Thoughts on history, memory, and music

Month: October 2017

The Nooksack Controversy and Questions of Belonging, by Riikka Haapanen

Belonging and sovereignty – these are central keywords in understanding Native American struggles to assert the right to exist, to assert the right to cultural self-determination, and to assert the right to a self-defined identity and history. The 2010s, however, have seen an exceptional case in which a tribal nation had their right to their identity challenged not by the United States federal government or other Euro-American institution but their own citizens—their friends, neighbors, and tribal council.

The Nooksack are an Indigenous nation residing close to the Canadian border in northwest Washington. The relatively small polity of 2,000 members was thrown into the public eye in 2013 when the tribal council decided that a group of approximately 300 individuals had been erroneously enrolled. According to the council, these members lacked the documents necessary to prove their ancestry as Nooksack Indians “by blood.”

The council concluded that the proper action would be to disenroll the entire extended family that descended from the same foremother, totaling 306 member—a staggering 15% of the tribal nation.

In 2016, the situation took an unexpected turn when the U.S. federal government threatened to intervene in the tribe’s domestic affairs. The council had not, it was argued, organized a new election after four seats had expired. As a result, as of March 2016, the council was not considered legitimate by the federal government. Since the council also wasn’t officially authorized to sign off on contracts and grants, the Nooksack lost tens of millions of dollars of state and federal money. In addition, the federal government announced that if the council failed to organize the election, the government would take over the tribe’s services, including health care and law enforcement.

The controversy has continued to this day. Both sides—the council led by Chairman Bob Kelly and the 306, as the members facing disenrollment are now called—have sought the help of lawyers to advance their respective positions. The controversy culminated in the closing of the Nooksack casino by the federal government in June 2017. It was re-opened in September, though, with a fine of 13 million dollars looming over the council.

It seems this was a deciding factor for the council: the Nooksack are currently preparing for a new, supervised tribal council election which is to be held in November 2017. Based upon posts found on their Facebook page, the 306 are eager to exercise their right to vote, end the disenrollment debate, and reaffirm access to citizenship-based benefits, such as health care.

Some of the members facing the threat of disenrollment have speculated that the question was never about the authenticity of their identity as Nooksack but that it had more to do with political power. The goal, according to them, was to get rid of a notably-sized faction of people opposing Kelly. Some say the tension derives from family matters. The 306 moved back and became citizens ten years after the tribe was federally recognized in 1971. To members who had enrolled earlier, they never belonged.

Nevertheless, the question remains: who has the authority to define tribal citizenship criteria and are there limits to that power?

Edgar Heap of Birds and Aesthetic Sovereignty, by Minna Kajasta

“It is a human right to have a voice and be heard”

The power of self-representation and the art of Edgar Heap of Birds

Art can be used as a powerful way to assert cultural sovereignty and justice against the one-sided, stagnant (white) American definition of Native Americans. The multi-disciplinary art of Edgar Heap of Birds (Cheyenne and Arapaho) brings past to present by highlighting the colonial history and contemporary realities Native Americans face.

From Public Signs to Public Awareness

Hock E Aye Vi Edgar Heap of Birds (b. 1954) is especially known for his art that mimics public signs to highlight the Native American colonial experience, both past and present. The signs contain short writings written by himself, sometimes combined with edited texts from the core of American identity such as the Declaration of Independence. By using text in his prints, public art and drawings, Heap of Birds utilizes the colonialists’ own weapon of written words – once and still used against Native people- to fight back the still existing colonial ways. In so doing, Heap of Birds advocates for Native American self-representation.

You Can’t Define Us – Aesthetic Sovereignty

The use of written English words in Heap of Birds’s art can also be seen as a protest against the way Native American art is defined by the dominant American culture. His art challenges the common conceptions of Native American art as something simple, traditional, and unchanging by making people reflect the multiple meanings his texts bear and by using modern art forms not conventionally associated with Indian art.

Heap of Birds’s work powerfully reflects the ever-changing Native American cultures. Moreover, his art asserts that Native people have the aesthetic sovereignty to determine what Native art is.

A good example of this is the controversy caused by Sam Durant’s sculpture Scaffold, purchased by Minnesota’s Walker Art Museum in 2017. The sculpture recreated a conglomeration of gallows used in government-sanctioned executions, including that of the 38 Dakota men executed in Minnesota in 1862. The local Native American communities condemned the sculpture as insensitive and re-traumatizing. In 1990, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis had commissioned a piece called “Building Minnesota” from Edgar Heap of Birds, honoring the same 38 Dakota men – but without controversy.

The difference is, it’s not and it shouldn’t have been the white man’s story to tell. Heap of Birds’s piece was about honouring, remembering and healing, with the consent of the local tribes. This wasn’t just art, it was part of an on-going Native American history and experience, not yet resolved.

Finding Your Place As a Native Artist

For Native artists it can be difficult to claim the right and power to determine who you are as an artist and how, if at all, you should be categorized. This is not the case with Edgar Heap of Birds, who actively builds a bridge to other American Indian and Indigenous communities and educates non-Native Americans about their misunderstandings of and indifference toward Indigenous people.

If aesthetic sovereignty is taken to mean refusal by Native American artists to utilize ideas and forms of modern Western art, then Edgar Heap of Birds can’t be said to represent it. But, in the sense that Heap of Birds draws upon them to make strong statements about Native experiences in his fight for the right of self-representation, his work clearly reflects the principles of aesthetic sovereignty. As he puts it: “It is a human right to have a voice and be heard.”

Sources:

Artforum: https://www.artforum.com/words/id=68033
Duke University Press: https://www.dukeupress.edu/edgar-heap-of-birds
Homepage of Edgar Heap of Birds:

http://heapofbirds.ou.edu/

http://heapofbirds.ou.edu/Websites/heapofbirds/files/Content/3277368/EHB_Brochure.pdf

http://heapofbirds.ou.edu/Websites/heapofbirds/files/Content/3277368/reading_5.pdf
Hyperallergic: https://hyperallergic.com/385682/in-minnesota-listening-to-native-perspectives-on-memorializing-the-dakota-war/

Emily Carr University of Art + Design:  http://www.ecuad.ca/calendar/edgar-heap-of-birds-genocide-and-democracy-secrets-of-life-and-death
Jstor Daily: https://daily.jstor.org/edgar-heap-of-birds-building-minnesota/

Kathryn W. Shanley, “The Indians America Loves to Love and Read: American Indian Identity and Cultural Appropriation”. American Indian Quarterly, Vol. 21, No. 4 (Autumn, 1997), pp. 675-702 (University of Nebraska Press)
Lippard, Lucy R. ”Moving days” in Marjorie Devon (ed.): “Migrations: New Directionsin Native American Art ” (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2006)
Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgar_Heap_of_Birds