When Authenticity Matters

As a woman in today’s culture, I can’t deny that I love a new piece of jewelry. Be it a gift from a special someone or window-shopping at the mall, I am attracted to the shiniest thing in the display case. Buying the most unique item in the store is often the goal, with hopes of receiving compliments and interest at the next cocktail party. The unique item for the Spring 2012 fashion season is turquoise jewelry. Turquoise in the United States has been associated with southwestern Native American culture broadly for many years, but what do the current wearers of turquoise really know about the native culture it hails from? How do big name sellers of this trending jewelry, which include the Smithsonian Institution, represent the culture in which these items are made?

An example of popular symbols made out of turquoise for sale.

Turquoise has been a prized gemstone for thousands of years, cultivated in desert regions of the Middle East like Egypt and Persia, as well as the Southwestern region of the United States. Among native cultures it is known for its medicinal powers, giving the wearer both physical and mental healing for ailments. The Navajo, who are currently one of the largest craft groups of authentic turquoise jewelry, have historically carved turquoise in to a variety of shapes and sizes to serve multiple religious and aesthetic purposes. Today’s southwestern culture of turquoise manifests itself in craft goods made by native people for profit. Beginning in the 1850’s, creating metal-worked gemstone jewelry became a trade business. First by the Navajo, then the Hopi and the Zuni, turquoise jewelry was produced among other things to bring much needed revenue to native tribes. Turquoise jewelry created for trade consumption is much different than personally made adornments for native people, created as “an amalgam of actual Southwestern Native American symbols and superfluous designs contrived to fit the tourist idea of what Indian jewelry ought to look like.”[1]. Turquoise jewelry has become increasingly popular among tourists ever since.

The most unlikely places now sell turquoise because it is “popular” this fashion season. Museums have not ignored this trending market for capitol. The largest museum system in the United States, the Smithsonian Institution, is following these fashions. At SmithsonianStore.com, you can find a wide variety of turquoise jewelry. There is a small section on each buying page that offers what they call a “Museum Provenance”. Flipping through the different pieces, I realized that this “provenance” was exactly the same paragraph for each Native American piece. The information given ironically suggests that turquoise was “originally used exclusively for Navajo ceremonies and religious rituals”[2], acknowledging that this gem might be a sacred ritual item to this culture, but is still available for purchase. The artist or the community they come from is completely unmentioned. Visitors and online shoppers alike are able to buy turquoise without visiting or having any knowledge about any native culture. While connecting it to the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) collection broadly, there is no detail of the why these objects connect to collection items, other than that they are Native American made.

A native jewelry maker passes this tradition to a young boy, likely his son.

The general non-native public is willing to purchase these pieces because they are “trendy” and want to say they own a piece of native culture, regardless of who has made it. However, finding a connection to who made these pieces can bring authenticity to the purchase. Having worked at Mesa Verde National Park in southern Colorado, I have seen native materials handled and sold much differently. Many tribes sell trade items at this National Park Site, including jewelry and pottery. Each native made pot, for example, comes with a small card that has a picture of the artist, their tribe and a description of their art training. This encourages future sales for artists and provides a personal connection and appreciation for their craft. There is no doubt this pottery is an authentic piece, in both provenance and in the character that created this beautiful work of art. If this principle where applied to the jewelry sold at the Smithsonian Store, an added layer of artistic appreciation could help provide recognition to native craft people and their beautiful pieces.

This authenticity is what gives you the most unique piece in the room.

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[1] http://www.camerontradingpost.com/turquoisehx.html

[2] http://www.smithsonianstore.com/jewelry/turquoise-jewelry/taos-turquoise-drop-necklace-45499.html

Photos:

http://www.southwestshowroom.com/categories/vintage-jewelry_page_1.html

http://www.visualphotos.com/image/1×5074231/native_american_jewelry_making

Awkward Understanding

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

I was an exceptionally awkward teenager. I typically had few, if any friends. I conversed more easily with adults twenty to thirty years my senior than I ever did with my compatriots. The only place I really felt like I belonged was on the football team, but even then, my tendency to read books in excess of 1,000 pages before, after, and sometimes during practice set me apart from my teammates. I rarely dated, though that trend continued even into my adulthood. I became used to being described as weird. And, while my experience was unique in its details, it is a completely normal experience for any teenager in America to feel like he or she doesn’t fit with the in crowd (even if you happen to be in the in crowd).

