Survivance and the American Indian

The little red squiggly line underneath the word "survivance" tells me that it is not an accepted English term, but it is the dominant theme of the National Museum of the American Indian, one of Smithsonian's less-traveled treasures. It's a block past the Air and Space Museum as you come from the L'Enfant Plaza Metro station. It stands between Air and Space and the Capitol dome.

All photos by C. G. Wagner; please credit and link if used.

Some takeaways, including the official museum book and a button commemorating today (Nov. 23) as Native American Heritage Day

View from the fourth floor.

Maidu Creation Story (2001) by Harry Fonseca

Background: Kiowa moccasin leggings

Inset: Kiowa Aw-Day (beaded sneakers) by Teri Greeves, 2004

The term "survivance" is attributed to Anishinaabe scholar Gerald Vizenor in the 1994 book Manifest Manners: Narratives on Postindian Survivance and means "more than survival," according to the museum exhibit notes. "Survivance means redefining ourselves. It means raising our social and political consciousness. It means holding onto ancient principles while eagerly embracing change. It means doing what is necessary to keep our cultures alive."

I admit I came to the museum today with no idea that it was Native American Heritage Day (or even American Indian Heritage Month). The day after Thanksgiving is just a good day to explore the unknown parts of my own neighborhood. And I take the broadest sense of that word: the cultures I walk among that are largely strangers to me.

So ignorant am I of this subject matter that, literally, the first I'd ever heard of Squanto was just last night, watching the Peanuts Thanksgiving special (the "Mayflower Voyages" half). So I was happy that the first exhibit I saw today had to do with Squanto, the Patuxet who was kidnapped by Europeans and, upon being returned to North America as a fluent English speaker, helped the Pilgrims adjust to the harsh land and climate.

The signage in the museum directs you to start on the upper floors, where you begin with the beginning, the mythologies of the universe and of creation. I stopped to watch a video presentation of a Cheyenne story about how the Big Dipper was formed. (Down in the bookshop, I could find no book or video or any souvenir of that charming and even tear-inducing story, but here it is at First People's Legends page: "The Quill-Work Girl and Her Seven Brothers.")

You can't help but be impressed by how fully integrated the indigenous peoples of the Americas were (and are) with their environment. It is embedded in the DNA, this reverence and respect for the natural world. I followed the crowd to a display of Alaskan wares, where there was a sheer coat made of an unusual, diaphanous material. Since I was the one standing next to the caption, I identified it for the group as "seal gut." Oooh! was the response. "They didn't waste a thing.... Waste not, want not." We all wondered how it could possibly have kept anyone warm.

"Waste not, want not" needs to apply to people. After having just seen Lincoln and the battle for treating slaves as human beings, I stood there wondering who had been treated worse--Africans who had been kidnapped from their homes and enslaved, or the indigenous peoples whose lands were stolen out from under them and killed outright. (Some of this murder was apparently an accident; the Europeans brought diseases to which natives had no immunity, and their populations were decimated.)

Death and destruction of culture continue even through "modern" times, as Native Americans have had to fight even for the right to educate children in their own languages and customs, and not be confined to a "choice" of either Protestant or Catholic schools.

I have no claims to a religious worldview, but the spiritual connection of humans to each other--and to animals, the land, the elements--makes a lot of sense to me. We are connected to everything and must be, lest we waste whatever it will take for all of our future survivance.

"Limit chaos
And cultivate order:
By singing, dancing, and
Talking to each other.

Realize life is short,
Respect your elders,
And recognize that death
Is a part of living."

--excerpt from "The Maidu Creation Story," told by Henry Azbill, 2002, and put to verse by Judy Allison

"Commit" Is a Verb

I'm "stuck" with an extra ticket to see Sabrina Fair at Ford's Theatre in a couple of weeks because an acquaintance who said she wanted to see it with me suddenly remembered a prior commitment with her daughter.

I'm clear on the concept of family coming first, but unclear on the concept of making a commitment you can't keep.

At first she just wanted me to change the date. Sorry, honey, Ticketmaster doesn't do exchanges. That's why being a subscriber and buying from the box office makes a difference. I have to exchange dates at Round House Theatre at least twice a season.

Anyway, in the process of apologizing and proclaiming how much she loves Ford's Theatre, she said (for about the eleventeenth time) that she is going to join Ford's as a member.

Commit to join or not to join. It's a commitment either way. Just saying you're going to do it doesn't count.

As I was walking to work today, I started counting some of the organizations I currently support (mostly arts and culture). In addition to the nonprofit association I work for, World Future Society, there are my alumni associations, Grinnell College and Syracuse University.

In the adventure of being a Clay Aiken fan, I have also supported the Bubel/Aiken Foundation, now known as the National Inclusion Project (NIP), as well as Unicef USA. I've gone along with a lot of Clay's "asks," including donating to Unicef recently for aid to children victimized by the floods in Pakistan.

I also went along with that Cookie company promo last year, wherein you rounded up as many of your e-mail addresses as possible to vote for NIP in a competition among thousands of nonprofit groups. The good news is that NIP won $10,000. The bad news is all the e-mail spam I get from the Cookie company.

I chose not to participate in this year's corporate scheme (Pepsi's) to collect active e-mail addresses, in spite of the fact that NIP and other worthy organizations had the potential to win some money. I also chose not to attend this year's gala "Champions of Change" fundraiser, because when I did so last year, it was a lot of money that I could not divert to the other organizations I've committed to.

Again, these are my choices. Other people have committed to these activities. Good! I'm certainly not saying other people shouldn't do it. I'm just saying I'm not doing it.

Anyway, here's my own little roundup of current commitments (not just Facebook fandoms):

World Future Society (where I've worked for 29 years)
Grinnell College alumni
Syracuse University alumni
USS Emmons Association (my father's shipmates)
Smithsonian Institution
National Museum of African American History and Culture
National Museum of Women in the Arts
Theatre Communications Group
John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Round House Theatre
Ford's Theatre
Corcoran Gallery of Art
Phillips Collection
WETA (Public Television and FM classical music)
MPT (Maryland Public Television)

love, hosaa
committing