NOTES
1.The original version of this piece was published in Ilinniapaa, a collaborative northern magazine available online: Chelsea Vowel, “Allowably Indigenous: to Ptarmigan or Not to Ptarmigan,” Ilinniapaa, last modified August 14, 2014, http://www.ilinniapaa.com/blog/2014/8/14/allowably-indigenous-to-ptarmigan-or-not-to-ptarmigan#_ftn2.
2.I deliberately use the singular here to highlight the perceived homogeneity of Indigenous cultures.
3.Noel Ignatiev, How the Irish Became White (New York: Rutledge, 1995); David R. Roediger, Working Toward Whiteness: How America’s Immigrants Became White: The Strange Journey from Ellis Island to the Suburbs (New York: Basic Books, 2005).
4.The rules governing what is “allowably Indigenous” inside our communities are less clear, since settlers are often not there to provide guidance.
5.“Christina David, Former Nunavik Resident, Takes Credit for Picking Bird on Montreal Metro,” CBC News, last modified July 28, 2014, http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/christina-david-former-nunavik-resident-takes-credit-for-plucking-bird-on-montreal-metro-1.2719136; “Stop Freaking Out About the Woman Who ‘Ate’ a Raw Bird on the Montreal Metro,” vice.com, last modified July 29, 2014, http://www.vice.com/en_ca/read/stop-freaking-out-about-the-woman-who-ate-a-raw-bird-on-the-montreal-metro-653.
6.Davidson Video, BQWSC – 100 Jobs: “Exclusive Interview with the Montreal Metro ‘Bird Plucker,’” YouTube video, 1:01, July 27, 2014, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oisx06u1UUs.
7.Jennifer Adese, “Aboriginal: Constructing the Aboriginal and Imagineering the Canadian National Brand” (Hamilton: McMasters University, 2012), https://macsphere.mcmaster.ca/bitstream/11375/15246/1/fulltext.pdf. Here, you will find an in-depth analysis of historic and contemporary commodification of Indigenous peoples, lands, art, and culture.
8.Dry meat.
9.Beluga skin; an Inuit delicacy.
10.Aged seal fat used as a condiment.
11.Statistics Canada, Inuit, last modified March 28, 2014, http://www12.statcan.gc.ca/nhs-enm/2011/as-sa/99-011-x/99-011-x2011001-eng.cfm#a5.
12.Sealskin boots.
13.Parkas with hoods large enough to put babies and toddlers in, yet still draw the hood up over the head of the parent carrying the infant.
8
Caught in the Crossfire of Blood-Quantum Reasoning
Popular Notions of Indigenous Purity
I read voraciously. While, for a time, my love of reading was suppressed (thanks, law school), I’m happy to report it’s come back with a vengeance! (There is light at the end of the tunnel, law students! Your literary libido is not lost! It’s just dampened for a few years after graduation.)
I particularly enjoy science fiction, and I’m always on the lookout for new authors. New to me, I mean. I decided to delve into the world of eReaders and purchased a Kindle – though, on some undefined level, I was philosophically opposed to deviating from the printed form. Any vague objections I had were quickly overcome by the fact I no longer had to lug around huge Neal Stephenson novels in my shoulder bag, which is nothing to scoff at when your commute on public transit takes two hours one way. Even better than this, however, is that oft-maligned experience of instant gratification an eReader can provide. When I’ve exhausted my current store of novels, I run a quick search online for top sci-fi novels in any given year, and then I flip over to my Kindle and download them. Some have been flops, but many have been a window into a body of work I’d never have known about otherwise.
And so it is that I came across the author Nancy Kress. I burned through her short stories and novels, completely taken with that “old-school aliens-are-neat, let’s-imagine-just-how-neat” approach to even the current post-apocalyptic fad.
