BLACK INDIAN RELATIONS

Chief Mankiller:


Alan Parker

Mr. Alan Parker (from Northwest Indian Applied Research Institute at Evergreen):

Thank you Wilma, for bringing this panel to NCAI. I think it is terribly important. And it is important to take this proposal, and carry it forward. It is long overdue.

I wanted to add a little bit. I am an individual who grew up on one of the western reservations, in Northern Montana [ed. note: the Rocky Boys Reservation] and we were isolated physically, socially and culturally. We never saw an African American, we never saw anybody who varied from the norm of that isolated community. So, I think part of this colonial mentality that David mentioned, which I think is a very important point that he made, that you have to understand the context of it. If we were isolated in areas where most of the reservations in the West are, and you are a white Indian, (you) buy into that white racism mentality--- So, that's why we have, I think, this unspoken racism that exists in Indian country, where it is considered more acceptable to be a mixture of white and Indian races, and it is not acceptable, in some ways, to be any other mixture, especially with African Americans. But, that's because you are dealing with populations that grew up in isolation, and I think that situation is certainly changing today. Then, I think we will no longer have that influence of inherent racism.

There is another consideration, which is that if you grew up in a tribal community, the dominant fact is tribal identity, as we grow into adulthood and we engage ourselves in fighting for human rights, the over-riding political fact is political sovereignty, self determination. And, as young people take on this struggle, they learn that we Native American, Indians Nation people have to preserve that. That is an imperative! If we don't preserve the fact of tribal sovereignty, tribal unity, then how are we going to preserve our ability to remain as a culturally distinct people? So that imperative is not often understood in the African American community.

That is not a criticism, that is the reality. But, some of those things, we need to bring out into the front line, and look at them from different perspectives.

Personally, I really appreciate your bringing this here. I think that as you look into the future, you know, where we sit here today and find that a great national questions is, who is going to be, you know, the next President, or whatever direction that goes--well I have a lot to say-- all of our lives, I think, are going to get a lot worse, for us people of color, in this society. So, as that happens, we need to find common bonds and to find a way of working together.

Chief Mankiller:

Does anybody want to respond to his comment? Well, I will -- you are not supposed to do that as the moderator-- but I think you are absolutely right. I think that having worked in both communities-- I have served on the Board for the South African Free Elections Fund, but I don't think we ever had a dialogue about the differences in what we are struggling for, and to try to get each other to understand that better. You are absolutely correct.

Dr. Littlefield:

One thing, in relation to the Seminole issue that was raised earlier, and I hope that any Seminole here will correct me if I am historically inaccurate here, but the vote that was taken this summer really seems to me, as an observer, represents a coalition of two issues. One was in 1991, a vote by the Tribal Council to bypass the Bureau of Indian Affairs in approving Constitutional changes, and that, of course, was slapped down by the BIA. And, that process continues, a movement continues in the National Council. And also in the wake of the award by the Indian Claims Commission, there was a debate about how that was going to be shared-- and, of course, they were sued and cross sued-- with the Freedmen members of the Seminole Nation.

Those two issues came together. If you look at the numbers, the numbers broke down on all three of those critical votes around 40% versus 60%. And, since the vote, the National Council has voted to put those amendments into effect immediately, and not wait for the BIA approval. Of course, tribal administrators see a problem with that, because they are in violation, basically, of their own Constitution.

So, they are really in a difficult place with this issue. But, it is an issue of sovereignty. On the other hand, there is a strong feeling among some people that I talked to, about the moral obligation to the two tribal bands that participated in the tribal government since 1867, down to this summer! So, it is a difficult issue.

Chief Mankiller:

I think that issue alone is worth a discussion in itself. Can we deal with it very calmly, just look at it with an historical perspective!

Mr. Ray Wahnitiio Cook (in the audience):

I want to commend you for kind of opening up this can of worms. No doubt, what we are really talking about is-- you are really biting into the heart of the sovereignty issue, and the ability of the tribes to-- tribes that were at one time, (subject to? had the ) the worse ...(record ?)(attack on?) ever to whatever was identified as Indian, traditionally. But, now the younger generation, Wilma, you are still part of that, they have brought the passion back to tribal governance, and try to refocus, in fact, on what ARE these groups.

