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By Native News Online Staff

October 25, 2023

Board member Dawn Houle (Chippewa Cree Tribe of Montana) has been elected Board Chair. Houle succeeds Stephine Poston (Pueblo of Sandia), who completed her term of office. 

Launched in 1922 with the Sante Fe Indian Art Market, SWAIA has a significant role in shaping Native American art. Held in August, the market draws up to 100,000 visitors from around the globe to purvey the works of thousands of artists from across Indian Country. The Sante Fe Indian Art Market Best in Show award is considered by many to be the most prestigious honor for Native art. 

In a press release, Houle acknowledged the pivotal role SWAIA plays in elevating Native American artists onto a global stage. 

“The new board members play a big role in supporting and advocating for Native Artists and I’m excited to join this world-class leadership in shaping how we continue to elevate Native Artists to the world stage,” Houle said in a statement. “We have a century of legacy work that we can build upon and I’m grateful to Ms. Poston for the tremendous efforts she provided to the organization. In a world of pressing issues and challenges, the expression of art helps us learn and celebrate. I welcome this new role to strengthen member commitments while bringing in new resources to support SWAIA and the artists.”

New appointments to the executive committee include Michael Trujillo, Vice-Chair, and JoAnn Chase (Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara), elected Secretary. Tom Teegarden will remain in the position of Treasurer. Natasha K. Hale, the Director of Native American Partnerships for the Catena Foundation, is also a newly elected board member. 

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When anthropologist Danielle Moretti-Langholtz started investigating the history of the Brafferton Indian School, she knew earlier scholars viewed the school as a failed enterprise. However, she didn’t expect to find that it had been both an instrument of British colonial policy and a place of Native American agency. 

To uncover this complex story, she assembled a research team of scholars and students to search archives on both sides of the Atlantic and engaged Native communities with identified historical links to the 18^th-century Indian school. This work led to a new perspective on the Brafferton Indian School placing Indigenous voices front and center.

This year commemorates the 300^th anniversary of the completion of the Brafferton Indian School on the William & Mary campus, marking the perfect time to share new findings about this story. Moretti-Langholtz, the Thomasina E. Jordan Director of the W&M American Indian Resource Center, will deliver the fall 2023 Tack Faculty Lecture “Reconnecting Native Narratives to the Brafferton Indian School.” Taking place on Nov. 14 at 7 p.m. in the Sadler Center’s Commonwealth Auditorium, the event is free and open to the public with a reception to follow. Attendees are asked to RSVP. 

“The Brafferton is part of a larger story connecting settler history, Indigenous labor and lifeways,” the anthropologist said. “Part of the work of a university is to reconsider topics that have been obscured, and this is such a story.”

She highlighted how Native Americans were at the genesis of her research, crediting her mentor, the late Thomasina E. Jordan, for encouraging her to look more closely at the history and connections of the Indian school to living tribal communities. 

At the start of more than a decade of research, Moretti-Langholtz found evidence that that the Brafferton Indian School did not conform to accepted notions about Indian boarding schools. Surprisingly, she said, some Native students were sent to Williamsburg and were enrolled at the Brafferton Indian School by their communities to learn to read, write and speak English to aid in negotiations with the British on behalf of their tribal communities. 

“My conclusions were validated when speaking to members of Native communities whose ancestors had been at the Brafferton,” she said. “One line I heard many times was, ‘We used to be there.’”

Working with descendant communities and other scholars, she reexamined fragments of documents from the colonial era, and started asking new questions about the place of Indigenous communities in the trans-Atlantic networks of trade and power.

Tribal communities were integral components of the networks of power and money that contributed to the funding of the university. The alliances that some Native tribes made to navigate a challenging landscape need to be understood in the context of the shifting power dynamics of the 18^th century.

“My interest is very much in putting Native history into a much larger context,” said Moretti-Langholtz. “We have still a lot of work to do reconnecting that building to those communities.”

Establishing a Native studies minor at William & Mary, a direct outgrowth of her research, has been part of that effort. 

For several decades the American Indian Resource Center and colleagues in the Department of Anthropology have engaged in community-driven work that has built strong partnerships with Native communities in the region and beyond. Additional initiatives in the Office of Strategic Cultural Partnerships also see to cultivate reciprocal relationships with Native communities. 