Of course, I wouldn’t be writing this just to mention I’d found some excellent reading material. In chapter 18, I discuss Robert J. Sawyer’s portrayal of Indigenous peoples in his Neanderthal Parallax trilogy. In some ways, he does an excellent job of questioning certain assumptions, while in another area his writing fits in with mainstream views. Overall, I think he does a good job of avoiding stereotypes and delving a bit deeper than is often done when Indigenous peoples are brought in as characters in novels, film,1 or video games.2
I’ve found a much more problematic approach in the Nancy Kress novel, Crossfire, which was published in 2003.3
The starting premise of this novel is that a bunch of extremely wealthy groups are travelling together off-earth to colonize a distant planet. You’ve got a large extended family of scientists, a Chinese contingent, deposed Arab royalty, Quakers, assorted others, and – about a thousand Cheyenne.
(As a quick aside, another bonus of the Kindle is that when I want to pull up quotes for you, all I have to do is search the term Cheyenne and boom. One drawback is the location in the book is not expressed by page number, but rather by location; so, if you have a copy of this book sitting on your shelf, it might be harder for you to find the same quote.)
The Cheyenne are a Plains culture. The Northern Cheyenne live in what is now Montana, while the Southern Cheyenne live in Oklahoma after being forced there onto a Cheyenne-Arapaho reservation. Like a great many First Nations, the Cheyenne have experienced many cultural changes over the centuries. From farming settlements to a horse-based, buffalo-hunting culture, the Cheyenne were never frozen in time and have adapted to new technologies and circumstances while maintaining kinship relationships and cultural cohesion.
First, some background from the book. The story takes place in the far future, so the year is undefined. I’ll just quote from the book for this:
Once they [Native American reservations] were terrible places, the dregs of arable land, full of poverty and alcoholism. Since the natives figured out that as a separate nation they could legally offer services that places part of the Unites States could not, they flourished. First gambling, then genemod and pet-cloning clinics, and –”
“I’m aware that reservations are great scientific centers,” Gail said dryly, “And greenly rich.”4
All right! Kress has the reserves crawling out of poverty and into scientific innovation and wealth, an approach somewhat similar to that taken by Charles de Lint in his futuristic yet fetishistic novel, Svaha.5 (The noble savage trope appears often in Svaha.) However, unlike de Lint’s novel, the characters in Crossfire do so in morally questionable ways by providing seedy, legal-limbo services not available elsewhere, which certainly fits into contemporary notions about Indian tribal sovereignty in the United States being mostly used for gambling, cigarettes, and so on.6 I sort of prefer de Lint’s approach of riches being accumulated by the explosive popularity of a mixture of traditional Indigenous music with pop tunes for the masses. Of course, I am casting A Tribe Called Red in the updated version of this!7 However, emerging out of crushing poverty is a somewhat positive future prediction, I guess – even if the root causes of that poverty (colonialism) are never addressed.
The “no true technology” fallacy8
But wait, that quote isn’t over! Here’s more necessary background:
That’s why I don’t understand why this lot wants to dump it all and go back to living as if the last two or three centuries hadn’t ever happened. But with genetic labs in tow, of course.9
One of the themes related to the Cheyenne in this novel is their occasional use of, and reliance on, technology. Of course, technology, as it’s generally used, and specifically in this novel, is not any human-made tool; it is “the application of scientific knowledge for practical purposes.”
By definition, this means no Indigenous peoples can ever invent technology, because doing so would require the use of scientific principles, which were not known among Native peoples before contact because settlers invented science – at least, science as it is defined in relation to technology.
However, this is not a universally applied principle. After all, in science fiction, aliens can have technology even if they have nothing comprehensibly equivalent to the scientifi
c method. Maybe we can even retrofit the concept of science to include peoples like the Maya with their complex and precise astrological observations, but probably not. Clearly, I do not agree this is the correct definition of technology, but when the word comes up, I’m fairly certain this is the way people are thinking of it.
Throughout Kress’s novel, the “desire to leave all technology behind” that has been attributed to this fictional group is described in derogatory terms – “Quixotic, ridiculous mission” and other similar sentiments.10 These Cheyenne have been set up as foolish Luddites and are mocked throughout.
