Steve, thanks for the long and personal response. If it understand it right, then every American is living on occupied land, since every corner of America once belonged to native Americans. You are not the only one. In the land of the free and the home of the brave freedom apparently does not mean freedom for American Indians to live as they would like to do. But you can judge the situation better than I do. You are right, it really seems to be a complicated issue.
An old Chinese proverb says 'better to bend in the wind than to break': although the native Americans have to bend, they still can remain firmly rooted in their unique heritage and rich cultural history. Maybe art and/or tourism can offer a way out of the crisis. Who knows.. -J. Sent from AndroidSteve Smith <sasm...@swcp.com> wrote:Jochen - I appreciate this post. > In the recent edition of National Geographic there > is an article about Native Americans named > "In the shadow of wounded knee" > http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2012/08/pine-ridge/fuller-text I am very sensitive to this issue because *I* literally own/live-on a small piece of land that was expropriated from a Native tribe very recently. I also listen regularly to strong rhetoric against the Israelis for their handling of the Palestinians while living amongst our own Native Americans who have been treated (in past centuries) even more brutally and in present times, perhaps less so, but still less than ideal. Some on this list will perceive your post and my response perhaps as "political".. I try to remain relatively neutral in the politics, but I believe this is a significant "humanitarian" issue. And by humanitarian I don't just mean the humanity of those being abused, I'm concerned for the humanity of the abusers... roughly "us". I am not religious so I don't really think in terms of saved or lost "souls" but if I did, I'd be much more worried about the souls of the occupiers than of the occupied. And a simple answer to simple question... NO, the cultural differences (I'm reluctant to use the terms higher or lower) do not justify an occupation. And to this list we can add many more examples (e.g. South Africa) and open questions such as the "Mongolian" occupation of much of Eastern Europe and the middle east, or the Roman Occupation of north africa, middle east, europe, or the Moorish occupation of Spain, or the Native American (Asian?) occupation of North America (did they have a big hand in the die-off of the megafauna of North America?). My house is built on 1.5 acres among a section of 5.5 acres which Public Service of NM took ownership for the purpose of building a natural gas compression station. I do not know their mechanism for this, it *may have been* a trade, but it also may have been a simple request to the State or Fed to "condemn" the parcel they wanted, literally taking it by (legal) force from the San Ildefonso Pueblo, a very small "tribe" on a very small "reservation", Perhaps a thousand people on a few hundred square miles. Apparently PNM changed their minds and decided not to complete the project but managed to hold on to the land and sell it to a private (Anglo) individual who then subdivided and resold (to more Anglos). 4 homes were built on these properties in the 1980's and in 2000 I bought mine from the original owner-builder. Reviewing the title search, I discovered the provenance. It was a little disturbing... the details I give here were not in the document, only the record that PNM was the first "owner" after the pueblo itself. The rest I pieced together from other information. So I am now, just like many of the Zionists in Israel, an occupier. I feel somewhat innocent in my motivations, however i have to admit to having coveted this location since before the homes were built 30 years ago, knowing that it was "embedded" in the "reservation"... appreciating it for it's location, including the proximity to this pueblo. Romantically, I wanted to believe it was some small homestead from the 1800s which had been deeded to the family of the hispanic original occupants when NM became a state in 1912. Of course, the truth was not nearly that romantic. The Natives have a much less adversarial stance with the non-native here than say in Palestine. They were completely crushed into submission centuries ago and have lived in relative peace with their "occupiers" since then with only small abuses of the relationship such as the one that lead to the expropriation of the piece of property that I live on. I have a number of Native friends from cultures distributed mostly throughout the southwest of the US, and a few from farther north, but really hardly any from the East. I also work with the Institute of American Indian Art in Santa Fe which puts me in contact with native students and faculty from all over North America. And I *should* put in a plug for them... they accept students from anywhere, there is no in/out state tuition... they are very affordable... many of their students and studying there would be an amazing opportunity for anyone. www.iaia.org New Mexico, as you may know, has the longest history of Native-European interactions in the US. The first incursion of the Spanish into what is now the USA and the first permanent settlement happened about 30 miles from my house in the early 1500's well before the pilgrims or Spanish settlements in Florida. They were (as the Spanish did in those times) looking for vast hoards of gold. The Natives in the area submitted somewhat willingly, being a relatively peace-loving people and the Spanish were not brutal unless there was resistance to their presence whereupon their horses and steel weapons and armor allowed them to be crushingly brutal. Not long after their first settlement among the Ohkay-Owinghe village, the Spanish Priests pulled rank on the Spanish Noblemen and made them move the settlement to what is now Santa Fe... The priests, no matter what else you may think of them, apparently were looking after the mortal as well as the immortal souls of the "children of god" they had come here to "save"... they saw that the presence of the Spaniards was causing the natives grave harm, even without overt abuses... I'm sure there were individual abuses, but in general, it is said that the Spanish "occupiers" were relatively not unkind in this period, but the priests already recognized that their mere presence was very disturbing to the natives well being. As more Europeans arrived, things got worse of course and In the early 1600's the natives pulled together and managed a widespread rebellion large enough to push the Spanish back south of what is modern day El Paso, the entire occupied Rio Grande River Valley for nearly 400 miles was expunged of these foreign devils. A few years later, Juan de Onate returned with a much more significant force and overwhelmed the natives with their "modern weaponry", horses, and brutality. A relatively small but significant group held out against this force on top of a mesa within view of my house... these native warriors were able to use thier knowlege of the terrain and some help from their people now