Yesterday for a class we read this book. Most people hated it. I hated it. I didn’t hate it as much as I hate Steven Hackel’s book about the Missions in California (more on that later). I actually found the Mexican Dream (mostly) hilarious. I wrote a few times in the margin “LOL” next to statements like: “Therefore, it is not by chance that our Western civilization today rediscovers the philosophical and religious themes of the Indians of America. Because has put himself in a position of disequilibrium, because he has let himself be carried away by his own violence, Western man must reinvent all that once made up the beauty and harmony of the civilizations he has destroyed.” And I wrote: “LOL!” I also wrote “White guilt? Western intellectuals as saviors of Native culture? Why thank you random dude. A-Thank-You.” And then I wrote “oh man, LOL.” Seriously- read this paragraph again: “Therefore, it is not by chance that our Western civilization today rediscovers the philosophical and religious themes of the Indians of America. Because has put himself in a position of disequilibrium, because he has let himself be carried away by his own violence, Western man must reinvent all that once made up the beauty and harmony of the civilizations he has destroyed.” As a dear, sweet friend of mine said “This is the greatest justification for appropriation of Native culture ever written.” (Citation- Stephanie Lumsden) We talked about the book yesterday in class and many (if not most, if not all) of us agreed that the book was, to say the least, “problematic.” Then I read the reviews. People loved it. Nobody I knew loved it, but we are apparently too busy to write reviews on Amazon. As Grad Students we pay big money to come together and hate on books. We also pay big money so that we can read a lot of books that we don’t necessarily hate and that we use in our classrooms. Sometimes we use books that we hate in our classes. (See, for example, anything written by Sherman Alexie except for Indian Killer and/or The Sin Eaters. See, for another example, any novel written by Ernest Hemingway, although I am quite partial to his short stories. The shorter, the better. In his brevity Hemingway is tolerable. I also quite enjoy the fictional version of Hemingway as he is portrayed in the movie Midnight in Paris where he is potentially my best friend and/or somebody I would have hooked up with in college. "Who wants to fight!" As Graduate Students we must also, however, learn to critically approach books and to offer a well thought out, scholarly response to the many problematic books that continue to be published as part and parcel to how we learn about Native peoples. Our history, our narratives and our stories have often been co-opted and presented in ways that have caused major problems for our people. Take for instance history books that for a long time suggested that Indian peoples were primitive stone age type people who lived in a vast “wilderness” and had no agriculture. And then realize that Indian people must continue to fight against this “knowledge” in order to acknowledge and claim their rightful stewardship of their Indigenous land spaces. There are tribes who are denied the rightful access and use of their sacred areas for ceremony because of this “knowledge” or “historical record.” And these ceremonies are intimately tied to the continued healing our communities must do from colonization. There are major and minor court cases that hinge on what Judges know about Native peoples and their history, and what they “know” is that we were a bunch of primitive peoples who were camped out in a vast wilderness who really had no “concept” of ownership over the land and who signed away our rights and became “wards” of the United States because they gave us some blankets and some beads. Not True. Vastly more complicated. Want to know more? Take a Native American Studies Course! Sign up today! So books – matter. Like movies matter. Like plays matter. Like mascots matter. Like t-shirts matter. I have for a while now been offering to post my review of a book by Steven Hackel called: Children of Coyote, Missionaries of Saint Francis: Indian-Spanish Relations in Colonial California, 1769-1850. But then I never posted it. I did, however, give the book 1 star on Good Reads because I couldn’t give it 0 stars. After that I started getting emails. True story. That’s the internet. Lately I’ve been meeting people IRL (for my Mom, I will translate, IRL meals “in real life.”) who know me from the Internet. They are very sweet, very nice people who tell me that they are “fans” and they really enjoy the blog. I often feel awkward and flattered. They will usually say to me “you are very funny.” And I will usually say back “thanks.” (awkward pause) “I hope you aren’t expecting me to be funny now.” And I also get emails and Facebook messages. People ask me a lot of questions about books to read, or movies to watch. Sometimes they want me to send them more information about some subject. They ask me about where I am from. They want to know if we can be friends in real life (maybe, if you enjoy watching the just posted lost episodes of Don’t Trust The B In Apt. 23 then PM me!) Sometimes they just want to know when the next blog is coming out. And (funnily enough) I have also been asked why I rated Steven Hackel’s book with only one tiny little star on Good Reads. This has actually mostly been from people who want to use the book in their work, or in their