One week ago, American history added a new chapter with the inauguration of President Barack Obama.Though far more than being the first African American president, Obama's election and inauguration showed that America can look beyond someone's skin and even beyond the fact that someone has two parents of two different races to see the leader inside.
Unfortunately, Indian Country is less than stellar in its track record with people of mixed race. Our languages have names for these people, all having various definitions, but the translation is always the same insult: half-breed.
The Lakota word for someone of mixed race (usually Native and white) is, "iyeska." While most accept this as a blanket term as an insult for "half-breed," the etymology of the word reveals far more than most realize. The word, "iyeska" translates as, "translator." It's a compound word for, "iyemiciska," which means, "they will talk for me."
In our first relations with non-Native peoples, our ancestors looked to those of mixed race who were taught two languages in order to communicate. They placed trust in these people who knew two worlds and two peoples, they relied on them as bridges for the coming changes ahead. Sadly, not all of our ancestors' sentiments were conveyed and not all of the stipulations of treaties and compacts were explained. Our ancestors then felt the sting of betrayal and began referring to anyone of mixed race as untrustworthy.
It is a momentary mistake from which, we have never recovered.
While the younger generations, as they always have done, prove that mixed race is no barrier between friendship there are always those who seek to continue the blame on those who are judged as "less Indian" because of one abstract concept: blood quantum.
With the Dawes Act of 1887, Natives around the country were rounded up and placed on tiny parcels of land in the hopes of, "civilizing" us. Along with that measure came a need to determine who was eligible for membership, therein whether voluntarily or not, came the concept of blood quantum. Based upon whether or not one's parents were of mixed heritage or full bloods, one was given membership and allotted land. But when the land allotments ceased, the practice of blood quantum did not. While to some, blood quantum is a source of pride, it is also our downfall as a race.
See, the thing about blood quantum -- the thing you'll want to write down -- is that it can never be increased, only decreased. Even if someone with a 4/4 degree of Indian blood marries and has children with someone of 2/4 quantum, their children will only be 3/4. And even if those children marry and have children, they will only be a further divided fraction of being "Indian enough." As a result of adopting blood quantum, most of our Native nations can never restore the rock, we can only pile one stone upon another.
When discussing this subject with a friend, she made a grim comparison that chilled my own blood. During the Third Reich, the Nazi Party would decide who was Aryan and who was Jewish. One ancestor too many who professed the Jewish faith and one would be sent to the camps and, tragically, would almost certainly be killed. It is a short jump from pride in one's heritage to the extermination of an entire people.
The fear of tribal membership is understandable, at what point is someone "Indian enough" and when do we start hearing stories from a blonde-haired, blue-eyed Native who claims their great-grandmother was a Cherokee princess. But there again, the fault is ours. When we practice the internalized racism against one another, we drive away those who are made to feel less than human, based on an abstract concept of blood purity. They are jaded and they have no desire to be united with their ancestral relatives.
In the days before the reservation, Natives knew no such dividing lines.
We lived in a world where we were at the mercy of animals four times our size or who could run and attack at speeds faster than an arrow. Nothing was ever certain. So, when returning from a long trip, family members -- regardless of their blood -- were ecstatic to see one another, cried tears of joy and offered prayers of thanks to the Creator for just one more day with their loved ones. Since then, with the advent of blood quantum, the generations pass on their distrust and even hatred of mixed blood Natives. We've lost sight of the importance of family and the thanks and praise we should be giving for just one more day with our loved ones.
Frustratingly enough, outsiders have been little help in uniting our people. Whether through the mission boarding schools or governmental policy, we've been pitted against one another, whispers in our ears of who is better than whom, based on how white or how Native one was. All throughout, our ancestors have been trying to lead us in a better direction.
From time to time, we will invoke the concept of the seventh generation, in other cultures, we must think ahead seven generations to consider what impact our actions now have on the future. But in Lakota culture, seven generations ago, our greatest prophets saw the coming of the oppression and the hopelessness our people feel on a daily basis. They saw in this current generation, the spirit of our ancestors beginning to rise again to restore our people to prosperity and happiness by taking up the mantle of leadership.
In all these prophesies, there was never a mention of blood quantum, never a prejudice for those whose parents were of different or mixed races. It is time for us to put behind us all the resentment of the years in between then and now.
Therefore, it falls to this generation to decide what is more important: a continually decreasing amount of full bloods as a source of momentary pride; or to unite as one people to help our elders, to care for our young and defeat the hopeless that alcohol and drug abuse brings in order to restore honor to the memory of our ancestors. It is our responsibility to embrace those who have been scorned simply because of the concept of blood quantum and instruct them in the traditional thought and philosophies our of people so they may better understand the vision of our shared destinies.
We talk of honoring the traditions, but we fail to realize those traditions will soon die out unless we embrace one another, free from judgment and pass those traditions onward, so that our story will endure.