Long time no hear! I have had the pleasure of being interviewed by the daughter of a collogue of mine for a paper she was writing. After reading it, I thought it would be a great topic for this blog. I think she does a great job of discussing the topics of White Public Space, Indexicality, and Native American Identity. At which it is the title of her paper. Obviously you will find one "Mindy" sounding pretty close to someone you know. I like what she has to say in this little quote
"An individual can be both "too Indian" to function in a white space and "not Indian enough" at the same time. Native Americans have to meet certain expectations when dealing with white people in white public spaces, but, as these expectations are primarily defined by white people, there is an entirely different set of expectations in interacting with other Native Americans."
Katie is a chemical engineering major at the Colorado School of Mines who has plans to continue on for her PhD in Archeology and this is what she had to say....
White Public Space, Indexicality,
and Native American Identity
Introduction
I
am one eighth Absentee Shawnee. Every year, even though I am not enrolled in
the school, the University of New Mexico offers me scholarship money because I
am an Indian. When I was in elementary school I got to bring in authentic
Indian artifacts for show and tell as a symbol of my Native American heritage.
I live in New Mexico where I am exposed daily to Native American cultures. But
that is the extent of my involvement with the Native American aspect of my
identity. I do not feel like I can truly call myself Native American. The fact
that one eighth of my ‘blood’ is Absentee Shawnee does not mean that I know
anything about the culture of the Absentee Shawnee people. I have not lived
with them or suffered with them. I can walk down the street without arousing
even the slightest suspicion that I have Native blood. I am guilty of having
what is known as ‘white privilege’ even as I, with my Certified Degree of Indian
Blood (CDIB) card, have access to the very resources intended for those without
this privilege. In searching for a job or applying to colleges I can claim to
be not only a woman, which makes me a minority in the STEM fields, but a Native
American as well because, according to my CDIB card, I am Absentee Shawnee. In
dealing with landlords, professors, or any authority figure, I have never had
to worry if I am being discriminated against due to my Native blood because I
look, dress, and act white. What does it mean that I can change who I am, that
I can choose which parts of my identity are emphasized, to fit the
circumstances in which I find myself? This practice of changing identity is
known in anthropological circles as a reframing of identity. My goal in writing
this paper is to examine the ways in which reframing, in the ‘specific’ case of
Native Americans, contributes to which aspects of identity are made salient
during any given interaction.
The word specific above is in single quotes because
“Native American” is not very specific at all. The term “Native American”
conjures up images of feathered headdresses, teepees, and medicine men dancing
around a fire. The words invoke a romantic and stereotypic ideal of a downtrodden
indigenous people that suffered through the destruction of their beloved
homeland at the hands of the white man. But what these words definitely do not
encompass is the wide range of cultures that comprise the groups of people that
lived here before the Europeans arrived. Author Lila Abu-Lughod, in her article
“Do
Muslim Women Really Need Saving? Anthropological Reflections on Cultural
Relativism and its Others”, points out the dangers of homogenizing any
group of people. Even within a group of very similar individuals there is
always variation in values. Categorizing all 565 federally recognized tribes in
the United States using only one term is homogenization on a very large scale.
In my paper I am going to analyze reframing of identity as it pertains to
Native Americans. Unfortunately it is not within the scope of my work to fully
analyze a single particular tribe; nor can I analyze even a fraction of all the
tribes in the United States, let alone the entirety of the Americas. The tribes
that are specifically included in my analysis in order to develop my argument
include the Sioux Indians, the Navajo Nation, the Poarch Band of Creek Indians,
and the Seminole Tribe of Florida. While I understand that my findings will not
reflect any particular tribe nor can they accurately reflect the situation of
the entire group of Native American people, I believe that the data I have
chosen can be used to make comparisons and establish general trends. I do not
intend to misrepresent a very diverse group of people by analyzing only a
handful of them; however I will use the term “Native American” throughout my
report because I am analyzing general patterns and because using one term is
much more succinct than listing all 565 federally recognized tribes.