classes, or one time a person who was assigned the book for a class and also hated it but couldn’t quite figure out WHY. I kept saying “one day I will write something about why I hate this book” and that one day – is today! YAY for today. This is what happens when people don’t schedule meetings with me apparently. If you have never read the book *spoiler alert* lots of Indian people die in the missions. Oh and *spoiler, spoiler (is that a thing?) alert* Hackel uses lots of charts and graphs and footnotes. Lots of footnotes. This will become important later. Foreshadowing. Children of Coyote, Missionaries of Saint Francis: Indian-Spanish Relations in Colonial California, 1769-1850 (Book Review) In Children of Coyote, Missionaries of Saint Francis: Indian – Spanish Relations in Colonial California author Steven Hackel attempts to present the complicated history of Indian-Spanish Relations between 1769 and 1850. While I (like many of the reviewers) was impressed with the sheer volume of information presented (via both narrative, footnotes and statistical tables) and while I was also, on occasion, struck by some of the more personal stories included in the text about the struggles of Indian people to reconcile the horrors and oppression of California mission exploitation, the book was most effective in inspiring me to re-explore and further study the “collisions” and “intersections of Indian and Spanish worlds” in order to provide some additional counterpoints for consideration. To start off, I’d like to break the ice by using the word genocide without so much as cringing or backing away from the word (by say referring to it as “a great upheaval”, “a demographic decline”, “challenges”, “restrictions” or “such behavior”, as in “The Franciscans were known to practice such behavior.”) I know it might cause some concern, as the author seems to have actively avoided this word throughout the book. Genocide is defined as the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group. In their 1987 book The Missions of California: A Legacy of Genocide, editors Rupert and Jeannette Henry Costo examine the consequences of and the controversy concerning the mission system. Costo and Costo attempted to solidify what many Indian scholars have known for centuries, that even though the missions in California were systematic attempts to destroy Indian people, Indians should be recognized for their continued strength, ability and power to maintain and protect their culture in the face of numerous genocidal attempts on their very existence. This book seems to be attempting to bridge the troubled waters between the promoters of Spanish colonial methods who portray Franciscans as saving child like Indians from their savage natures; and the detractors who depict missions as brutal labor camps, committed to cultural genocide. Positive reviews of the book focused on the “reasoned tone.”[1] In reality, the “reasoned tone” only illustrates the disquieting nature of the book. The book attempts to pursue and support the idea of “dual revolutions” as causing the massive demographic collapse of Native peoples in California during the mission period. The sometimes flat, mostly distant tone of the book seemingly serves as confirmation that these dual revolutions are simply part of the colonization business. Demographic collapse (Revolution 1) and ecological change (Revolution 2) become go to reasoning behind the migration, deaths and suffering that Indian people survived. The book therefore completely ignores the third probable reasoning for the horrific outcomes of this period of time: the systematic genocide (there’s that word again) of Indian people at the hands of the Franciscans. Sadly, this historical rewriting to one of “traces of coexistence of Indian and Spanish cultures” where there were “Indians living in their own dwellings, electing their own leaders and practicing elements of their spiritual beliefs and subsistence economies” becomes, in a way, a systematic attack on modern day Indian people by devaluing the lasting effects of this horrific colonization on the modern Indian world.[2] When this history is reduced to “missions as institutions” that were “more porous than scholars have realized” the book implies that Indians were simply dealing with Franciscans who prescribed for them “regular attendance at work and at mass, marital fidelity and monogamy” and misrepresents the true nature of the missionaries methods (including starvation, beatings, rape, humiliation etc.). This demeans the continued effects of historical trauma on the Indian community. The sources used in the book are of particular concern to me as a reader, considering that many of them were written by the Spanish yet there is little to no discussion about the obvious and inherent bias of these works. In fact there is little to no discussion of any extenuating or external forces that could corrupt the resources used in the text. Especially troubling is the continued use of Father Fermin Francisco de Lasuén’s Refutation of Charges without considering the context in which this document was written. As Jackson and Castillo write: Since it was a defense, Lasuen began with a minor confession followed by the beginnings of a vigorous offense. “At the outset I admit that defects exist, and inevitably so,” he wrote, “but not one is in the category of a crime, not one is beyond the normal, not one remains uncorrected once it is recognized, and if any are permitted it is but to avoid greater evils.”