[News] On Ward Churchill

[News at freedomarchives.org]

Date: Mon, 14 Feb 2005 10:16:07 -0800
From: Tatsuo Kage
Subject: On Ward Churchill

I was sent the url on the new slander-site on Ward Churchill. On that site,
we have Ann Coulter, the Queen of the vitriolic ad hominem and attack dog
for the ultra-right having, as usual, nothing to say about the content or
scholarship of the person being attacked--Ward Churchill. Then we have
Susan Shown Harjo purporting to pass on Ward Churchill's lineage and how
"Caucasian" he "looks" (over 95% of "federally registered" Indians are mixed
race) again with nothing to say about the content, arguments, implications
or scholarship of Ward Churchill's work--and, by the way, since we are
talking about lineage and connections, I have seen little actual scholarship
that is tangible from Harjo; this could be because some of her work is
apparently classified (one of my former students, whose father was a Lt.
Colonel in the U.S. Army's "Civil Affairs" and does consulting work for the
U.S. Department of Defense(DOD), gave me a list of D.O.D. " authentic Native
consultants" to give "workshops" on "cultural sensitivity" when DOD is
dealing with Natives--e.g. getting them to accept the Rezes being used as
toxic waste dumps--and Susan Shown Harjo's name is prominently featured).
Perhaps, just perhaps, Harjo has just acquired another "consulting gig" from
the D.O.D. an historic and predent-day instrument for extermination of
Indians.

Chief Lame Deer of the Lakota once noted: "You can tell a real Red Indian by
how he [or she] lives and not by his [or her] blood percentage." No one
chooses their "blood quantum" (itself an illusion for anyone trained in
basic biology) we choose only what it might mean to us and what to do with
it. My mother used to say that "No one 'chooses' their blood; this comes
from the Creator. Any Indian who does not keep the sacred sacred, any Indian
who does not respect the worthy Elders, any Indian who does not protect the
children, any Indian who does any kind of corruption, whatever their
purported blood quantum, is doing "Custer Work" and they are aiding and
abetting the extermination of what they DARE to call "their own" blood and
People--their purported blood quantum is meaningless." I have seen no
evidence of Ward Churchill having betrayed the cause of survival and
prosperity of Native nations; I cannot say the same for the likes of Harjo
and others who apparently trade on purported "blood quantums" and
phenotypically "looking" like a "typical Indian" while they attack those
whose scholarship they cannot critique to work for those clearly bent on
exterminating/assimilating what is left of Native nations in the Americas
and elsewhere. I know, on my Rez and others of the Blackfoot, supposed
"full-bloods" who are corrupt sell-outs and whose supposed blood-quantums
are worthless--and I know some "breeds" who are resolute and uncompromising
Warriors for survival and prosperity of Indigenous nations and Peoples..

The U.S. and Canadian governments know how to play the blood-quantum game
and how to use it: "Set the blood-quantum at one-quarter, hold to it as a
rigid definition of Indians, let intermarriage proceed, and eventually
Indians will be defined out of existence; when that happens, the Federal
Government will be finally freed from its persistent Indian problem."(BIA
document quoted by Patricia Lamark in "Legacy of Conquest.", p. 322). Those
who play--and attack on the basis of--the blood-quantum "game"are aiding and
abetting those bent on the extermination and forced assimilation of what is
left of the Native nations; and they only show how empty and devoid of
substance are their attacks, critiques and themselves.

The bottom line? Ward Churchill has touched taboo subjects, from conceptual
scopes and angles of analysis, using primary and other creative sources that
few scholars or even tenured academics will touch in the cause of exposing
the ongoing genocide against Indigenous Peoples and Nations. That is all I
need to know about Ward Churchill. The rest, including how he may "look" or
anything about any supposed "blood-quantum" I do not need to know and I do
not care about.

My definition of "Indianness" comes from Chief Lame Deer, my mother and from
the nature and activities of other Indians who recognize a given person as
one of them. In this sense, I regard Ward Churchill as an Indian while I do
not regard the likes of Harjo as a real Indian--by virtue of what she says,
does and for whom she apparently works or has worked.

Jim Craven
Blackfoot name: Omahkohkiaayo i'poyi
Blackfoot Nation
Professor of Economics, Chairman of Business Divsion, Clark College
http://www.aradicalblackfoot.blogspot.com


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