subjugated in the region to remain at large for months. Once they finally fell, Onate and Spain "owned" the region again, and his first act to make the point that rebellion would not be tolerated was to cut one foot off of every able-bodied male of age to be a warrior as a preventative and a reminder of his power (and intolerance). It was nearly 300 years later before the last of the Apache, a much more warlike nomadic people closely related to the Navajo were finally subjugated in the region. In most if not all cases, subjugation of the native population in the Americas was really near-extermination. Both California and Texas, two of our largest, richest States have almost NO indigenous people left... The bulk of the Native Americans *not* exterminated are in the Southwest, concentrated in Arizona, New Mexico and Oklahoma. This of course, excludes the very large native Population in Alaska where their remoteness protected them from abuse and exploitation somewhat until modern technology and our thirst for oil caused us to overrun them as well. I've lived among Natives all my life, meaning in regions where they lived both on their own reservations and among the non-native populations. I've had several good friends who are native. But I do not pretend to understand the magnitude of what we did to them as a population (even if I can pull the numbers and see the landscapes and peoples). One of my friends is Lakota Sioux and he grew up near Pine Ridge and came of age (teenager) during the Wounded Knee debacle. He has spent his life becoming a very proud and capable artist and craftsman but along the way he spent a great deal of it in the depths of alcoholism and homelessness. He has had a number of children, only a few of whom he remains close to. He is currently leading a large effort/proposal among peers to win a grant to do an installation art piece in South Dakota referencing not only the bad things that happened to his people but also the good. I have worked with him to develop a digital maquette of an oversized pile of buffalo skulls to be constructed next to I-70 in this area as well, a huge pyramid in testimony to another travesty we perpetrated with our railroads and our rifles. But I do get queasy when our right-wing contingent supports Israel's strong hawkish/occupational stances in Palestine and when some of our left wing harsh attackers of Israel seem to forget our own (not that far in the past) heritage as not just occupiers but exterminators, perpetrators of genocide. In many ways, our own brutality exceeded anything that Israel has done by far. This does not excuse the Palestinian Occupation, but it should remind us that we have our own wicked heritage which continues (as the stories in your links remind us). It is helpful to me in understanding the Israeli/Palestinian problem to remind myself that I too am an occupier. Anyone living in the Americas are occupiers, etc. My personal case is somewhat more fresh, having been established as recently as the 1970's. I'm not likely to deed over my "legal" property out of guilt, yet I recognize that makes me little different than the Zionists who are pushing back the borders of the Palestinians on a daily basis. I came to this location very respectful of the Natives, both intrinsically because I've lived "among" them all my life, but also because I knew that the land I was living on *was* expropriated from them at some point in history. While I like where I live very much, I would accept being "relocated" to relieve my "occupation" of their territory... I did engage in the US real-estate market in good faith, and would expect *someone* (US Govt, PNM?) to compensate me reasonably for this, but to accept that my choice of "a good location" was misinformed and poorly thought through and needed to be corrected. If the bulk of my financial security were not based in my home ownership, I might also consider truly, simply returning the property to the tribe. This of course would be a drop in their bucket (1.5 acres out of a hundred square miles) and a confrontation to my 3 neighbors who are in the same circumstance, but perhaps spiritually a good gesture. The region enjoys a colorful "tricultural" experience of Native, Hispanic and Anglo and this is part of what I love about it, and perhaps even the Natives themselves can appreciate (every pueblo has a catholic church in it, most natives have hispanic surnames, and many enjoy the lifestyles afforded by working the jobs provided by the "occupying force"). But it is quite disorienting when a modern hispanic man (this is a very coveted role in the region) rides his horse into the plaza in Santa Fe each year during Fiesta decked in armor, sword in hand and the entire population shouts "Onate!", celebrating his 'return' to Santa Fe. Nobody mentions the brutality of that moment, just the splendor. A friend of this list worked with Robert Mirabal (Taos Pueblo) last year to help him produce an extremely moving production called "Poh Peh Speaks", re-enacting the life and experience and perspective of the Native Spirit starting with the experience of the Taos Pueblo Native who instigated the uprising nearly 400 years ago and leading up to the present. It is very moving. He has even traveled to Spain this year to present this performance. I hope that he can continue to reach a wider audience. The problem of colonization and occupation is not an easy one. It is very hard to undo things that were done. Things done centuries ago are hard for one reason while things done today are hard for other reasons. Good issue, IMO, but probably too rich for this lists blood. We'll see. - Steve > It contains a map ("the lost land") which shows > the shrinking land of the Indian reservation (esp. the ones from the > Sioux) during the 19th century. Once the native Americans owned the > whole country, from the Apache in the south west to the Massachusett > in the north east. Then the British settlers and European colonists > came, and in the name of their god they occupied and invaded the > country. Now the Indians live in ever shrinking reservations. > http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2012/08/pine-ridge/reservation-map > > Somehow this reminded me of the shrinking land > of the Palestinian people. Palestinians are a bit > like the native Americans, they are the native > inhabitants of a countried occupied by foreign > settlers. Today they live in a small confined area. > http://sabbah.biz/mt/archives/2006/05/10/the-shrinking-map-of-palestine/ > > In both cases, the occupying force justify the occupation with an > higher entity which gave them the right to live there. Expelled from > there original countries, the settlers (Puritans in American, Jews in > Palestine) came to stay. > > In Australia, the native Australians ("Aborigines") > are confined in aboriginal reserves. Like the > native Americans, the indigenous Australians had not developed a > system of writing. Does this > lower cultural level justify an occupation? > > -J. > > > > > > > > ============================================================ > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