Theory
In order to
paint a complete picture, I am going to define several terms that will appear
throughout my paper - first, identity. Identity, to borrow from Bucholtz and
Hall (2005), is “the social positioning of self and other” (p.2). Identity is
important only because of the impact it has on interactions with the other. It
is a very fluid concept that incorporates pieces of all of the aspects of an
individual’s life. The idea that identity is dynamic rather than fixed makes it
essential to establish the context in which taking advantage of this feature,
or reframing, becomes necessary.
This leads me to the white public
space. Jane Hill develops this concept in her paper “Language, Race, and White
Public Space” as “an arena in which …disorder on the part of whites is rendered
invisible and normative, while the …behavior of members of [minority]
populations is highly visible and the object of constant monitoring” (p.6). In
other words, a white public space is an arena of interaction between two groups
in which whites, with their invisible privilege, can act however they wish
without any fear of social reprisal, but where members of minority groups face negative
repercussions for any deviance from expected behavior. In such a space,
acceptable behavior is defined by whites. In the United States most, if not
all, interactions between the majority and minority take place in a white
public space. This may not be a conscious decision on the part of the
interactants but it tends to be inevitable because the creation of a white
public space is often invisible to the white participants.
Cultural capital, as it will be used
in this discourse, is what allows individuals to succeed in white public
spaces. Philippe
Bourgois, in his article “Workaday World
– Crack Economy”, examined the motivations behind the creation of a crack
economy in Harlem. He found that most of the cocaine dealers he spoke with
actually preferred legal work but they felt that they could not find a place in
corporate America due to their lack of the requisite cultural capital. Not only
were their living conditions and educational opportunities a world apart from
those of their white counterparts, but they also felt that the opportunities
they did have forced them to reject some of their cultural values, especially
their dignity. Gaps like these, gaps which would seem to be insignificant in
the grand scheme of things, have forced cocaine dealers into choosing between
working outside the law or accepting demeaning positions that force them to
participate in a white public space. This discrepancy between the cultural
capital that a group possesses and the cultural capital required for success in
white public spaces, the same discrepancy that leads to reframing, is
reinforced by indexicality.
An index, much like the index finger on the human hand,
points from one object to another. The classic example is smoke as an index of
fire. If there is smoke, it means that there is a fire. Indices are not the
same thing as stereotypes. Stereotypes do not have to be, and rarely are, based
in fact. Stereotypes index a society’s belief about another group of people.
The stereotype that all New Mexicans speak Spanish or that we need green cards
to travel to other states is an index of the popular belief that New Mexico is
comprised mainly of illegal immigrants.
All
of the anthropological definitions discussed so far do not have any purpose
except where they are used in analyzing people. I am going to examine some of
the ways in which these definitions impact the identities of Native Americans.
Historic
Interactions
Historically, relations between whites and Native
Americans have been conducted from a platform that reflects white beliefs in
their own superiority. There was a sense of duty: whites must educate the
backwards Indian and save him from himself. This ‘white man’s burden’ was used
to justify many of the historic interactions between the whites and the Native
American tribes. These historic interactions set the stage for the development
of a white public space. The wants and needs of any society are culturally
defined. As put by Ruth Benedict, in her book Patterns of Culture, “Each
[culture,] from the point of view of another [culture,] ignores fundamentals
and exploits irrelevancies” (p.24). Thus some character trait or behavior that
is highly valued by one group of people may be of next to no importance to
another group of people. The institution of poll taxes is a clear example of
this concept as it pertains to my research question. Native American tribes
were self-sufficient and independent. They could get whatever they needed from
the land that they lived on. By demanding a poll tax, the white settlers forced
the tribes to change their lifestyles. Not only was the concept of money
distinctly European, but the skills needed to acquire it favored European
cultural capital.
