Indian Giver.

Neil Young’s song about what’s happening at Standing Rock! Thank you, Neil.

Young has campaigned against big oil for years, and he drives a car that runs on plant-based ethanol. Along with Willie Nelson and Lakota hip-hop artist Frank Waln, he performed at a concert to rally supporters opposing the XL Keystone Pipeline. Earlier in 2016 he provided the background music for the American Indian College Fund’s new advertising campaign.

When the Apache Stronghold movement traveled throughout the United States to oppose the degradation of sacred Oak Flat by the Resolution Copper Mine, Young welcomed the Apache to drum at one of his concerts in New Jersey before they rallied in Washington D.C. The iconic performer has also been actively engaged in First Nations’ battles. He donated the proceeds of select concerts on his Honor the Treaties Tour to the legal fund for the Athabasca Chipewyan’s struggle to halt the expansion of the Alberta Tar Sands.

Vincent Schilling’s full article is here. And please, heed Neil, and share the news!

Not Your Grandfather’s Blue Jeans.

Courtesy Lauren A. Badams.

Courtesy Lauren A. Badams.

A team of scientists from the U.S., Belgium, Portugal, and the U.K. have pushed back the first use of Indigofera tinctoria as blue fabric dye in the world to South America 6,200 years ago. The previous oldest physical specimen was from Egypt 4,400 years ago, although there were written references to blue dye going back 5,000 years. The blue dyed cotton fabric was discovered in an archaeological site that has been studied for many years, Huaco Prieta, located in the northern coastal region of modern Peru.

Publication of the study by Jeffrey C. Splitstoser and his colleagues in Science Advances this month has set off wisecracks in popular science publications about Andean Indians inventing blue jeans, but it is a much bigger deal than that. Besides, what was new about blue jeans was the rivets, not the color.

[…]

Indigo blue was highly prized long before the Americas were “discovered.” The ancient Greeks understood India to be the source of the dye and indigo—along with spices and silk—made up the trade goods the Europeans were seeking when they got sidetracked by Aztec and Incan gold.

Why is it a big deal that indigo appears in South America long before Asia or Africa? If the dye required nothing but mashing up something blue, then it might be found everywhere the plant grew, but it’s a bit more complicated than that.

Most ancient dyes were fairly simple. Flower petals were boiled to make them yield up their color. Ochre yielded reds and yellows, depending on the exact iron content. A bright white dye can be extracted from milkweed.

The first difference indigo presents is that the dye is not in the flowers. It’s in the leaves. To make the leaves yield the color, they first have to be fermented. The fermented solids are then dried. The fermented and dried indigo is light and easy to ship.

The indigo solids must then be treated with an alkaline substance, commonly urine, to produce a dye that is apparently white. Yarn treated with the reconstituted indigo comes out white but then turns to yellow, to green, and finally to the deep blue that makes the dye so valuable.

In an interview with Live Science, Splitstoser speculated, “This was probably a technology that was invented by women.” He noted that women were typically in charge of weaving and dying in Andean cultures.

The discovery at Huaco Prieta adds another example of cultural knowledge either purposely destroyed or ignored out of arrogance by conquistadors who believed they were doing God’s work in destroying non-Christian cultures. That destruction fed the myth that Europe represented science when the Americas represented superstition.

These people who were burning Mayan writings and destroying works of astronomy and mathematics and chemistry were burning human beings for heresy at the same time. Indians had science and Europeans had superstition. It ought to be possible to compare cultures in a more objective manner than the settlers have chosen when they wrote all the histories.

Full article here.

Tackling the B Word.

jenni-olson-2015-tighter-headshot-2-wide_0

Film maker Jenni Olsen takes on the B Word, and does a great job of it, too. The word is pervasive, now more than ever, and it’s a damn difficult word to get out of your head, even if you manage to get it out of your speech and writing. I came of age in the early ’70s, and being a native Southern Californian, spent much time at various beaches. Back then, bitchin‘ was used as an overall positive. How that came about, I don’t know. Like most of my peers, that expression dropped from lips often. My grandmothers disapproved, in pursed lip fashion. They also felt that geez was near blasphemous, so I didn’t pay much attention to the pursing. Later on, bitchin! disappeared, and bitch was in, in a very dark and nasty way. The nastiness of it hasn’t disappeared in the least, if anything, it’s dug in, and bitch is more widespread than ever. It’s directed at pretty much everyone these days, but the basic of it has not changed. When you call someone a bitch, you’re calling them a woman, and that remains a very lowly and bad thing to be. Just a small excerpt from Jenni Olsen’s article, because the whole thing is an excellent read:

As this terrific Vice.com article on the word’s long history concludes: “ ‘Bitch’ has come a long way, sure, but perhaps the reason it hasn’t been truly reclaimed is because conditions for women haven’t really changed, either…Words only make sense in context. When we see the day when the context is changed, then the core meaning of the word will change, too.”