All of this served to make reading The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie all the more easy for me. While Mr. Alexie specifically wrote the non-fictional fiction for young adult audiences, his use of the awkward and lonely experience of Arnold Spirit, Jr. in his first year at high school made his story immediately accessible to me, though I have been out of high school for ten years. I can imagine that this was, of course, Mr. Alexie’s goal: to write a book that exposes non-Native youth to an experience that is at once intimate and unfamiliar, the life of a Native American teenager on a reservation.

Having lived in a city that is partially ensconced within the largest reservation in Michigan, I was more familiar with the topics of domestic violence, poverty, substance abuse, and low expectations than I think Mr. Alexie’s intended audience is in general. I also held a job at an institution owned and operated by the economic development corporation run by the tribe, and interacted with many of the archetypical characters found within Mr. Alexie’s novel. I met Arnold’s family, who dealt with substance abuse and poverty on a daily basis. I conversed with his Grandmother and Uncle Eugene. I even met many people who took the brave steps that Arnold did to break free of the cycle of poverty, and who probably had many of the same questions and trials as Arnold in trying to find their own identity.

Image Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

This is the strength of Mr. Alexie’s novel. He uses the teenage quest for identity that we all experience to discuss issues that represent an epidemic of poverty among a part of America that the general public never really tries to understand. If they did, then no one would wear hats with the Cleveland Indians logo, or jackets that say “Redskins” in red and gold, Land O’ Lakes butter wouldn’t be on the shelves, and there wouldn’t be a concrete Tepee east of Cherry Valley on U.S. Route 20 in New York (where no tribes ever built tepees). But remedying these surface issues is only the start. If poverty and racism are going to end, then education and skill-building amongst all populations in the United States are necessary.

“Geronimo EKIA”

On May 1, Americans discovered that the United States military had killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden during a raid on a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. As I watched CNN with my roommates, the television commentators announced that the military code name for the operation to capture bin Laden was “Geronimo.” When I heard the name, I immediately knew that there would be a backlash against associating the killing of one of the United State’s greatest terrorist threats with the name of a Native American hero.  Sure enough, on May 5, national news magazines began reporting the anger of many Native Americans over the military’s use of Geronimo’s name.

You can already buy a T-Shirt with the phrase "Geronimo EKIA (Enemy Killed in Action)" on it. Photo from redbubble.com, May 2011.

Native American groups, particularly the Apache, were deeply insulted by the military’s use of Geronimo’s name to refer to bin Laden’s capture. Geronimo was an Apache leader who fought against American and Mexican expansion into his tribal lands. He eluded capture by United States forces for twenty-eight years (1858 – 1886), finally negotiating a surrender with a cavalry unit sent to return him to the United States dead or alive. Today, Geronimo has a complicated legacy. He embarrassed the United States army for decades and led raids that resulted in the deaths of many Americans and Mexicans, yet Native American groups look to him as a brave leader who fought against decades of American exploitation of Apaches and other tribes. Indeed, today the United States military occasionally uses the word “Geronimo” as shorthand for bravery during risky maneuvers and operations [1].

The military claims that the code name for the operation was chosen at random. Does anyone really believe that excuse? I certainly do not. In an article published on May 3, BBC News tracked military and media comparisons of Geronimo and Osama bin Laden back to 2001 [2]. The name Geronimo has a symbolic meaning for the United States military and the historical parallels point to them purposely choosing it for the operation. Perhaps the military believed that the code name would never be publicly revealed and that they would never have to account for it. Now that it has been revealed, should the President apologize to Native Americans, as several groups have called on him to do?

