Posted on 02/11/2005 12:10:39 AM PST by Snapple
The reason it's important for Native nations to speak out about Native identity issues is that they are the only ones who can say who their citizens are and are not. If they don't speak out, other people and entities will fill the silence.
It's important for Native mothers and fathers to speak out because pseudo-Indians do things that affect our children.
Churchill will not be discriminated against on the basis of being Indian, but he is placing our children and grandchildren in harm's way by creating ill will and hostility against Indians. Native kids and elders who actually look Native are the ones who suffer from the blowback.
The author, an Indian, has followed Ward Churchill's career for many years.
I think she is a really great journalist. Maybe the University should give her Churchill's job. She is an articulate Indian intellectual and would know a lot of interesting Indians to teach people about.
February 10, 2005
by: Suzan Shown Harjo / Indian Country Today
I met Ward Churchill 15 years ago, before he gained his present infamous reputation. My friend, a college professor, said this Cherokee-Creek guy wanted to meet me. I expected to meet an earnest young student who would relate to me as Creek (I'm Hodulgee Muscogee on Dad's side and enrolled Cheyenne on Mom's).
Instead, there was Churchill. Caucasian in appearance and in his mid-40s, he was wearing dark glasses and going for the look of an Indian activist circa 1970.
I asked him who his Creek people were and other questions we ask in order to find the proper way of relating. Churchill behaved oddly and did not respond (it's unusual to find Indians so deficient in social skills).
Churchill now refers to that as an ''interrogation,'' which tells me he still does not know how to be with us.
Most Native people want to know each other's nation, clan, society, family, Native name - who are you to me and how should I address you? It's an enormously respectful way that we introduce ourselves and establish kinship.
It wasn't much of an encounter, but it was enough to tell me that he was not culturally Muscogee or Cherokee and had not been around many of our people.
The next time I heard his name was from Native artists at the Santa Fe Indian Market. Churchill was peddling a scandal sheet, railing against White Earth Chippewa artist David Bradley and the New Mexico and federal Indian arts and crafts laws, which Bradley and other Indian artists helped to enact.
It turned out that Churchill was a painter - not a good one, but bad art is not illegal - who would face stiff penalties if he promoted his work as made by an Indian if he were not, in fact, an Indian.
The Indian arts laws bow to tribal determinations of tribal citizenry or membership. There's also an ''artisan'' category as a way for a Native nation to claim an artist who does not meet its citizenship criteria, but who is part of one of its families.
People began to check out Churchill's claims. Cherokee journalist David Cornsilk verified that Churchill and his ancestors were not on the Cherokee Nation rolls. Creek-Cherokee historian Robert W. Trepp did not find them on the Muscogee (Creek) Nation rolls.
Churchill lashed out against tribal leaders, sovereignty, citizenship and rolls, attacking Native people who did not support his claims as ''card-carrying Indians'' and ''blood police.''
Then, he went tribe-shopping. He added Metis, then Keetoowah, variously claiming to be an associate member, an enrolled member or 1/16 or 3/16 Cherokee.
Oneida comedian Charlie Hill recalls Churchill interviewing him in 1978. ''I asked him, 'Are you Indian?' And he said, 'No.' Later, I heard that he was saying he was Indian and wondered just how that happened.''
Churchill started listing his various ''Indian'' credentials on resumes as he moved into academe. He also moved into American Indian Movement circles, but most of the activists did not accept him as an Indian or as an activist.
AIM founders and leaders Dennis J. Banks and Clyde H. Bellecourt, both Ojibwa, state that ''Churchill has fraudulently represented himself as an Indian, and a member of [AIM], a situation that has lifted him into the position of a lecturer on Indian activism. He has used [Denver AIM] to attack the leadership of the official [AIM] with his misinformation and propaganda campaigns.''
Churchill took up ghostwriting for Oglala actor/activist Russell Means. Together with a small following, they protest the annual Columbus parade in Denver.
As Churchill has lurched through Indian identities, he has not found a single Native relative or ancestor. He is descended from a long line of Churchills that Hank Adams has traced back to the Revolutionary War and Europe. Adams, who is Assiniboine-Sioux and a member of the Frank's Landing Indian Community, has successfully researched and exposed other pseudo-Indians.
Adams traced Churchill's ancestors on both sides of his family, finding all white people, including documented slave owners and at least one spy, but zero Indians.
The United Keetoowah Band has disassociated itself from Churchill, so he will have to stop flashing that ''associate member'' card that has enabled him to bully his way around campuses and newsrooms.
The reason it's important for Native nations to speak out about Native identity issues is that they are the only ones who can say who their citizens are and are not. If they don't speak out, other people and entities will fill the silence.