Moretti-Langholtz stressed the importance of bringing the findings back to the Indigenous communities whose ancestors had attended the Indian school at William & Mary. She managed to retrace the tribal affiliations of four of the Brafferton students to their respective communities — Pamunkey, Nottoway, Wyandot and Cherokee — and credited Buck Woodard M.A. ’07, Ph.D. ’13, now an anthropologist at American University, for the actions that came next.

“Buck suggested that we seek funding to offer artists from the four communities to create individual works of art to express their community’s perspective on the Brafferton Indian School,” she said. “The Muscarelle Museum of Art generously stepped up, providing the funds for this part of the project. The artists were given full authority to create a response to the Brafferton story: whatever response their communities wanted.” 

It was a really emotional moment when these artworks came back, said Moretti-Langholtz. While embodying Native narratives of the Brafferton Indian School, these objects also represent a point of connection between these communities and the university: On Nov. 14, she will shed more light on their significance. 

The Tack Faculty Lecture Series is made possible through a generous commitment by Martha ’78 and Carl Tack ’78. Initially launched in 2012, the Tacks’ commitment has created an endowment for the series of speakers from the W&M faculty.

Antonella Di Marzio, Senior Research Writer

Native Knowledge 360° and Teaching for Change Virtual Teach-In: Indigenous Education

Saturday, Nov. 4, 12:00 p.m.–3:00 p.m.

Online, Cost is $15, and registration is required.

Register Now

Join the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian and Teaching for Change for a day of online conversation, curriculum highlights, and ideas exchange. The teach-in will be held virtually via Zoom. Educators will take part in workshops that include relevant and resource-rich training experiences to support effective use of American Indian-focused classroom lessons, and resources from Teaching for Change and the museum. Find more information and register here. 

Artist Raven Chacon in Concert and Conversation

Saturday, Nov. 4, 2:00 p.m.–5:00 p.m.

Washington, D.C.

Artist Raven Chacon is joined by Joy Harjo, Candice Hopkins, Ange Loft, Laura Ortman, and Olivia Shortt to present selections from his work, For Zitkála-Šá (2020). A Pulitzer Prize-winning composer, Chacon dedicated this portfolio of scores to contemporary Native American and First Nations women to celebrate their contributions to music. Following this piece, a local ensemble will perform …lahgo adil’i dine doo yeehosinilgii yidaaghi (2004), which is held in the collection of the National Museum of the American Indian. This program marks the first time each of these compositions will be performed before a live audience in Washington, DC. The event will conclude with a conversation among the five For Zitkála-Šá performers, moderated by Chacon. A selection of works from this portfolio of thirteen lithographs is currently on view in SAAM’s Musical Thinking: New Video Art and Sonic Strategies.

This program is co-presented by the National Museum of the American Indian and the Smithsonian American Art Museum, with funding support from the Smithsonian American Women’s History Initiative. 

Honoring Native Veterans

Saturday, Nov. 11, 10:00 a.m.–5:30 p.m.

Washington, D.C.

Join the museum on Veterans Day 2023 to recognize and honor the military service of Native Americans. Events include family activities, a special presentation about the National Native American Veterans Memorial by the designer, Harvey Pratt (Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma), and Curator Rebecca Trautmann, special hospitality for veterans, and a wreath-laying ceremony at the memorial, preceded by the presentation of colors by the Kiowa Black Leggings Warrior Society.

SCHEDULE

10:00 a.m.–5:30 p.m.: Veterans Hospitality Suite, Patrons Lounge, Level 4

Veterans are invited to enjoy light refreshments in the museum’s Hospitality Suite.

2:00 p.m.–5:30 p.m.: Memorial Information and Family Activities, Potomac Atrium, Level 1

Veteran bookmarks: Learn more about Native veterans who have served throughout history at the Veterans Profiles Teaching Cart and take home a veterans profile bookmark.

Veteran postcards: Write a postcard to a veteran or active-duty service member and the museum will send it for you.

3:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m.: Meet the Memorial Designer, Rasmuson Theater, Level 1

Memorial designer and veteran, Harvey Pratt, and Curator Rebecca Trautmann discuss the design process and creation of the National Native American Veterans Memorial. The conversation will be webcast at AmericanIndian.si.edu/livestream.

4:00 p.m.–4:25 p.m.: Screening of Why We Serve (25 min.), Rasmuson Theater, Level 1

4:30 p.m.–6:30 p.m.: Presentation of Colors and Wreath-Laying Ceremony at the National Native American Veterans Memorial

The Kiowa Black Leggings Warrior Society will present the colors to open a wreath-laying ceremony lead by Director Cynthia Chavez Lamar at the National Native American Veterans Memorial. The Memorial Flame will be lit from 4:30 p.m.–6:30 p.m.

Major support provided by The Boeing Company.

Native Cinema Showcase 2023

Friday, Nov. 17, to Friday, Nov. 24, 12:00 a.m.–11:59 p.m.

Online

The National Museum of the American Indian’s Native Cinema Showcase is an annual celebration of the best in Native film. For this year’s theme, we highlight films of Indigenous perseverance that inspire, uplift, and triumph against adversity. The showcase provides a unique forum for engagement with Native filmmakers from Indigenous communities throughout the Western Hemisphere and Arctic.  

This program is funded in part by the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians.

Mexico Now: The Present and Future of Ancestral Practices

Saturday, Nov. 18, 1:00 p.m.–3:00 p.m.

New York, NY

Learn how Chef Diana Wangeman preserves ancestral Oaxacan food practices. Following Wangeman will be a performance in the Diker Pavilion by Maya rapper Pat Boy, who uses music to preserve the Mayan language and teach rap to youth in his rural community in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo.

SCHEDULE

1:00 p.m.–2:00 p.m.: Maize and Traditional Ingredients with Chef Diana Wangeman, Auditorium, Lower Level

Diana Wangeman was born and raised in Oaxaca, Mexico, where she learned the traditional practice of processing corn from her mother, who is the chef and owner of the restaurant Tierra Antigua in Oaxaca. As the owner of the Brooklyn, NY, restaurant Sobre Masa, Wangeman works to raise awareness about ancient forms of maize cultivation and doing business in a responsible way.

2:00 p.m.–3:00 p.m.: Maya Hip-Hop with Pat Boy, Diker Pavilion, Level 1

Jesús “Pat Boy” Chablé started his solo career in 2009 mixing genres such as reggae, pop, and reggaeton in the Yucatec Mayan language. His work was recently featured in the Marvel blockbuster film Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. He is the co-founder and producer of ADN Maya Producciones, which nurtures young talent across the Yucatan Peninsula. He also produces the Ko’one’ex K’aay Rap Ich Máaya Festival and fosters Rap Ich Máaya T ́aan, a methodology he created for bilingual youth that promotes the Mayan language through rap improvisation and rhyming.

Native American Heritage Day: Honoring the Jingle Dress Dance

Friday, Nov. 24, 2023, 11:30 a.m., 12:30 p.m., 1:00 p.m., 3:00 p.m., and 4:00 p.m.

Washington, D.C.

Learn about the origin and significance of the jingle dress and Jingle Dress Dance with dancers Misty Solorio (Brokenhead Ojibway First Nation/Roseau River Anishinabe First Nation), Jennifer Night Bird Miller (Red River Métis), and Nathan Solorio (Brokenhead Ojibway First Nation/Roseau River Anishinabe First Nation). The dancers will be accompanied by father-and-son duo Ralph Zotigh (Kiowa/Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo/Isante Dakota Indian) and Dennis Zotigh (Kiowa/Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo/Isante Dakota Indian).

Image credit: Damon Bowe for the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian

Native American Heritage Day: Akwesasne Women Singers

Friday, Nov. 24, 12:00 p.m., 2:00 p.m., and 4:00 p.m.

New York, NY

The Akwesasne Women Singers are a group of young women, mothers, aunties, and grandmothers who came together to form a singing society. The group joins the museum on Native American Heritage Day to share their original compositions, written in a combination of English and Kanien’kéha, as well as traditional songs, accompanied by dance performances. The significance of each dance will be shared, and attendees will be invited to join the circle during Social Dances.