So, that was one of the issues here, and it is the idea of people of color, you know, us working together. Yea! you know, my personal view is that I have more in common with The Nation of Islam, and the right to life people, and what I try to do! when I go out there, heh, you know, these folks are really hot(?), and I so I am working from there, and (that is)part of my ability to work there was well as any where else-- but getting tribes to gather back those traditions that were terminated or assimilated, it goes back to, like, the adoption ceremonies, because what we are talking about are blacks who, and Indians, who came together at one period of time.

And, on my reservation, I am Akwesasne(?) Lenape (?)/ Mohawk and my great great great grandfather was black! He was caught in a raiding party from the British, and was a slave, back when he was twelve years old, ... and he became an interpreter of the (_____?) the tribe, and a representative from my tribe to New York State, in fact.

Now, we have some black Indian people (who have) married, you know, Jamaican families and so forth, coming back to the Rez and thinking that they can start a life together, and the dissimilarities- they are so dissimilar (?)-- they are being chased off, called "nigger" and so forth, they go back to the urban areas.

But the funny thing is, that whether it is Indian, or mixed marriages, if you bring that city culture into the reservations, forget it, it is not going to work. Once you are citified, you are going to have a hell of a time getting back into the reservation. Those are the issues!

So, whether you are adopting a Navajo from Four Corners area, or adopting a Navajo by mixed marriage, what is that cultural and political process that is going to be put into place, to make that OK again? It has been a hundred or so years since we have done that this in our community.

Again, the adoption ceremony. We have to bring back that tradition, mixed with the governance, and that's really a question among the (for the?) folks up here (on the panel?) now that we have opened up Pandora's Box, and with these young people here, this is what it is all about, maybe even after them.

How can we get back to the passion, after being brutally raped, beaten, killed, stole from, and so on, and bring back the passion for (our) governing system, and our culture, so that it is OK once again to rejuvenate our genetic base with other people, along with the social and spiritual (values??)

Dr. Wilkins:

I just what to comment on that. Some recent research done by some Indian sociologists, and when I first read their figures I was just shocked, and it was actually reprinted in Clinton's Race Initiatives, that "X-File Report" --that produced some of that data, although I don't know whatever happened with it--the statistic was in terms of out- marriage of the various ethnic groups in the country --and the Blacks didn't marry that much to non-Blacks. Whites don't get married that much to others. But, the out-marriage rate for American Indians was 60 %! and so, if you note-- if that is a fact, I think we see that in evidence in the communities that we are from, I think that's going to cause us..., as Allen and the Chairman has mentioned here, and go back to the original concept that Willard started off with, the notion of kinship. Are we going to find some way to return to that concept in the broadness in what it meant, which originally included adoptions. Or, are we going to have to address this notion as citizenship, and we were talking about this over lunch, how these tribes have this constitutional democracy, and they had different categories of citizenship, or are we going to rely on this archaic concept of membership, and what that concept entails--that you belong to an association, not a nation, see. And I think, until we, in our own minds, get our hands around these three concepts, kinship, citizenship, and membership, and take into consideration the marriage rate among our young folks, and some of these old folks too-- this is all about how we are going to redefine ourselves as nations, because the nation concept will persist, so long as we have reserve lands, you see. But I think we will have to deal with that down the road, and now.

Mr. Gerald Watson, from Audience:

My name is Gerald Watson and I live in Albuquerque. I was in a meeting about a month ago, and heard about this workshop today, and I am not a lawyer, or (?) I am just a regular guy. But in Albuquerque, my wife, Geneva? We have a family owned business. We manufacture beaded and hand crafts, jewelry, and I just started it with my wife, and have run it for about thirteen years, and we finally can market our exhibit through the Pow Wow circuit around the country.

