it through an Indigenous perspective. Dunbar-Ortiz appears to anchor herself in this Indian identity but at the same time raises question about Indigenous perspective. Dunbar-Ortiz must be careful not to assume that just because her mother was “most likely Cherokee,” her voice automatically resonates and serves as an Indigenous perspective. These confusing and contradictory statements do raise interesting questions about Indigenous identity that Dunbar-Ortiz should have further examined. Are
For as much good as the spreading of a new culture intended, the Native American culture suffered immeasurably. Her authentic writing is very much focused around the joining of practical and symbolic objects in Native American culture. Many Native Americans were uneducated and poor and placed more value in intrinsic qualities. She tells stories of struggle and triumph, but through the eyes of a Native American which more completely value symbolic and spiritual goals. As she personally witnessed what the whites has done to the Dakota people, she wrote in reflection, “few there are who have paused to question whether real life or long-lasting death lies beneath this semblance of civilization.” Zitkala Sha made it one of her life goals to educate others about this imbalance between the two cultures sharing a common land. For too long prior, many of the images and stories of Native Americans were written by white men, lacking an unauthentic view into true Native American daily life and oftentimes written with disregard of Native American