The
shift in focus from things that Native Americans were good at, areas where
Native American cultural capital was extremely valuable, to an arena dominated
and dictated by white men, an arena where the only cultural capital of import
is that of the white men, led to the devaluation of Native American cultures. Poll
tax is not the only instance of forced societal change in a way that privileged
white skill sets. Rather than changing the demands of the white public space to
appreciate the cultural capital of minority groups, Native Americans were sent
to boarding schools and forced to speak English in an attempt at assimilation.
The goal of such measures was to equip Native Americans for success in
interacting in white public spaces by eliminating every trace of their culture.
Expectations
White public spaces operate based on behavioral
expectations. In other words, an individual can only interact in a white public
space if they operate within acceptable behavioral boundaries. More often than
not, these acceptable boundaries are defined and reinforced by whites, although
they can also be defined and reinforced by Native Americans themselves. Jessica
Cattelino has written several papers on the subject of casino gaming in the
Seminole nation. She has found that the Seminole nation is caught in what she
calls a “double-bind”: the Seminoles have become relatively wealthy as a result
of gaming, but white expectations are that Indians are supposed to be poor.
Since the Seminoles have defied that expectation there has been a push to
terminate their federally recognized status as a Native American tribe, the
very status that allows the tribe to operate casinos in the first place.
Kelly Fayard conducted research among the Poarch
Creek Indians during her examination of the role that blood quantum plays in
defining Native American identity. She found that, to the Poarch Indians,
“defining someone as ‘Indian’ had less to do with a Certified Degree of Indian
Blood (CDIB) card than with the way in which they acted or looked” (p. 82).
Specifically, “what draws the people together [is] discrimination” (p. 82). The
Poarch Creek Band of Indians expect other Indians to be discriminated against.
A lack of discrimination is indicative of a non-Indian status.
Peggy Wilson looked at the academic performance of
Sioux Indian high school students. She points out the many structural and
cultural barriers that prevent Sioux students from achieving the academic
success of which they are capable. These barriers range from the physical
layout of non-reserve classrooms to the racist remarks of white students. One
Sioux student observed that attendance policies that were lax when a white
student missed class were suddenly strictly reinforced when a Sioux student
missed class (p. 375). These very real, but overlooked, issues create the
expectation on the part of non-Native faculty members that the Sioux students
are actually incapable of reaching the same educational standards
expected of white students. Expectations on the part of white teaching faculty
create a white public space in which Sioux students are ill-equipped for
success. Rather than accounting for the difference in cultural capital, Sioux
students are held to the same, or sometimes higher, standards as white students
and are punished the moment they fall short of those standards. These expectations
are clearly communicated to the Sioux students and, in response, many do not
try to fight an unfair system: they drop out of school. This reinforces the
expectation that Native Americans are not capable of obtaining a high school
education, which in turn eliminates any possibility of removing cultural
barriers, which means that Sioux students have to struggle to develop the
correct cultural capital, which means that they have a harder time than white
students, which means that faculty expect less of them and treat them as less
than, which leads them to drop out, and so on. Wilson summed it up nicely: “Low
expectations become a self-fulfilling prophecy” (p. 379).
Stereotypes
and Indexicality
In
all of this talk about expectations and white public space, I have yet to touch
on stereotypes. As stated in the theory section, stereotypes index the
naturalized associations that one society forms about another. In other words,
stereotypes about Native Americans index white beliefs about Native Americans.
They reinforce the expectations that lead to white public spaces. There was a
recent controversy that reflects the power of indexicality. No Doubt recently
released a music video for their song “Looking Hot”. In the video lead singer
Gwen Stefani and bassist Tony Kanal are depicted as Native Americans that are
captured by the other band members, who are depicted as cowboys. Many of the
complaints against the video had to do with its generic nature. The clothing,
behavior, and symbols used in the video did not reflect on any one particular
tribe but rather represented white ideas of what Indians are, namely that they
are not white. This stereotype indexes the white belief that Native Americans
can be lumped together into one large group of non-whites. As discussed
earlier, this view is inaccurate. Unfortunately it plays a large role in white
public spaces. The uniqueness of each tribe is often overlooked in Government
policies even as the differences between “Indians” and whites are emphasized.