Ultimately, the President must answer that question himself. I am more interested in the fact that the military denies purposely choosing Geronimo as the operation’s code name. By refusing to acknowledge that its actions have offended some Native Americans, the United States government only worsens the insult. In class this week, we discussed the many issues that hinder the Native American community in the United States. One large problem is the refusal of many Americans to acknowledge the historical destruction of Native American people, traditions, and livelihoods and the depressed reality of many modern Native Americans. The military’s unwillingness to admit that it did anything wrong mirrors this shortsightedness. The military would be better served by admitting the reasons why it chose Geronimo as a code name and engaging in a discussion with the Native American community over Geronimo’s complicated legacy and the implications of invoking his name.

[1] Kathryn Westcott. Osama bin Laden: Why Geronimo? BBC News, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-13265069, May 3, 2011.

[2] Ibid.

Bringing History Home

Noongar Elder Uncle Angus shared his personal experience as a child of the Stolen Generations with Colgate students at Marribank, formerly Carrolup, in Western Australia. June 2008.

“How can you criticize our history? You did the same thing in America to the Indians.”

I was on the Perth subway with several classmates two days after arriving in Australia. In a casual conversation with the stranger, a classmate had explained that we were spending time with members of the Noongar tribe in Western Australia. “Oh, watch out for those aboriginals. They steal,” he had told us.

This answer had taken us aback. While we knew Aboriginal people in Australia still faced racism in daily life, we didn’t expect to encounter it ourselves in the first days of our trip. Further, we had not anticipated this criticism of our own history when another classmate mentioned that we had been studying Australia’s Stolen Generations. But the man on the subway was right about one thing: both our nations have checkered pasts in terms of the treatment of our native populations. Even our country’s history with Indian Boarding Schools mirrors Australia’s efforts to “smooth the dying pillow” of Aboriginal cultures through harsh, assimilatory educational efforts.

As I read Sherman Alexie’s An Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, I started to think about this encounter on the subway and I realized we were both wrong. In so intensely focusing on Australian Aboriginal issues, we had forgotten to look at home, while by treating the Stolen Generations as a historical issue, the man on the subway failed to see the continuing issue of racism. Moreover, we were speaking in broad institutional terms, instead of the daily lives of people whom none of us represented.

Based on his own experiences growing up, Alexie’s novel is told through the eyes (and cartoons) of fictional teenager Arnold Spirit, Jr. who lives on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Urged by his high school teacher, Mr. P, Junior leaves the reservation and enrolls at the all-white Reardon High School 20 miles from his home. Throughout the rest of the book, Junior grapples with his outsider status both racially and socio-economically at school and amongst his community on the reservation.

The true highlight of Alexie’s young adult novel is the complex portrayal of a life on and off the Spokane Reservation from the perspective of multiple characters. Many characters like Rowdy, Junior’s best friend, do not support his decision to attend Reardon High School and feel that he is abandoning his community and Indian culture. Yet others such as Junior’s father’s best friend, Eugene, support the teenager and recognize the bravery that it takes to try breaking the cycle of poverty on the reservation by pursuing a better education elsewhere. Ultimately, Alexie’s novel clearly presents the tension between the individual and community, personal and collective experience.

In 1969 a non-profit organization called Indians of All Nations occupied Alcatraz Island. Courtesy of nativelegalupdate.com

This complexity is an important part of American Indian history, which so often focuses on the collective while neglecting the individual perspective. In the late 1960s a Pan-American Indian movement began to develop, influenced by the Civil Rights movement of the previous decade. In 1969 a group of Bay Area Indians occupied Alcatraz Island under the banner of “Indians of All Tribes.” Through the 1970 “Planning Grant Proposal to Develop an All-Indian University and Cultural Complex on Indian Land, Alcatraz,” the group asserted that “we don’t speak for Indians all over the country. The Indians all over the country speak for themselves.” Indians of All Tribes recognized the need for an overarching movement to lobby for the greater American Indian community, while also still representing individual voices and perspectives.

Bringing varied individual perspectives into a community history certainly presents a challenge. For Indians of All Tribes, the similarities of personal experiences across the country became a rallying point for the Pan-American Indian organization, while for Sherman Alexie’s Arnold Spirit, Jr., the varying personal perspectives created a challenging social web for him to navigate as he set out to find personal hope and freedom through an education off of the reservation.