It's important for Native mothers and fathers to speak out because pseudo-Indians do things that affect our children.
Churchill will not be discriminated against on the basis of being Indian, but he is placing our children and grandchildren in harm's way by creating ill will and hostility against Indians. Native kids and elders who actually look Native are the ones who suffer from the blowback.
It's important for Native people to speak out in order to counter the sort of thing that Churchill, even after being so very publicly unmasked, is now telling reporters: that he is Indian by virtue of community acceptance over a prolonged period. While some people in Colorado believe one or another of his stories, no Native nation and no Indian community of interest accepts him as one of their own.
Native artists never knew nor embraced him, either as an artist or as a Native person.
Churchill once worked for news outlets, but has not been accepted as a Native journalist, particularly by those he's viciously attacked after they reported what they found: that he could not substantiate his Indian claims.
(This note is for any reporters and editors who are confused: Churchill is the Stephen Glass, Jayson Blair and Jack Kelley of American Indian studies, but without their talent. Churchill simply makes it up, too, plus he invents Indian credentials. Keep in mind that no one accused their papers of violating free speech when they fired frauds for cause.)
Colorado and all universities should respect Native nations at least as much as they respect schools and other employers, but they don't. They frown on people who falsify their written material and wrongly claim degrees they did not earn and jobs they did not hold. But when people falsely claim to be Native, it is seen by some as less serious, less offensive and something anyone besides the Indians ought to decide.
Churchill got jobs, promotions, tenure and the Ethnic Studies chair at the University of Colorado because he portrayed himself as American Indian.
Now he's wrapped himself in the First Amendment, carefully draped over his Indian blanket. He's threatening to sue if he's fired for breach of contract or for the shameful things he said about the 9/11 victims.
The university should fire him because he has perpetrated a fraud, and moral turpitude is a deal breaker. The university shielded him from those who tried to reveal the truth and looked the other way as he attacked a lot of decent Native people.
If he sues, he will have to come into court as the American Indian man he has claimed to be, and how is he going to do that? It is time for the university to end this charade.
Suzan Shown Harjo, Cheyenne and Hodulgee Muscogee, is president of the Morning Star Institute in Washington, D.C. and a columnist for Indian Country Today.
Harjo is pretty brave to write this. Churchill is a mean, vindictive man.
Information about Suzan Harjo and links to her writings. As you can see, Harjo is a real advocate for Indian-related Issues here in Washington D.C. Her writings are linked at this site:
http://www.indiancountry.com/author.cfm?id=26
Suzan Shown Harjo is a poet, writer, lecturer, curator and policy advocate, who has helped Native Peoples recover more than one million acres of land and numerous sacred places. She has developed key federal Indian law since 1975, including the most important national policy advances in the modern era for the protection of Native American cultures and arts: the 1996 Executive Order on Indian Sacred Sites; the 1990 Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act; the 1989 National Museum of the American Indian Act; and the 1978 American Indian Religious Freedom Act.
Ms. Harjo is President and Executive Director of The Morning Star Institute, a national Indian rights organization founded in 1984 for Native Peoples' traditional and cultural advocacy, arts promotion and research. Morning Star has initiated an ongoing international effort to issue declarations of tribal cultural property and to achieve a Treaty Respecting Cultural Property Rights of Native Peoples. Morning Star was the sponsoring organization for The 1992 Alliance (1990-1993) and for the initial lawsuit, Harjo et al v. Pro Football, Inc., regarding the trademarks and name of Washington's professional football team.
The case was filed before the U.S. Patent & Trademark Board in 1992 by Ms. Harjo and six other Native Americans. The Native parties won in 1999, when a three-judge panel unanimously decided to cancel federal protections for the team's name because it "may disparage Native Americans and may bring them into contempt or disrepute." Their victory was appealed and now is in federal district court. Ms. Harjo's essay on the case, Fighting Name-Calling: Challenging "Redskins" in Court, is published in Team Spirits: The Native American Mascots Controversy (University of Nebraska Press, 2001).
Ms. Harjo is a Columnist for Indian Country Today, the leading Native American newspaper. She wrote the Foreword: Camp Criers Speaking Across the Generations for Indian Sovereignty Is Good for America: Editorials from Indian Country Today (2002). Founding Co-Chair of The Howard Simons Fund for American Indian Journalists, she has worked as News Director of the American Indian Press Association and as Drama & Literature Director and "Seeing Red" Producer for WBAI-FM Radio in New York City. A keynoter for the 2000 Journalism & Women Symposium, she was a 1998-1999 Brain Trust Member for UNITY: Journalists of Color and a presenter at UNITY '99 in Seattle and UNITY '94 in Atlanta. Her poetry, arts criticism and commentary are widely published and anthologized, and her essay, Redskins, Savages and Other Indian Enemies: An Historical Overview of American Indian Media Coverage of Native Peoples, is in Images of Color: Images of Crime (Roxbury, 1998 and 2001).