Another
example is embodied in the phrase “off the reservation”. This phrase is often
used when talking about some action or thought that is viewed as completely
crazy. Not only do the words themselves imply that Native Americans belong on
reservations, but the concept serves as an index of white beliefs that it would
be irrational for there to be a space for Native Americans in mainstream white
society. The term “Indian giver” is applied to individuals or groups that give
a gift and then take it back. This term could be an index of white beliefs that
Native Americans are unwilling to share, which leads to ideas like those
propagated by Governor Ratcliffe in Pocahontas when he refused to
believe that the Natives had no gold. On the subject of Pocahontas,
popular media has constantly indexed white beliefs that all Native Americans
are spiritually connected with the land and, being so involved, are unwilling
to fully exploit their resources.
Indexicality
serves as a constant reminder of the expectations placed on Native Americans
and their role in the white public space. They must be in tune with the Earth,
as exemplified by Pocahontas when she teaches John Smith to “paint with all the
colors of the wind”. They must be generic, as perpetuated by media like
“Looking Hot”. They must accept the idea that they belong on reservations, as
indicated by the catch phrase “off the reservation”. But most of all, they must
not expect to find a place in white public spaces if they do not meet indexed
expectations. Perhaps the concept was put best by Vine Deloria in his book Custer
Died for Your Sins: “…the Sioux were presented with an authority figure who
bemoaned the fact that whenever he visited the reservations the Sioux were not
out dancing in the manner of their ancestors. In a real sense, they were not
real [Indians]” (p. 87). White expectations were that the Sioux lived just as
their ancestors did; that their culture is static. When the Sioux do not fall
into that neat category, when they gather the cultural capital to make a stand
in white public space, their status as Native Americans is denounced, both by
whites and by other Indians. This is where reframing comes in.
Reframing
All of the previous
discussion has been building towards a single idea: an individual can be both
“too Indian” to function in a white public space and “not Indian enough” at the
same time. Native Americans have to meet certain expectations when dealing with
white people in white public spaces, but, as these expectations are primarily
defined by white people, there is an entirely different set of expectations in
interacting with other Native Americans. These Native American expectations
were briefly touched on earlier in the discussion about Kelly Fayard’s work,
but I do not feel knowledgeable enough about Native American cultures to
outline them as I have done with white expectations and indices. Likewise, I do
not wish to reduce my conclusion to broad assumptions based on the very indices
that lead to reframing in the first place. Since I, as stated in the introduction,
am not a Native American and I cannot therefore evaluate instances of reframing
in my own life, I decided that the best course of action would be to interview
an individual who is intimately familiar with the situation from the
perspective of a Native American. In order to answer my research question I
interviewed a Navajo woman to whom I was introduced through a mutual
acquaintance. For the sake of anonymity I am going to refer to my interviewee
as Mindy.
I do not want to be
guilty of one of the things that Vine Deloria criticizes anthropologists for:
seeing what I want to see. At the same time I struggled with asking neutral and
non-leading questions that would provide the answer to my research question of
their own volition. Being a novice in the art of interview, I hope that I have
achieved some balance between the two extremes, however I would caution the
reader to remember that the following is my, probably very biased,
interpretation of another complex individual’s life and that I may have taken
some key response out of context in a way that negates the spirit in which it
was given. If that should be the case, I apologize to my source. It is not my
intention to misrepresent her in any manner; I am extremely grateful for her
assistance. With that being said, after two email interview sessions I have
found several instances of reframing in the context of a white public space in
Mindy’s life.