[3] Nor is there any discussion of the obvious bias that Lasuen illustrates in this written document. Not only does he display prejudicial and racist views of Indians, he is also quick to blame the Indians for their savage natures and imply that the corporal punishment they did receive was less than they deserved. I would not deny that Lasuen (as any human being) was a complicated man and probably had at least some moments of humanity in addition to his deeply rooted prejudicial view of the savages he came to save. And it is not necessary to discount everything he wrote in his documents simply because of his obvious bias. Here would have been a perfect time for discussion about the complications of Mission research. Instead, the opportunity for true discourse about the meanings of Lasuen’s writings is passed over for a quick and easy use as a reference for the way things must have been, because Lasuen said they were so. One recurring question that does occur in the book is trying to find reasons why Indians came to the missions. Ostensibly, we are lead to believe that most Indian people were lead to the missions by the outcome of the “dual revolutions.” Without options or ability to properly combat against the demographic collapse and ecological changes, Indians saw the missions as their only recourse. Again this is a gross oversimplification of Indian motivations and it also ignores the key role that the violence and brutality of the missionaries played in recruitment of Indian peoples into the mission system. Perhaps the dual revolutions played some role in Indians coming to the mission. However, historical accounts of the mission system also point out the tendency of the missionaries to round up Indian people and bring them to the missions through force. Since Alta California came at the end of the mission era, Franciscans were well versed in the challenges and issues that would face them when confronting Indian peoples. By the time Alta California was reached, missionaries had a long history of dealing with Indian peoples. They were also well versed in the violent and underhanded techniques they would have to use in order to validate their presence and maintain their power within the Spanish social structure of the New World. I also find the language and writing problematic and passive aggressive throughout the text. Readers often get very little discussion as to the truly horrendous things enacted by Missionaries on Indian people during their “interactions.” Instead there is usually a blanket statement about some bad things the missionaries may have done followed by an illustration of how the Indian people were actually worse than the missionaries. Case in point, one section begins “through exhortations, interrogations and actual physical confinement, Franciscans sought to restrict Indians to a heterosexual, procreative, married model. When these efforts failed, as they often did, missionaries forced adherence to the model through assaults on Indians bodies.”[4] But there is no discussion as to what “assaults on Indians bodies” actually means, and the ambiguity of this statement is laced with disregard for the impact that these assaults could have on Indian people. This happens again two pages later where you state “It is no surprise that most Indians – either willfully or out of ignorance of the padres’ teachings – did not adhere to the Catholic model of sexuality and marriage and that missionaries subsequently went to great lengths to prohibit and punish their rebelliousness.”[5] But then, again, there is no discussion of what that even means. How did they prohibit and punish rebelliousness? Instead, the immediately following paragraphs focus on Indians who assaulted and killed their wives. It is incredibly problematic how the writing is organized in this instance, considering that it seems to be presenting instances of the brutal treatment of Indian peoples, though it does not explain or expand on those instances, and instead focuses on detailed statements and stories meant to show that the Indians themselves also had violent tendencies, thereby deflecting the abhorrence of the missionaries actions. This bias is additionally present in the way that Indian violence is presented as compared to the violence of Missionaries. While, as discussed above, there is no discussion of what “harsh punishments” by the missionaries entails, there is a lot of detail and telling words used when describing Indian on Indian violence, or Indian against missionary violence. Here we see words like “mutilated” and “killed” and not the nondescript language used to describe the violence perpetrated by missionaries. I also would like to address the use of “illicit sex” when referring to relationships between soldiers and Indian women. In particular the book highlights two reasons why Indian women married or had sex with soldiers namely “to create advantageous kinship ties and to improve their family’s economic lives.”