Going back about ten years on the Pow Wow Circuit, I really counted Black Americans I would see, and I really didn't see that many -- really, you could count them on one hand. I guess about five years ago, I began to notice more and more Blacks at the Pow Wows-- largely in search of their Native roots. Many were on a spiritual quest. And, they came from all over the country. Many of them came to Albuquerque not knowing anybody, just showing up, looking to get that spiritual piece that was missing for them. So, what we would do is, we began to talking to folks, sharing meals and sharing resources, and it got so intense, that it was just very clear that there was a spiritual calling. So, what we did was, back in April, we formed an organization called The Black Indian Society--it is a not for profit organization, it is a 501c3, -- our whole our mission was education, research, communion, it is really clear that we need to get out in the community, where people are, because of all the things we understand, we have been hearing from the militants (?), people with Natives in their family who don't know how do you connect. I meet people whose mother or father may be Native people, who don't know how to connect with their tribe, how to register. And we decided back in April that we would get something going. So we made our debut at a gathering in April. And the response was really, really strong. In fact, an interesting response that we had not anticipated was that we had a lot of Native folks who were coming to us, who have...who are black Indians, living on the Rez, who were totally disconnected with their Black heritage.

And so that was a whole other piece that we began to put discover. We went on down the road, and this past September, at a Chicago Pow Wow, we set up a Black Indian Day, that we felt was grass roots, we did it with chewing gum, but we set up, like, a photo exhibit and that was very well received. We did a viewing all day of the film, an excellent film called Black Indians, hosted by James Earl Jones -- it is an enriching film. It is sixty minutes (long) and we had many people, it was a cold day...This is just a comment. And the comment that this brother here made, about a cultural mind set was very clear, because even though, for many of us, we cannot go back and be directly connected because of the lack of records, it is what is in your minds, what is in your spirit, what is in your heart, that really makes the difference.

What we are doing is sharing. I have really enjoyed this session.

Chief Mankiller:

(to one of the persons in the audience (Mr. Allen?) since you have already spoken, let me go to this other person. You have to speak loudly because there is the competition from the other session!

Another young person in the audience:

I will try to respond. I just want to express my thanks that we have this dialogue. To me it is really exciting, because...my mother is ___?and my father is (Powhatan?) I don't know, I kind of felt alienated from both groups. I felt different from both groups. It makes me feel good that this dialogue is called the relationship between African Americans and Native Americans. I just wanted to express my thanks that this is happening. That is all I can say. Thank you.

Mr. Daryll G. Davis (U. S. Department of Justice, and Law Enforcement Officers Alliance, from the audience):

I came to this session, in part, in connection with my new position. I just got assigned to a committee of the Minority Law Enforcement Officers Alliance, policemen, ...it has expert type groups . . branches around the country, there are two black, organizations including ones with a focus on civil rights, there are a couple that are Asian, Latino organizations, so there is work going on, which would be much like the themes we are discussing today. I need a little help in research on this, this alliance does do this type of analysis. . One of the bi-lingual groups has just started...a survey or study of homicides and suspicious deaths, is there a disparity between these groups and non-minorities? I am trying to research this...I do not know if there is much research on (it?) What I need is some numbers.... I hate to go to the FBI for statistics on this.

Chief Mankiller:

Again, we hope to ask people together. . to make lists of (sources) they have used and put together a list of films and research material, and articles, and other materials, and then we will post it on the NCAI website for the people who are interested in these issues, so they can do further research.

Dr. Minges:

Could I comment. I have two hats, I have worked on certain aspects of this. I have worked for human rights organizations for about fifteen years. I worked for Amnesty International for about twelve years. And for the last three years I have worked for an organizations called the Human Rights Watch. When I first came to Human Rights Watch, we were working or a report called "Police Brutality in the United States" and I have asked the person who is doing the research, "what percentage of Native Americans figured into the writing of this book?" And I will be honest with you, very little if any. And in twenty-five years, Human Rights Watch, as an organization has published one twenty page book on human rights abuses against Native Americans. From my experience at Amnesty International. As a rule, Amnesty is better about it. In 1992, they published a couple of books, and these books largely dealt with,...they didn't really deal with a lot of issues that Native Americans are facing with respect to human rights. I would be interested in any comments that you have.