Directly after the conclusion of Native American Heritage Month, the museum hosts the yearly Art Market in Washington, D.C. and New York at the beginning of December.

Native Art Market

Saturday and Sunday, Dec. 2–3, 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

New York, NY

The museum’s annual Native Art Market features award-winning and innovative Indigenous artists from across the Western Hemisphere. This weekend event invites lovers of art and craftsmanship to meet Native artists and learn about traditional Native arts and contemporary Native creativity. Visitors will have the unique opportunity to purchase traditional and contemporary handcrafted artworks, including beadwork, jewelry, paintings, photography, pottery, and sculpture.

Photo: Apple TV

Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, based on David Grann’s 2007 book of the same name, tells the true story of the Osage Nation and the crimes committed against their people in 1920s Oklahoma. Scorsese’s goal in telling the story was to refocus the narrative on the Osage themselves, rather than the early days of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Despite having an endorsement from Principal Chief Geoffrey Standing Bear of the Osage Nation, the film, in its second week of release and trailing closely behind Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour, is beginning to widen into a bigger and deeper conversation about, as Chief Standing Bear calls it, “challenging history.”

Devery Jacobs, who starred in Hulu’s acclaimed Reservation Dogs, critiqued the film, calling it “painful, grueling, unrelenting and unnecessarily graphic.” Jacobs, who is a Native actress from Canada and activist, shared “strong feelings” in a Twitter thread on October 23. “I don’t feel that these very real people were shown honor or dignity in the horrific portrayal of their deaths,” she wrote. “Contrarily, I believe that by showing more murdered Native women on screen, it normalizes the violence committed against us and further dehumanizes our people.”

“Indig ppl exist beyond our grief, trauma & atrocities,” she said. “Our pride for being Native, our languages, cultures, joy & love are way more interesting & humanizing than showing the horrors white men inflicted on us.”

In a statement from October 20, Chief Standing Bear said the atrocities laid bare the truth. “Killers of the Flower Moon is an Osage story of trust and betrayal as directed by Martin Scorsese,” Standing Bear in a statement. “While watching, you need to know that this is a true story. Many Osage lives were lost, and whole family trees were forever altered. The film lays bare the truth and injustices done to us, while challenging history not to be repeated. We honor our ancestors who endured this time by continuing to survive and ensuring our future, guided by our Wahzhazhe culture and traditions.”

Gianna Sieke, an Osage Nation princess from 2021 to 2023 who worked on the film, discussed the difficulty of the history portrayed with Today. “It does tell our dark history, but it’s also including things that no one really knows, and it hasn’t been expressed to Osage people and anyone because it’s a dark history,” Sieke said. “People don’t really talk about it that much. And because of that, [the movie] has made a really big impact. Families are learning to cope and understand.” Regarding a scene in which Mollie Burkhart (Lily Gladstone) learns about a family tragedy, Osage Nation Congress member Brandy Lemon, who worked as a liaison between the film and the Osage community, told Today she “still wasn’t ready for it.” “It just hit me in the gut so hard, and every time I watch it, it still does,” she said.

Another point of discussion became Scorsese’s choice to make Ernest Burkhart, a white man who committed the film’s central crimes played by Leonardo DiCaprio, the main character. Christopher Cote, an Osage language consultant on the film, told The Hollywood Reporter on October 19 that “Martin Scorsese, not being Osage, I think he did a great job representing our people, but this history is being told almost from the perspective of Ernest Burkhart — they kind of give him this conscience and kind of depict that there’s love,” he said at the film’s Los Angeles premiere. “But when somebody conspires to murder your entire family, that’s not love. That’s not love, that’s just beyond abuse.”

“I think in the end, the question that you can be left with is: How long will you be complacent with racism?” Cote said. “How long will you go along with something and not say something, not speak up, how long will you be complacent? I think that’s because this film isn’t made for an Osage audience: It was made for everybody, not Osage. For those that have been disenfranchised, they can relate; but for other countries that have their acts and their history of oppression, this is an opportunity for them to ask themselves this question of morality, and that’s how I feel about this film.”