Meanwhile, my mind seems to ever be elsewhere. Right now I keep going over a 5 minute "speech" I'm supposed to be doing on Monday for Indigenous day. I'm really kind of freaking out about this, actually. So I'm going to write down my thoughts so I can go away and come back to them Sunday night and hopefully know what the hell I'm doing when I stand up on Monday.
When I was asked to speak, it was at a Coalition Against Environmental Racism meeting. My friend, who was desperate to find speakers for Monday's Indigenous Day celebration, suggested that we could talk about an EJ issue. Basically she just wanted some speakers and some representation of allies. I'm an ally, I thought, and I know quite a bit about the cultural, environmental, and social impacts of mining on Indian reservations. Why not? But I decided I didn't really want to talk about environmental justice and list a bunch of numbers and facts about the impact of snowmaking on the 13 tribes who consider the San Francisco Peaks sacred land. I had no idea what I wanted to talk about, but for some reason, it wasn't any of the issues that I have stockpiled information about for papers and CAER presentations.
My friend's reaction when I told her that I was doing this was ironically, and almost painfully, appropriate: she burst out laughing, saying it was the last thing she expected me to say. And why not? If you look at me and my family background, you see middle class white girl whose ancestors are all white Europeans.
That is never more apparent to me than when I go to a Powwow or the Zuni Pueblo Dances or a Native rights activism event. It's equally obvious to me when I participate in the LGBTQ or Chicano rights movements. I'm forever an ally, forever an outsider, and forever wondering if I should really be there.
But, despite my ancestry, there's a lot that you wouldn't know by looking at me. For instance, I probably wouldn't exist if my parents, who come from very different places and backgrounds, didn't share a common desire to fight for Navajo land rights...to fight for families whose land had been taken away from them, and to stop mining on Native land. To look at me, you might not guess that I grew up considering my best friend and his family, who are Navajo, to be my family. You certainly wouldn't know that I called mutton and fry bread "grandma food," and constantly sought to get away from my vegetarian father to eat it. I have vivid childhood memories of celebrations at Hopi mesa, sitting on a rooftop with a bunch of other kids catching candy thrown by the clown kachinas.
None of this makes the Native movement mine. I don't suffer from any of the litany of injustices wrought on Native peoples, nor do I lay claim to any of their demands. But it's important for me to be an ally, because Native culture is a part of who I am and Native rights are important to me.
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I'm not sure that I can say all that in the five minute time period they are having people speak for, especially if I listen to the little "mom voice" in my head, telling me not to talk so fast, and to enunciate. I don't know what to say really, but those are the things that come to mind when I think about what I want to say. My frustration at my outsider status has been a growing thing inside me, making me second-guess myself constantly. It's one thing to say that to my mom, or write it in my blog, but I'm not sure I want to announce it to the world. Can I say all that without sounding pretentious or like I can, indeed, stake my claim to indigenous rights without actually being indigenous? It's a difficult position to try to be PC in. And difficult to not come off as a privileged white girl trying to make a point about not being a privileged white girl.
Urgh! I should NOT be stressing about this 5 minute speech when I have about a million years worth of homework, but for whatever reason, it's important to me to assert myself as a legit ally without trying to be someone I'm not.
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