1. REVITALIZING NATIVE TRADITIONS: BACK TO THE FUTURE
Are tribes going “back to the past”
by “reclaiming” their cultural heritage?
Are tribes “going backward” by
“reviving” their traditions?
Dr. Zoltan Grossman
Faculty member in Geography & Native American Studies,
The Evergreen State College, Olympia, Washington

2. Model of Linear “Progress”
Past
Present
Future
“Going backward”
“Reclaiming past”

3. A Tale of Two Birds 1. Chickaloon, Alaska

6. “STUPIDCHICKEN”

7. “STUPIDCHICKEN”

8. A Tale of Two Birds 2. Muscoda, Wisconsin

9. Ghost Eagle in Wisconsin River Valley
A Tale of Two Birds 2. Muscoda, Wisconsin
1,300-foot wingspan
Ghost Eagle in Wisconsin River Valley

10. A symbol & allegory of Native survival and continuity

11. Gottschall rock shelter
xxxxx
Continuity
of stories
Ho-Chunks’
Red Horn legend in
Gottschall rock shelter

12. Continuity through the “Dark Ages”
After suppression of Native culture
and before modern revival
Little awareness of Native history
from 1890s to 1960s
Wounded Knee massacre, 1890
Wounded Knee siege, 1973

13. Continuity through the “Dark Ages”
Boarding schools assimilated youth
Reservation land allotted
Off-reservation harvesting banned
Religions outlawed
Languages repressed
Yet cultures practiced
in secret, survived and adapted…..

14. Frozen in time? Edward Curtis photo in a Piegan Lodge, 1910

15. Spearfishing Lac du Flambeau = “Lake of the Torch”
Motorboats, halogen lamps, metal spears
Birchbark canoes, torches, wooden spears
State outlawed treaty spearfishing in 1908 but Ojibwe practiced secretly

16. Wisconsin Walleye Wars, 1986-92
Ojibwe treaty rights
rights upheld, 1983.
Anglers protest
spearing as harmful
(yet only 3% of walleye)
Criticize technology
as “nontraditional”
(not in use at time of treaty)

17. Makah whale hunting
1855 Treaty recognized importance of whaling to ancient Makah sea culture. Non-Indian commercial whaling depleted grey whales, 1920s (Recovery in 1980s)
1997 agreement
for non-commercial
Makah harvest
5 out of 20,000 grey whales;
Quota released by Siberian tribe

18. Washington Whaling Conflict, 1999
Save a Whale -
Harpoon a Makah
Animal rights groups
join anti-Indian groups to
protest harpooning/
shooting of one whale.
(Yet rifle brought quicker death).

19. Gaming as nontraditional?
Casinos in U.S. cash economy

20. Gunpowder and fireworks from the Chinese
Western culture
constantly adopts
and adapts to
new technologies

21. Clocks from the Germans
Why do only Native
Peoples have to
be museum pieces?

22. Christians?

23. Americans?

24. Right to bear arms ?

25. Authentic Indians (Paige Raibmon)
If present-day Indians are not deemed as authentically Indian,
their lands can be taken and their rights and nationhood denied.
Raibmon “examines the political ramifications of ideas
about ‘real Indians.’ Focusing on the Northwest Coast
in the late nineteenth century and early twentieth,
she describes how government officials, missionaries,
anthropologists, reformers, settlers, and tourists developed
definitions of Indian authenticity based on such binaries as
Indian versus White, traditional versus modern, and uncivilized
versus civilized. They recognized as authentic only those
expressions of ‘Indianness’ that conformed to their limited
definitions and reflected their sense of colonial legitimacy
and racial superiority.”

26. Living, evolving cultures, not resurrection of dead cultures
xxxx

27. “New traditions”: Jingle Dance
xxxx
“New traditions”: Jingle Dance

28. xxxx

29. Cultural Mixing
xxxx

30. Grand Entry

31. Flag Song

32. Traditions of Governance (Cornell)
Does modern tribal government
resemble older traditional form?
Trouble if decentralized before,
but centralized today, etc.
Tribes with successful economic development followed
precolonial government form (e.g., Pueblos)
Start of a “Native Renaissance”?

33. Greco-Roman Era Italian Renaissance ( = “Rebirth”)
Selective revitalization:
Drawing from the past, but
different from the past (Alfred)

34. Negation of the negation (Hegel)
of past
Negation of
negation
Past
(Precolonial)
(Colonialism)
(Decolonization)
Moving forward to a reconstituted culture.
(Closest idea that Western thought has to Indigenous circular thinking.)

35. “Tradition” Not about technology but consciousness
Not about form but substance
Not about appearances but values

36. Native Renaissance xxxx Applying past values to present problems
to build a better future

37. “Miner’s Canary” analogy
By Felix Cohen, 1953
(Modern founder of federal Indian law)
“The Indian plays much the same role in our American
society that the Jews played in Germany. Like the
miner's canary, the Indian marks the shift from fresh air
to poison gas in our political atmosphere; and our treatment
of Indians, even more than our treatment of other minorities,
marks the rise and fall of our democratic faith.”

38. “Greenhouse” analogy Tribes are in a position to apply
their traditional values to solve
21st-century problems
Reservations at least partly shielded by
tribal sovereignty, federal trust relationship
Can “grow” their own forms of social organization
and environmental sustainability
Can develop solutions that benefit Native and
non-Native communities alike.

39. “Greenhouse” analogy Reservations as “testing grounds”
for new ways of relating to the land
Sustainable Development
Land purchases; put into trust for projects
Stables, Deer farms, Organic farms, etc.
Tribal policies
EPA “Treatment-As-State” status
Gaming enables technical/legal environmental work

40. “Greenhouse” analogy Reservations as “testing grounds”
for new ways of relating to people
Development from gaming on some rezes;
Reverse migration from cities for new jobs
Slow reversal of festering poverty & inequality
Tribal employment for non-Indians

41. “Greenhouse” analogy Not just casino money,
but also cultural resurgence
Local cooperation
Tribal investments in local festivals, tourism zones
Tribal radio stations provide alternative
Tribal models
Tribal laws precedents for new local, state laws
Potential areas of healing & “disinfecting”
for the entire society