By the end of my study trip to Australia, I found my understanding of the Aboriginal issues had been equally complicated, bringing the historical into present day and the community story to the individual level. Intimate conversations with members of the Stolen Generations in culturally significant spaces only underscored the serious problems that still exist today. The conversation on the subway now stands out as an example of confusing institutional faults with individual perspectives. Change must come from both sources, though at times they may seem diametrically opposed. However, without the Sherman Alexies a la Arnold Spirits of the world in tandem with larger movements like Indians of All Tribes, we have no chance at making even the smallest change.

Creating the Future Through the Past

Is a museum a place where cultures go to die, or where they go to live?  According to James Clifford, the answer is increasingly the latter.  Museums are becoming places of cultural exchange, reciprocity, and contest.  They are becoming contact zones, where cultures enter into ongoing relationships.  According to Clifford, “When museums are seen as contact zones, their organizing structure as a collection becomes an ongoing historical, political, moral relationship – a power-charged set of exchanges, of push and pull.” [1]

We in the museum profession are sometimes conflicted between our desire to give other cultures a voice in our institution with our desire to maintain curatorial and interpretive control.  The Wampanoag Homsite at Plimoth Plantation in Plymouth, MA shows that giving other cultures a voice in an institution can substantially enhance the institution’s ability to accomplish its mission.

Image by Swampytank, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike License

The Wampanoag Homesite is quite literally a “living” history site.  The interpreters and visitors at the site, as participants in a contact zone, are making history as they preserve it.  Not only does the Homesite educate visitors about the history and traditions of the Wampanoag people, but it also serves as a representation of Native People’s contemporary worldview.  It allows Natives to display their heritage, as well as to articulate their desire for recognition and respect in the present.

The creation of Plimoth Plantation’s Wampanoag Indigenous Program in the early 1970s was influenced by the cultural movements of the time.  During the 1960s and 1970s, Native groups attempted to fight back against the marginalization of Native Peoples in American culture and politics.[2] Although Plimoth Plantation had not ignored the Native perspective, it had previously been told from a European point of view.   The Plantation began outreach to the Wampanoag community in the early 1970s, with mixed results.  However, by 1972, two Wampanoag tribal members had joined the board of the museum, and by 1973, the Wampanoag Indigenous Program was established.[3] The early years of the Wampanoag Homesite were not without their difficulties.  It proved difficult to find Native People with sufficient knowledge of traditional crafts, and the museum had difficulty incorporating the Homesite into its administrative structure.[4]

Today, the Wampanoag Homesite is a thriving part of Plimoth Plantation.  Members of the Wampanoag and other tribes demonstrate traditional crafts such as basket weaving and boatbuilding.  Unlike the 1627 English village, the interpreters at the Wampanoag Homesite do not portray historical characters.  Although they wear traditional clothing, they speak in modern dialect and interact with visitors as themselves.  This fulfills the dual role of the Wampanoag Homesite as a place where Native culture can be represented in both its contemporary and historic forms.

There is an extensive Frequently Asked Questions section on the Plimoth Plantation website, which prepares visitors for their encounter with the Wampanoag culture.  Some of the questions cover basic cultural sensitivity issues, such as whether it is acceptable to greet interpreters with “How” (it is not), while others are more nuanced, explaining the reasons for calling the Wampanoag “Native People” rather than “American Indians”.  This is the nature of a contact zone.  Culture is constantly being defined, as each group learns and shares from others.  When museums allow themselves to become contact zones, they give up some control, but they gain power and strength by allowing multiple cultures to shape the institution.  By doing this, a museum not only enhances its ability to interpret the past, but also becomes able to shape the future.

[1] James Clifford, “Museums as Contact Zones,” in Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1997), 192

[2] Elizabeth A. Peterson, “Time Travelers Wanted: Re-Imagining the Past at Plimoth Plantation, 1965-1978” (MA thesis, State University of New York at Oneonta, 2009), 45

[3] Ibid, 52-55

[4] Ibid, 63-64

[5] “Wampanoag Homesite Frequently Asked Questions” http://www.plimoth.org/features/faqs/homesite-faq.php

Displaying Ethnographic Objects

Museum exhibits have a purpose:  they tell a story, they teach you something, and they make you think.  Behind the scenes at a museum, people are working to help us learn and understand this story, but who should decide what we should learn from a museum?