In chapter 19, I address the frozen-in-time approach to Indigenous peoples and why I believe it is a ridiculous and arbitrary standard. Nonetheless, it is an enduring belief, and one that comes out loud and clear in this novel. In this story, the Cheyenne are trying to rid themselves of all “Volcano Man” (settler) technology, because they are suspicious of it; but the big irony in the book is they can’t seem to live without it. Once again, the desire to return to traditional Indigenous principles somehow gets conflated with the notion that doing so requires Indigenous peoples to eschew all forms of technology and revert to exactly how they lived precontact.
I would really appreciate it if authors and individuals stopped pushing precontact conditions as a goal or a desire on our part. Having to constantly explain there isn’t a large movement to get rid of indoor plumbing (assuming we have it in the first place, which, given contemporary living conditions in Indigenous communities, should not be taken for granted), vaccinations, and so forth, is frustrating and draining. Integrating settler technology into traditional Indigenous practices does not require us to accept settler philosophies, and it certainly does not erase our indigeneity. Unless you’re talking about settler notions of what it means to be Indigenous. And do I need to point out how flawed those Hollywood stereotypes are to begin with? (If so, check the resources listed at the end of this chapter.)
Kress has deliberately set up this splinter group as a minority Indigenous view against a backdrop of Indigenous peoples who have embraced and benefited from technology; but, this is a tired meme and no new ground is being broken by rehashing it. This is the first time I’ve seen Indians go into space in a sci-fi novel, and I expected more than this.
“Fake” Indians: The blood-quantum mess
The technology issue is not even the reason I’m writing this. It’s a pretty standard issue I can ignore for the sake of my sanity and an otherwise good read. So let me get to the real point. Here are some quotes describing the space-faring Cheyenne:
“Larry Smith’s dubious tribe of ‘Cheyenne.’”11
“Saying good-bye to nine hundred sixty-seven Cheyenne Native Americans, almost none of whom possessed actual Native American ancestors.”12
“On Earth, he [Larry Smith] had been a cattle breeder. Now he was a Cheyenne chief.”13
“Oh for God’s sake, Gail didn’t say aloud. She’d read the personnel records. Larry Smith was one thirty-second Cheyenne. The ‘tribe’ included Irish, German, Spanish, Swedish, and French blood, and it was in the majority. One brave was three-quarters Chinese, with features no seventeenth-century Native American had so much as ever set eyes on.”14
Almost every time the name Cheyenne is written in this novel, it is done in scare quotes: they are the “Cheyenne.” As is made clear in that last quote, these are not full-bloods. They are fakes; not really Indians – just people playing Indian.
Oh, blood quantum; what a strange concept.15
In chapter 3, I explain the system used in Canada to determine who is a legally recognized (status) Indian and who is not. Essentially, you are no longer an Indian once an Indian parent and an Indian grandparent have married out. That amounts to extermination of your identity in two generations.
The situation in the United States is somewhat more complicated. The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) can issue a Certificate of Degree of Indian Blood (CDIB) with the blood quantum of the bearer and his or her tribal affiliation. Each tribe in the United States has its own enrollment requirements, some require half or a quarter blood quantum, others less, and still others have no minimum blood-quantum requirements and determine membership by lineal descent (descent from an original enrollee of the tribe).
In Canada, blood quantum is relevant to those Indigenous peoples born in Canada who want to enter the United States to live or work without a green card or work permit. The United States requires First Nations peoples to have at least 50 percent blood quantum to do this, and this must be proven through a letter from a First Nation or from Indian Affairs.16
The widespread imposition and acceptance of blood-quantum definitions by settlers and their governments means that culture and community acceptance doesn’t matter. You are a real Indian only if you haven’t intermarried with non-Indigenous people. Nancy Kress buys into this notion completely in her portrayal of the “dubious Cheyenne.”