A Founding Trustee of the National Museum of the American Indian (1990-1996), she was its first Program Planning Committee Chair and Principal Author of the NMAI Policies on Exhibits (1994), Indian Identity (1993) and Repatriation (1991). Guest Curator of the Peabody Essex Museum's 1996-1997 major exhibition, she wrote a curatorial essay for the show's award-winning catalogue, Gifts of the Spirit: Works by Nineteenth-Century & Contemporary Native American Artists (traveling exhibit, Eitlejorg Museum, 1998). She curated "Healing Art," the 1998-2000 exhibition at the American Psychological Association in Washington, D.C., and "Visions from Native America," the first exhibit of contemporary Native art ever shown in the U.S. Senate and House Rotundas (1992). A contributing writer to the NMAI/Atlatl 2000 exhibit catalogue, Who Stole the Tee Pee?, she curated three journal gallery exhibits for the Cornell-based Native Americas: "Native Images in American Editorial Cartoons" (2001); "New Native Warrior Images in Art" (2001); and "Identity Perspectives by Native Artists" (2002).
Honorary Guest for the 2001 Tulsa Indian Art Festival, she also was a moderator and presenter for the biennial Atlatl Native Arts Network conferences (1996-2000). A Founder of Indian Art Northwest, she served on the Artists Council (1996-2001), as Co-Chair (1999-2001) and as Judges Committee Chair (1997-2000). She judged the Sundance Institute's Native American Initiative, Lawrence Indian Art Show and Red Earth Film & Video Competition; served on the First Circle and Board for The Association of American Cultures; and was National Coordinator of The 1992 Alliance and Co-Chair of "Our Visions: The Next 500 Years" (Taos, 1992).
A 1996 Stanford University Visiting Mentor and a 1992 Dartmouth College Montgomery Fellow, she was the first Native American person selected for the honor by Stanford's Haas Center for Public Policy and the first Native woman chosen for the prestigious Montgomery Fellowship Award. She has lectured, presented and read at educational institutions nationwide. Executive Director of the National Congress of American Indians (1984-1989), she also was Special Assistant for Indian Legislation & Liaison in the Carter Administration and Principal Author of the 1979 President's Report to Congress on American Indian Religious Freedom.
Ms. Harjo (Cheyenne & Hodulgee Muscogee) is the mother of Adriane Shown Harjo and Duke Ray Harjo II.
The Morning Star Institute ; 611 Pennsylvania Avenue, S.E., #377 ; Washington, DC 20003 ; (202) 547-5531
2005/2/10 - Harjo: Why Native identity matters: A cautionary tale
2005/1/27 - A glimpse of inauguration and a few habits of racism
2005/1/20 - Harjo: My New Year's resolution: No more fat 'Indian' food
2005/1/10 - Harjo: Selective memories of Vine Deloria Jr.
2004/12/17 - Harjo: The 'good Indians' and 'hostiles'
2004/11/26 - Harjo: Don't buy into the red-states, blue-states myth
2004/10/29 - Harjo: Character and gender in the Oglala Sioux election
2004/9/18 - Harjo: Our vision for a living museum
2004/9/10 - Harjo: The Whiteman and the Disease
2004/7/23 - Harjo: Dancing on graves of missing Native Americans
2004/7/2 - Harjo: A Native child left behind
2004/5/28 - Harjo: Bush in the field of screams
2004/4/12 - Harjo: Stealing bodies, stealing history
2004/2/13 - Harjo: Open Letter to Michael Powell, Andre 3000 and Big Boi
2004/2/2 - Harjo: 'Ndn Eye for the Racist Guy'
2004/1/16 - Harjo: Praise for rescuers of Bear Butte, even for Janklow
2004/1/5 - Harjo: Billy Frank Jr., A warrior with wisdom and an elder with courage
2003/12/22 - Harjo: Strictly confidential, who's keeping secrets from the Sand Creek descendants?