This question becomes even more complicated when we consider the ethnographic objects of people who were traditionally marginalized by scientific racism, such as the people of the Northwest Coast Indian tribes.

In 1887, Franz Boas began to outline the way museums should display their ethnographic collections.  Boas is considered the father of modern American Anthropology.  His basis of study in science changed the way anthropologists examine the world.  Unlike most of his contemporaries, Boas believed that ethnographic exhibits should tell the visitor that culture is “relative, and that our ideas and conceptions are true only as far as our civilization goes.” [1]

Boas used this ideology to organize his exhibits, particularly the Hall of Northwest Coast Indians at the American Museum of Natural History.  He believed that “if the underlying idea of the exhibit can be brought out with sufficient clearness, some great truths may be impressed upon (the audience).” [2]  He organized the objects by a “tribal arrangement of collections,” not by object type, in order to teach the visitor the meaning of the object within that culture. [3]

Today, many museums strive to do just this in their exhibits.  Curators aim to help the audience understand the importance of objects to their origin culture.

This goal is at the heart of the 1989 meetings of the staff of the Portland Museum of Art and the Tlinglit elders about the objects in their Northwest Coast Indian collection.  The curators wanted to understand how the objects represented the culture of these tribes.  Unlike Boas, they asked representatives from the culture marking a key difference between how museums approach objects now.  However, it is what those present learned about these objects from the representatives is what is truly surprising and modern.

The museum professionals expected the elders to tell them about the objects, “for example:  this is how the mask was used; it was made by so-and-so; this is its power in terms of the clan, our traditions.” [4]  In reality the objects “provoked (called forth, brought to voice) ongoing stories of struggle.” [5]

Historian James Clifford argues that this experience is an example of when museums become contact zones.  A contact zone is “a space in which people geographically and historically separated come into contact with each other and establish ongoing relations.” [6]

Ethnographic objects in museums are objects that invoke “histories (memories, hopes, oral traditions)” and work as tools of the contact zone to “challenge and rework a relationship.” [7]  When objects are seen this way, they become tools for “active collaboration and a sharing of authority.” [8]

Any time an object is used in a way that ignores its presence as a mutable object of a contact zone, it is subject to the dominant culture’s views.  Clifford believes that if we ignore these objects’ status within a contact zone, we continue to perpetuate “culture-collecting strategies” that are a reflection of old world views of “dominance, hierarchy, resistance, and mobilization.” [9]

Maybe, in reality, ethnographic objects don’t have a story.  They are continually changing because they reflect a continued story.  Next time you find yourself at an ethnographic museum think about the story.  What do the objects tell you?  Are they just reflections of another culture, or are they a reflection of what happens when two cultures meet?

I challenge you to think about what the museum wants you to learn about that culture and think about what that might be saying about our own culture.  We can learn more about contact zones and other cultures from the way we displayed these objects in the past and the way they are viewed by both cultures now.

 

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[1] Jacknis, Ira, “Franz Boas and Exhibits: On the Limitations of the Museums Method of Anthropology,” Objects and Others: Essays on Museums and Material Culture History of Anthropology, Volume 3, Ed. George W. Stocking, Jr (Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1985), 83.

[2] Ibid, 86.

[3] Ibid, 79.

[4] Clifford, James, “Museums as Contact Zones,” Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century, (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997), 188.

[5] Ibid, 193.

[6] Ibid, 192.

[7] Ibid, 194.

[8] Ibid, 210,

[9] Ibid, 213.