One of the things
Mindy spoke about was her upbringing and her challenges in ensuring that her
children are raised differently than she was while remaining appreciative of
their positions in life. These challenges include instilling in her children a
knowledge of their Navajo heritage. She talked about some of her difficult
childhood experiences and how she simultaneously wants to “show them how lucky
they are without exposing them to the pain” that she and her husband faced
growing up. She pointed out that her children only see the struggles that are
part of the lives of most Native Americans in the media or through their
parents’ stories. Mindy also mentioned that it is difficult for her to teach
her children about their Navajo heritage because they do not live near the
reservation.
Mindy is married to a
man form San Ildefonso Pueblo. Being Navajo herself and working and living in a
white public space, Mindy has to navigate between the expectations of three
very different cultures on a daily basis. We had a brief conversation about her
experiences working in a white public space and the different responses she got
from the people in her life. Mindy said that her “own Navajo family has always
pushed education to better us and to pursue [a] better way of life, so they
have always been supportive” of her decision to find employment. On the other
hand, her husband’s family “doesn’t ask about [her] work, and generally views
[her] career as ‘selfish’ and not being very motherly”. This view is the exact
opposite of that held in the white community, namely that it is selfish to stay
at home and focus on being a parent. In order to even obtain a job in the white
public space, Mindy had to get a higher education. Since she lives closer to
her husband’s family, this meant that she “had to ask for them to help support
[her] husband and 3 children” while she attended school. Traditionally, her
husband’s Pueblo is patriarchal. His family’s disapproval of Mindy’s
educational achievements is an index of the patriarchal nature of the Pueblo.
Mindy works as a
women’s health care provider. She described some of the ways in which her
occupation in the white public space interacts with her Native background. She
specifically mentioned the role of traditional ceremonies and dances: “When
someone dies, they hold a 4 day event and they choose cooks for the event. In
the Tewa or Navajo tradition, when you are asked to do something like this,
even to participate in a particular dance, you can’t turn it down. So whatever
outside job you have, you basically have to take time off to attend to your
Native traditional doings.” In a white public space that does not recognize
something even as universally necessary as maternity leave, taking time off to
attend to important ceremonies is likely not encouraged, and yet this is an
integral part of Mindy’s identity as a Native American. In another instance,
Mindy talked about some of the ways that she combines traditional Navajo
beliefs with her job. She prays “with [her] corn meal prior to going into work
to have a clear mind” and she “care[s] for women in a way that aligns with
…traditional [Navajo] teachings of thinking, speaking, and acting in a positive
manner”. I believe that this is an instance cultural hybridization: Mindy is
not hiding or diminishing her Navajo identity, nor is she hiding or diminishing
her scientific education. Rather she is blending the two together to create a
new public space; one in which the beliefs and expectations of Native Americans
bear just as much relevance as the beliefs and expectations of whites.
Essentially, Mindy has
to maintain her identity as a Navajo woman while socializing in an environment
dominated by Pueblo expectations and working in a white public space. Thus,
when Mindy goes to work, although she is still a Navajo woman, she is primarily
a health care provider. When she visits her husbands’ family, she is primarily
a woman. When she is teaching her children about their heritage, she is
primarily a Navajo. All of these are very subtle instances of reframing of
identity.
Conclusion
I examined reframing
of Native American identity in light of the creation of white public spaces,
indexicality, and expectations. In order to do this as accurately and
objectively as possible, I interviewed Mindy, a Navajo woman. Through my
interaction with her I learned that identity reframing does indeed occur in the
daily lives of Native Americans. While the work I have done here is by no means
conclusive, I have found that the reframing of Native American identities
brings historical interactions, white expectations, Native American
expectations, and stereotypes together in a very complex way. Simply stating
that a Navajo woman acts differently at home than she does at work in a white
public space does not do justice to the forces at play within Native American
cultures and interactions with white public spaces. Unfortunately, I do not
have the skill set to perform a more complete analysis.
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