Leaving aside the fact not all “out-breeding” was voluntary and sexual violence was (and continues to be) an issue faced by Indigenous women, the concept of blood quantum puts enormous pressure on Indigenous peoples not to marry non-Indigenous people. Imagine someone telling you that you can’t be Canadian because your father and your grandmother came from a different country. Oh, I’m sorry, am I conflating citizenship with ethnicity? Well, we never agreed to be defined by blood in the first place, so I’m going to give myself permission to discuss identity in the various forms it is defined.
Blood-quantum rules have been called a “slow genocide,” and I think this is an apt description. Not mass murder, but extinction via definition. Every time a non-Indigenous person enters the “Indian gene pool,” fewer people in the next generation are counted as Indians. I’m sorry, but what are we? A breed? Or peoples with distinct languages, customs, and beliefs?
I can understand the reluctance on the part of settlers and settler governments to consider Indigenous culture as a defining aspect of Indigenous identity, given how intensely our cultures were repressed and deliberately interfered with. A lot of effort was put in to erasing our languages, kinship ties, territorial relationships, and so forth. How can any of that possibly matter now, if it’s basically all gone?
The answer is, of course, it isn’t all gone. Indigenous peoples have tenaciously resisted colonization and the destruction of our cultures – not without cost, setbacks, and battles, which continue to be fought. But our demise is greatly exaggerated.
Also, the blood-quantum approach freezes us in time. No genetic mixing was allowed after contact. The unstated belief is that genetic mixing was fine before contact, when it only involved Indigenous nations and did nothing because it did nothing to dilute identity as an Indigenous person; but, for some reason, non-Native blood erases indigeneity?
The idea that Indian blood has some sort of magic quality that imbues one with legitimate Indigenous culture is as ridiculous a notion as I can think of, and so is the idea that “outside” blood can dilute or destroy Indigenous culture. That kind of thinking is 19th-century pseudo-science, and I don’t want it in my 20th- and 21st-century-produced science fiction, thanks.
I don’t care if Larry Smith’s Cheyenne are all 100 percent ethnically Chinese – which is somehow presented by Kress as being even less legitimate than being a mixture of European stock. Unpack that if you will. This novel takes place centuries in the future, in a time when it is conceivable, given current policies, there will be no more “pure-breed” Indians in existence. If Nancy Kress can imagine such a future, yet still make space for there to be a continuation of an Indigenous land base (unfortunately still restricted) where Indigenous culture is still legitimately practiced, then surely she can reboot the entire notion of blood quantum!
What this novel did for me was to highlight some of the more problematic stereotypes out there about Indigenous peoples. I cannot avoid confronting these portrayals when they are presented to me, and I’m hoping the next time you come across an Indigenous char
acter in a book you’re reading, you give more than a cursory thought to the image the author creates.17
NOTES
1.Catherine Bainbridge, Neil Diamond, and Jeremiah Hayes, Reel Injun (National Film Board of Canada, film, 2009), https://www.nfb.ca/film/reel_injun/. Here, you will find an invaluable breakdown of the portrayal of North American Indians in cinema; this film is on my list of resources teachers should absolutely be using with their students.
2.Elizabeth LaPensée, Native Representations in Video Games (video, 2011), https://vimeo.com/25991603. This is a short film on Indigenous representations in video games by the incomparable Elizabeth LaPensée. Elizabeth is passionate about Indigenous futurisms, and designs Indigenous video games, comics, and art. You should definitely check her out: http://www.elizabethlapensee.com/.
3.Nancy Kress, Crossfire (New York: Tor, 2003).
4.Kress, Crossfire (Location 591, Kindle version).
5.Charles de Lint, Svaha (New York: Ace Books, 1989).
6.Tribal sovereignty, a term specifically used in the United States but not in Canada, refers to tribes’ right to govern themselves as domestically dependent nations. Although they have power over certain matters, First Nations in the United States are still subjects of the United States government. This is simply another type of colonial regime; one that differs significantly from what exists in Canada – though the standard of living for Indigenous peoples in Canada and the United States remains abysmally poor regardless of which regime is in place.
7.A Tribe Called Red is an Indigenous electronic music group that blends traditional and contemporary powwow music with other music samples. They describe their music as “powwow-step.”
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