“Americans Love to Play Indian”

Our discussion last week touched on how American popular culture incorporates various aspects of Native American culture to our use and significance.  This entire conversation reminded me of Adrienne K.’s blog called Native Appropriations, which claims to “counter stereotypes one cigar store Indian at a time” by “documenting images of American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian people, language, and culture in everyday life.” [1]

A prominent theme throughout her blog is how Americans appropriate Native stereotypes into their clothing, and a multi-post discussion of the so-called hipster headdress particularly illustrates this adaptation.  She debates why this phenomenon is taking place, declaring it mostly fashion-conscious as a “reiteration of tribal trends” and “the desire to be counter culture.” [2]  But she also wonders “Are hipsters trying to be strong, raw, and unapologetic? I can see the raw and unapologetic, maybe. But are the skinny guys in skinny jeans really going for ‘strong’?”  [3]  What are they going for then?

Baby Gap Dress

Clothing appropriation is not, however, unique to hipsters.  Baby Gap recently produced a dress that Adrienne claims blatantly imitated a Native Plains-style star quilt. [4]  These quilts (and other designs!) hold great significance in that region and are “often given as symbols of honor, celebration, or thanks.”  [5]

Mitakuye Baby Feathers Star Quilt

Is this use of Native American culture in mainstream American culture appropriate?  What does it mean when a culturally relevant symbol is marketed and mass distributed?  Does it even mean anything?  Can anyone really claim ownership to these patterns or designs, like the star, which is clearly used in other American quilts?   Is it appropriate to wear Native-made jewelry, and, if so, when?  For example, my Pawnee stepmother gave me a necklace and earrings.  Is it the consumer’s responsibility to determine if a piece is solely decorative?

Sometimes its Just Hard to Tell

Our class discussion about Native American identity made me think about my favorite image of the 18^th century.  Unfortunately I do not hold copyright on this image, so you must follow this link to view it.  The drawing is of a Stockbridge Indian and was done in 1777 by a German Officer named Johann Ewald who was serving with the British Army.  Looking at the image, it is hard to tell the race of this individual, who clearly displays both native and black features.  By the Revolutionary War the number of Stockbridge Indians in New England had declined significantly and many of them had mixed with blacks and mulattoes living in the area.  During the war many of the Stockbridge joined the Continental Army serving primarily in the Northern Theater and on Long Island.  At Fort Ticonderoga the Continental natives were forced to wear red wool caps to distinguish them from British allied natives.  The earlier image speaks profoundly about the mixed identity of this Stockbridge and how they were viewed during the American Revolution.

Texas Textbooks Revisited

Given Audrey’s post on the Texas textbook controversy several weeks ago, I was excited to see the issue pop up again, this time framed in an interesting context and with some connection to this week’s discussion.

“Studies in Crap” is a weekly blog written by Alan Scherstuhl for The Pitch (a Kansas City news/entertainment/events website). This week’s find is a 1932 Texas history textbook entitled The Lone Star State: A School History, by C.R. Wharton. Given this week’s emphasis on issues of Native American and Latino identity, the post’s focus on these two groups was particularly interesting.

In an attitude derived from the philosophy of states’ rights, Wharton decries the reservation system as an example of unnecessary federal spending: “Nor did this handling of the Indians suit the white people. They worked hard to make a living without the assistance of the government and they resented the government’s aid to the Indians.”[1] Nowhere does it mention the forced relocation, broken promises, and crippling poverty that have too often defined relations between the US government and Native Americans. According to Wharton, this “aid” was purely benign and completely undeserved. Looking back a couple weeks to our discussion of feminism, Wharton’s argument is resurrected by the Reagan administration 50 years later in the form of the lazy, conniving welfare queen.

Shifting focus to relations with Mexico (specifically the Mexican-American War), Wharton’s words provide an interesting dimension to the arguments surrounding Hispanic immigration to the United States today. He decries Mexican President Bustamante, who in an effort to halt American migration into Texas (then held by Mexico), passed an 1830 law “prohibiting further immigration from the United States.”[2] Such a measure was cruel, Wharton argues, since “[s]uch an act would have kept relatives and friends of the settlers from joining them in their new homes.”[3]

Sherman Alexie Speaking

Sherman Alexie is not only a great writer, he is also a fantastic speaker.  Addressing issues of race, politics, identity, and culture, Alexie uses humor to get at the truth(s) of contemporary Native American life.  Here are some videos of Alexie that I found on YouTube.

How are his speaking and writing styles similar/different?  How does he challenge popular stereotypes of Native peoples?