[6] There is, of course, no mention of rape (another very plausible reason) or how coercion, fear, violence, threats or even pressure by soldiers could play a significant role in Indian women having relationships with soldiers. Instead there is an inordinate focus on Indian women who have sex for “payment” which is described as “watermelon, meat and corn flour.” These basic staples of living would of course be more attractive to people who were starving and could not amply provide for their families (but since that part of mission living has not been discussed in the text at this point, I could see how this would also go unmentioned). This inordinate focus on women accepting payment for sex continues with the story of Maria Cecilia, whose relationship with a soldier is referred to as “casual and illicit” when it is anything but. It is not until several paragraphs later that we learn Maria Cecilia was actually attempting to prevent the abuse of her husband in exchange for sex. Should this action be classified as “casual and illicit” or is it a method of survival and protection for her family? Maria Cecilia is referred to again on page 225 as “some women, like Marie Cecilia” who “extracted payment from soldiers and settlers in return for sexual favors.” Once again these types of statements reduce her true motives and completely ignore the outside factors weighing upon her in making this decision. In the text, “Indian labor” is classified as “neither enslaved or indentured servants, in essence, [Indians] were a semi captive labor force, held in place by both their own needs for food and community life and by the Spaniards’ willingness to make them work and remain at the missions.”[7] Expansion on this concept includes the detail that “Neophytes did not earn a daily wage” and that Franciscans believed they were “compensated albeit indirectly, for their labor since they gained food, housing and an occasional change of clothing…”[8] Attempting to distinguish between “semi captive labor force” and “slavery or indentured servants” is quite challenging especially when considering that children were part of this “labor force” (and can we classify children as simply labor?). In essence the book seems to be arguing that Indians cannot be considered slaves to Missionaries simply because the Missionaries themselves never classified them in this way. History continuously changes based on those who are reviewing it. And I have a feeling that the author of this text is an admirer of Native cultural survival in spite of the “challenges” faced by Indian peoples throughout history. I must also reason that he knows and understands that this culture, able to survive during this bleak period in history, exists to this day. It is in this existence that history and historians have a responsibility to understand the role their theories and practice play in the everyday lives of a people still rebuilding and recovering from their past. The words we write, the way we conceptualize history still matters to a people trying to heal from that history. I hope the author will take a moment to consider this lasting legacy himself. [1] For a positive review see: http://hahr.dukejournals.org/cgi/reprint/86/4/827.pdf . Other discussions of your book focused on your constant speculating about aspects of Indian life with a prose “rich in ‘perhaps,’ ‘no doubt’, ‘would have,’ ‘must have,’ ‘might have,’ ‘it seems,’ ‘surely,’ ‘probably,’ ‘one imagines,’ ‘doubtless,’ ‘it is easy to imagine,’ and the like.”
[2] (Hackel; Preface). For a varying opinion on this notion see Jackson, Robert H., and Edward D. Castillo. Indians, Franciscans, and Spanish Colonization: The Impact of the Mission System on California Indians. 2st ed. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1995. Jackson and Castillo note that living in traditional dwellings was part of the “early stage” of mission development and that “Once the missionaries had constructed the basic buildings, which included a church, a residence for the missionaries, granaries, workshops, housing for the soldiers stationed at the mission and their families, and mills, they directed the construction of adobe houses for Indian families” (49). Therefore, it is slightly misleading to note that Indians lived in their own dwellings as if this was the norm and did not change once the Franciscans deemed it so. [3] Jackson & Castillo; 88 [4] Hackel; 203. [5] Hackel; 205. [6] Hackel; 222. [7] Hackel; 281. [8] Ibid
1 Comment
marlette
5/21/2013 01:23:33 pm
Good job Cutcha! Would love to be in your book club, we should have a writers club as well so we could write our own histories. Specially since we are "still here."
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AuthorCutcha Risling Baldy is an Associate Professor and Department Chair of Native American Studies at Humboldt State University. She received her PhD in Native American Studies from the University of California, Davis. She is also a writer, mother, volunteer Executive Director for the Native Women's Collective and is currently re-watching My Name is Earl... (5) Top PostsOn telling Native people to just "get over it" or why I teach about the Walking Dead in my Native Studies classes... *Spoiler Alert!*
Hokay -- In which I lead a presentation on what happens when you Google "Native American Women" and critically analyze the images or "Hupas be like dang where'd you get that dentalium cape girl? Showing off all your money! PS: Suck it Victorias Secret"
In which we establish that there was a genocide against Native Americans, yes there was, it was genocide, yes or this is why I teach Native Studies part 3 million
5 Reasons I Wear "Indian" Jewelry or Hupas...we been bling-blingin' since Year 1
Pope Francis decides to make Father Junipero Serra a saint or In Which I Tell Pope Francis he needs to take a Native Studies class like stat
I need to read more Native blogs!A few that I read...
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