Sharing what I know
I have been compiling a series on what I have learned about Indian boarding schools and the people responsible for creating the system. The first two parts are up now. I am scripting them as I go and ended up focusing my second video primarily on Sheldon Jackson, Presbyterian church leader and general agent for education in Alaska. His actions led to the establishment of the religious, militaristic education system that separated children from their families and stripped them of their culture and language. Abuse was rife in the schools, and evidence of forced labor is being revealed in contracts. Jackson lobbied for the legislation that ultimately funded the schools in Alaska.
Last month, I attended a conference at one of the former schools run by Sheldon Jackson. After his death, the campus was named after him. The (Sharing Our Knowledge) conference itself is a showcase of culture, and it felt like having a firehose of tradition fired at me on full blast after being gone from home for so long. Overwhelming, but in the best ways. Multiple times, I went close to 20 minutes without hearing English spoken. Only Tlingit songs or protocols. Elders laughing in regalia, children dancing. It was an incredible experience. Most of the time I was there, I was busy meeting my dad's friends and colleagues or watching presentations, but there were a handful of quiet moments when I found myself alone with my thoughts in a hallway, and the telescope of time would start to bend. My stomach would drop, my head would spin, and I would have to step outside before I could breathe again. It was a rollercoaster of emotions every day.
Folks can see some of the presentations from the conference here.
Since the trip, I have been learning more about Sheldon Jackson and his role in building the system of boarding schools. I have been compiling my thoughts in a series of videos. The first two are up, and I am working on a third.
The research and work on this are eerily grounding in such high-pressure times. We are circling closer to election day, and tensions get tighter by the hour. I will not pretend to know how things will turn out over the next few weeks. All I can cling to is the hope that we have done everything we can to equip as many people as possible with the tools they need to navigate this election.
On another note, something that made me smile this week was seeing this story:
The Episcopal Church in Wyoming returned more than 200 cultural and sacred items to the Northern Arapaho Tribe during a ceremony in Ethete on Indigenous Peoples’ Day. They’d been in the church’s possession for almost 80 years.A couple hundred people and students from Wyoming Indian Schools gathered in a grassy field on Oct. 14 at St. Michael’s Circle in Ethete for the “Coming Home - Noe'heeckoohut Hiisi'” celebration. The afternoon included prayers, a cedaring, drumming, words from Northern Arapaho elders and leaders, and a liturgy of lament and healing from the Episcopal Church.
Northern Arapaho elder Marian Scott said it was very historical to have the collection back with the tribe.
“I am just so proud that they are back home and they're going to stay here with us now,” she said.
Scott had turned eighty the day before the celebration. She was part of a group that went to Casper earlier in the year to see the items, which were previously being stored at the church’s diocesan office.
“Every time we opened a box and we seen those things that were in there, I could actually feel those people who they belonged to. And it was very, very emotional,” she said. “It still is because they're here now. They're back home.”
That's all I have for you this time. I’ll see you around the internet!
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