Indigenous Peoples' Day / Monday, October 10, 2022
Hello Friends,
Just a friendly reminder that tomorrow is Indigenous Peoples’ Day. How can we celebrate? Well I’m glad you asked…
LISTEN to Indigenous Peoples’ Voices. We need to unlearn/learn. If we were taught anything, much of what we were taught that is from a colonist mindset towards removing the Indigenous from this land for extractive resources. So listen to their history through their own voices. Their own stories. It’s the least we can do. Okay, I guess doing absolutely nothing is the least we can do, but I assume anyone reading my blog/newsletter/Patreon account is a compassionate soul, so take the time to listen.
One of my favorite shows/podcasts EVER - On Being with Krista Tippett just curated a list of all of the conversations she has had through the years who are descendants to those who were Native to these American lands. I heard them all when they originally aired and loved them then, but it’s been a real treat to listen to them all again in such close succession.
The Whole of Time
Joy Harjo
The Intelligence of Plants
Robin Wall Kimmerer
The Freedom of Real Apologies
Layli Long Soldier
Reimagining Sitting Bull, Tatanka Iyotake
Ernie LaPointe and Cedric Good House
Language Carries More Than Words
David Treuer
Daybreak
Jake Skeets
Also one of my other favorite podcasts is Scene On Radio with John Biewen. He create a season called “Seeing White” on the construct of race and it’s history to the present. It was mind-blowing for me and I learned soooooooooooooooooooooo much I was never taught in any of my schooling. Including this episode that tells the story of the largest mass hanging that ever occurred in the US (38 Dakota Men). It was an order signed by President Abe Lincoln the same week he signed the Emancipation Proclamation!!!! The complexity of that!?!? I’m also blown away by the fact that it happened just 3 hours from where I grew up and I never heard a word of it!!! Please take the time and listen to this episode. (If you want to have your mind blown at all you never learned, listen to the whole of Seeing White. Shoot, listen to all 4 seasons. Each one has blown my mind.)
S2 E5: Little War on the Prairie
John Biewen
I’ve really been digging Unreserved with Rosanna Deerchild on Sundays here in the PNW on NWPB. Unreserved is the radio space for Indigenous voices. I’m learning more about the Indigenous Peoples’ who live in this area I am currently calling home.
Find a LOCAL MUSEUM to learn more about the Indigenous Peoples who lived on the land where you now live and learn more about them that way. Locally, the Tamástslikt Cultural Institute is a lovely museum here that I went to last year. They are not open on Monday (bummer, I was gonna go for IPD), so I will be going sometime during the week or next weekend to not only continue to learn, but also to make sure I support them financially. They also have a lovely gift shop with some cool things made by members of the Cayuse, Umatilla, and Walla Walla Tribes.
AMPLIFY Indigenous Peoples’ Voices. Find those voices in books, poetry, on FB, or IG (@NotoriousCree is one of my favs) or just copy and paste this and send it to those you know. Find cool music (Buffy Sainte-Marie) created by Indigenous Peoples and play it for others. Even better, buy their book, album, etc… Support them financially. Get and give these things as gifts.
Let’s all join together with compassionate hearts and minds to Re-member (as Krista Tippet calls it) Our past, Our history. I’m sure there are MANY other ways! These are just a few and more. So please, find the time.