I would like to encourage you, if you can, reach out to these organizations, and write them letters, and say "how come you are not dealing with this issue! How come you can talk about human rights in Kosovo, or in Chechnya, but ignore these issues at home?" And, I will tell you why, basically, they are scared. They don’t know anything about this, and they are scared to write about something they don’t know anything about, so that is why it is important for Native Americans in the US to step forward and try to contact these organizations.

You ask about statistics and demographics that don’t really exist, and the only way that they are going to exist is to put a face on who these people are. And, the only way that you can do that is to reach out to these organizations, write them letters, and say "look, we are here! It would be very nice if you would (write about us) once in a awhile."

Chief Mankiller:

Let me just reiterate just how important I think what he said is! Because, I am on the board of a couple of organizations that do international work, and about human rights abuses, internationally, and it is staggering to see what goes on in Indian country is ignored, and, people want to go all over the world and deal with human rights abuses there, but they don’t want to deal with them in this country.

Mr. Richard Allen (Researcher for the Cherokee Nation, from the audience):

This is just an observation, regarding American Indians, blacks and whites, (who claim it) you know, based on (high cheek bones?) brown hair, you know.

Being what I consider a full blood Cherokee, I have had to deal with this over the years, because of tribal …dogs, who come from some other tribe, you know, become Cherokee dogs. Those of us who don’t move away from home and try to stay in the territory that we know as Cherokee country --looking from the outside at that, knowing that I probably have this much White Indian (holding up two fingers very close together) you know my family, well I have never found a need to search for those white roots. And, it appears that it is always the mixed bloods, whether they be white, black, or Asian--and Indian, you know, they come looking for the "Indian-ness" in them, and I am not sure what that all entails, what kinds of dimensions that means in terms of the original inhabitants here. I feel that sometimes, they are looking for something, like this gentleman here said, "spirituality," but we don’t have spirituality to give them!

I have heard so much, over and over again --"well I know I am Cherokee, its right there in my heart" And I am saying, "No! its not!" (laughter in audience) Maybe you think you are, but finding out that you have this much [again holding up two fingers very close together] Cherokee blood doesn't make you Cherokee!

And, I think that’s probably what is going on with the Seminoles, they just voted in an eighth, a cut off at an eighth, in blood quantum.

We find so many of our Cherokee people, who are mixed, who come back to us, not you (nodding at Chief Mankiller) I deal with this at Pine Bluff?, because I worked for Chief Mankiller at one time, we respond to those types of things. And, to us – it is almost ludicrous, that people protest, with this much [holding two fingers up] about one two-thousandths, I think it is now, of Cherokee blood. And, for those of us who were raised in the Cherokee community, if you weren't raised in that community, you don’t really know who you are as a Cherokee.

It almost becomes ludicrous at a point - people will argue that they want to become traditional, they want to become spiritual, and they want me to teach them how to do that? I had an email like that today. I can’t do that. I think it is good that this is being discussed, but I don’t think that it is going to do anything more than provide a genealogy dimension to those particular tribes. That is just an observation.

Mr. Darius Lee Smith (Director of the Native Peoples Initiative, Habitat for Humanity International, from the audience):

I want to make a quick observation as a black Navajo. I appreciate this whole forum. I think that it comes down to privilege. I am a privileged black Navajo, because I grew up in an all black community in Denver, nine months of the year, and then every summer I spent on the Navajo Dine Nation. I am Hashk’aahadzohi (which in Navajo means "yucca-fruit-strung-out-in-a-line") on my mom's side. On my black Father’s side I am considered by Navajos to be a "Nakaic Lizh inic" (meaning black Mexican.) So in terms of a personal experience, every summer I was a "zhini"in Navajo country (slang word for Black person) and I was a Mexican in Denver (laughter.) It was difficult.

One of the things we are talking about too is privilege, because I was --my Grandmother doesn't speak English--and so I understand the Dine’e and so (I am privileged to be able to) have this connection, in terms of the language. And I think that the number one language for Black folk is English.