2003/11/7 - Harjo: Protecting sacred places against all odds
2003/10/17 - Harjo: Governor Schwarzenegger and California Indian policy
2003/9/18 - Harjo: Twelve Steps to Decolonization
2003/9/9 - Harjo: Building the Native national arts economy
2003/8/26 - Harjo: Credit where credit's due
2003/8/8 - Harjo: Prayers to protect Salt Mother and sacred places
2003/8/1 - Harjo: American Indian Religious Freedom Act at 25
2003/7/18 - Harjo: Trust funds, the rule of law and regular order
2003/6/27 - Harjo: Happy Little Bighorn Memorial Day
2003/6/13 - Harjo: Indian laws and Tribal lawmakers
2003/6/9 - Harjo: Scalp lock on Internet auction block and a burial ground headed that way
2003/4/11 - Lori Ann Piestewa: Honorable hero
2003/3/3 - A history of critics getting our story wrong
2003/2/24 - Bear Butte threatened by shooting range
2003/2/7 - Harjo: One small and unworthy man
2003/1/17 - Questions from past follow Janklow into the House
2002/12/27 - New Senate leadership and colorblindness
2002/12/18 - Sacred places under attack in Native America
2002/11/29 - Smallpox: To Be Vaccinated or Not To Be Vaccinated
2002/11/1 - Trail of Broken Treaties: A 30th Anniversary Memory
2002/10/31 - Attention Party Indians and other Native American voters: Ranking the "modern" U.S. presidents
2002/10/14 - 1492 Ö 2002: 510 Years of Native Resistance
2002/9/20 - The Wall Street Journal's drumbeat: Is this the way termination started?
2002/9/6 - Shame on you, Judge Jelderks, for letting scientists pick over ancient one's bones
2002/8/23 - TIPS Ö Where first impressions are right & rumors are always true
2002/7/29 - The danger of legislating on appropriations
2002/7/26 - A distinguished gentleman warrior in the cause for Indian justice
2002/7/8 - Letter from WaHeLut, Frank's Landing
2002/6/22 - Fact sheet: Protection of Native American sacred places
2002/6/9 - Enemies within Indian country
2002/5/20 - Taking back America Ö David Horowitz on (and on and on) Indians
2002/4/18 - The real Fightin' Whities
2002/4/1 - Protecting Native Peoples' Sacred Places
2002/3/12 - Recognition: It's time for politics in the open and an end to turf games
2002/2/16 - Indians in the Olympics Ceremony Ö Postcard from the Past
2002/2/4 - Washington Chief-Making and the R-Word
2002/1/20 - An Approach to New Law to Protect Cultural Property Rights
2001/12/28 - Open Letter on Tribal Consultation for Interior Secretary Norton
2001/12/22 - Airport Insecurities Ö Travel Notes for Those Who Have Not Flown Since 9-11
2001/11/20 - Trust Matters
2001/10/29 - Whither the Peltier Pardon?
2001/10/12 - Enemies within Indian country
2001/9/19 - Native Peoples in the Society of Sorrow and Justice
2001/9/10 - Gwich'in, caribou and a 2,000-acre trail in ANWR
2001/9/1 - Senator Helms Ö leaving makes Senate a better place
2001/8/8 - Navajo Code Talkers and other Native American heroes
2001/7/25 - What do you want to be called?
2001/7/11 - The generosity of a stranger: Stay in your place, accept gifts of civilization
2001/7/6 - Happy 57th Anniversary, Mom & Dad
2001/7/4 - Watch your language!
2001/6/27 - Mohegan museum gift carries on Native tradition of give-aways
2001/6/6 - Senate shakeup and the Indian policy agenda
2001/5/9 - The first 100 Bush days for Indian Country
2001/4/25 - A good Deed Day at DQU, a good act in California
2001/4/11 - Signs of the times - racism just below the surface
2001/3/21 - Richard V. La Course (1938-2001), Indian journalist
2001/2/28 - Respect Native Women - Stop Using the S-Word
2001/2/14 - Vampire policy is bleeding us dry - blood-quantums be gone!
2001/1/31 - An open letter to President George W. Bush: Do big things and do no harm
2001/1/10 - Norton at Interior - fairness for Indians, or Watt now?
2000/12/18 - No Need for Post-Partisan Blues in Indian Country
2000/12/3 - Until Jan. 3, the cry is 'Slade Lost!'
2000/11/15 - The Nader/LaDuke factor
ping
I'm reminded of a conservative Indian blogger I like to read from time to time. He's proud to be a part of the country that defeated his ancestors, because he keeps finding evidence that there's still a place for Native Americans in today's United States.
http://www.badeagle.com/
The indian people need real indian leaders, not unstable nutbags who demagogue for their own purposes.
Also (not trying to be controversial here) I once had a conversation with a full-blooded Lakota woman, who really had a great deal of disdain for these faux Indians. She told me, if they look white and claim to be Cherokee, look twice then don't believe it.
Not sure about why she picked out Cherokees, but ever since that time I've noticed that many poseurs do grab onto that tribal identity. No idea why.
Just to be clear, I'm white, not Indian.
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