It was very frustrating to be in Denver, when the President’s Initiative on Race came through Denver, and the Indian Community really got upset, and we talked about why were Indian people left off, and Dr. John Hope Franklin said "I am Indian" But his Indian experience was like this (holding up fingers with virtually no gap between them) so there are different degrees of Indian experience that needs to be played into this.

And so, I think that, it is just important to realize that some of us are privileged to be on the reservation! I look at is as a privilege, and have the Indian experience. But, there are a lot of our Indian people that have been adopted out, and stolen, and those people (need to find ways)-- and there are ways, to connect. I think that one of those ways is through the Tribal Colleges. I wish some of these Tribal Colleges would build dormitories and a lot of our urban Indians could go back to their communities and reconnect. I think that is important, in terms of building this alliance. We need to start doing bridge-building activities. I want to see this continue to happen. There was a symposium at Dartmouth recently, I would like to see some of that information pulled into this as well.

And, I challenge a lot of these young people here too, you have to be proud of who you are! In 1991 I moved back to Denver (after graduating from college in California) and I was proud to be a black Indian. And, I remember, I first introduced myself to the Denver Indian community at a meeting of about two hundred people at the Indian Association, and I said "I am a black Indian. "I learned later that I offended some Indian people, they wanted to know why I said that! They said, "well, you kind of look black" -- they looked at my hair! (laughter).

I think that they have to realize that I am heavily influenced by black music, by the black church, by the black community. And, this applies to white kids, and Indian kids, who are influenced by the white community, and our Indian kids who are influenced by the Chicano community. There is this absolute that has been created, absolutism, and we (make a mistake to) buy into it. No one is pure anything. And, as for the blood quantum issue, we need to challenge this for the artificial construct it is. We need to break those barriers.

I think that this Forum is a good thing; I know our time is wrapping up, so I just feel that I am personally connected to this issue, and I would like to see more black Indians talk about it. I am glad you spoke about it.

And I think, I think we have to look at those four issues, of privilege, if you are an Indian and you speak your indigenous language, you are privileged, and we have to look at it like that, but at the same time we have to be compassionate, that we have Indian people that never had that opportunity.

I work for a Christian organization – Habitat for Humanity. When they hired me, I said in the interview: "the demise of Indian people happened because of Christianity." This went over their heads – they didn't know what the hell I was talking about. I challenged them, and I went a little bit further, and I said: "we have to realize that as a Christian society, this country is based on conquest, we have been conquered. "

And, again, I think about the experience with Dr. John Hope Franklin, in 1998, when I got up and I said some things, I pissed off the black church in Denver. I did! The Black Church Coalition called me the next day and said "you Indians ruined a perfectly good opportunity to dialogue with the President, you have ruined it," and I went to them and I said "well, I’m sorry, but I have been heavily influenced by Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, and I just used a tactic that black folks have used back in the ‘60s and the ‘70s -- being assertive. Those are my role models. And by the way, my Grandfather, on my black side, belongs to your AME church." And his mouth fell, because he just looked at me as an Indian person.

And so I think that this Forum is a good thing, and we need to continue this type of dialogue [in order to overcome the conditioned silence about the multiplicity of who we are, to understand that there is no one definition of what it means to be Indian, just as there is no one definition of what it means to be Black. By examining who we are and the diversity among us, we will be strengthened in our ability to be strong and dynamic human beings.

Editor’s note: Mr. Lee added this later.] And I want to get that material from the Dartmouth Symposium? Is that going to be published?

Dr. Minges:

I wish they would publish it. It would be costly. When they were first putting it on, I said "you need to get this recorded, and get it into words, and even take the essays and put it together in a compilation. " But it never happened.

Mr. Lee:

could this panel, with your influence Ms. Mankiller, try to get that to be part of the Congress next year?

Chief Mankiller:

I think it will! I think it is always going to be part of the Congress, because the issues are important to everybody. And so, if it is not me bringing it to the Congress, obviously it is important to the NCAI leadership or we wouldn't be having this panel taking up time on their agenda.

A question in the back?