[…]

Just to anticipate the two arguments in your head. Yes, it’s true that women use the term. We’re women—we get to do that sometimes because it’s ours. And no, it’s not the same as the reclamation of the word queer, at least not for you. Britney, Rihanna, Madonna and Alanis Morissette can shout it at the top of their lungs. But as men you can’t reclaim something that was never yours in the first place. And I confess that, as a feminist raising two daughters in our still very sexist society I’m not really that comfortable with those songs and reclamations either—the hostility towards women and continued sexism in our culture just makes it hard for me to accept so much mainstream flippant usage of the term. Quite simply: It still feels hurtful and hateful to me.

So maybe just ask yourself next time you have it on the tip of your tongue. Does this word really mean so much to you? And if it does, why is that? If you felt that compelled and entitled to use those other F and N epithets on a daily basis—what would it say about you? As my thirteen year-old daughter Sylvie often urges me when considering her requests: “Think about it.”

Read the article, and think about it.

Willard Stone.

Willard Stone, “War Widows” (nd), wild cherry wood, 7 1/2 x 20 1/2 x 4 1/2 inches (courtesy Gilcrease Museum).

Willard Stone, “War Widows” (nd), wild cherry wood, 7 1/2 x 20 1/2 x 4 1/2 inches (courtesy Gilcrease Museum).

Most people don’t know Willard Stone, a Cherokee sculptor who did amazing work, most of in in the 1940s. He was deeply affected by the threat of atomic war, and that is the subject of several of his pieces. There’s a show and centennial celebration of his work at the Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma until January 22nd, 2017. Hyperallergic has an excellent article about Mr. Stone.

TULSA, Okla. — Willard Stone’s wood-carving style might be described as Art Deco Cherokee, with a distinct, streamlined movement and natural themes that reflect his indigenous heritage. He’d originally wanted to be a painter, but a childhood accident with a blasting cap blew off his thumb and two other fingers. So he slowly learned sculpture instead, forming figures from Oklahoma’s red clay. His 1940s work in particular responded to the threat and promise of atomic energy, while still including the Native American motifs expected by his patrons. To mark the centennial of his birth in Oktaha, Oklahoma, the Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa is exhibiting Following the Grain: A Centennial Celebration of Willard Stone.

Willard Stone, “Tree Dog” (nd), torch-burned cherry wood, 13 3/4 x 3 3/4 x 5 1/8 inches (courtesy Gilcrease Museum).

Willard Stone, “Tree Dog” (nd), torch-burned cherry wood, 13 3/4 x 3 3/4 x 5 1/8 inches (courtesy Gilcrease Museum).

 

Willard Stone, “Modernistic Indian Girl” (1946), oak wood, 9 x 2 1/2 x 1 3/4 inches (courtesy Gilcrease Museum).

Willard Stone, “Modernistic Indian Girl” (1946), oak wood, 9 x 2 1/2 x 1 3/4 inches (courtesy Gilcrease Museum).

There’s much more to see, and read, at Hyperallergic.  Following the Grain: A Centennial Celebration of Willard Stone.

Via Hyperallergic.

Hands Up, Shot to Death.

Dash cam video shows Terence Crutcher with hands above his head (screen grab)

Dash cam video shows Terence Crutcher with hands above his head (screen grab)

It is with queasy despair followed by anger that I see yet another person dead, murdered by cops.

Dash cam video released by the Tulsa Police Department on Monday showed 40-year-old Terence Crutcher with his hands above his head moments before he was shot and killed by one of the officers at the scene.

At a press conference on Monday, Chief Chuck Jordan explained that the video was “very disturbing — very difficult to watch.”

The video shows multiple police cruisers approach Crutcher’s vehicle, which appears to be broken down in the middle of the road. Crutcher is seen with his hands in the air. Both hands appear to be empty.

Pastor Rodney Goss of Morning Star Baptist Church, who was able to view the dash cam video as well as video from other department vehicles, said that all views showed Crutcher’s hands in the air.

Goss also denied claims made by a police spokesperson that suggested Crutcher was shot because he refused to obey commands.

“It was not apparent at any angle from any point that he lunged, came toward, aggressively attacked, or made any sudden movements that would have been considered a threat or life-threatening toward the officer,” Goss told Tulsa World.

The article at Tulsa World is full of assurances that justice will be done, and the cop who murdered Mr. Crutcher, Betty Shelby, has been placed on administrative leave. I have to question those assurances of justice, because we’ve all heard that one before, over way too many corpses. There’s also much murmuring about “can’t talk about it yet” “might be criminal charges, we need to investigate” and “we don’t know how long an investigation will last”.

We have to stop asking what the dead person may or may not have done. This is akin to justifying rape as something caused by the victim. We need to be asking, in our shoutiest voices, why cops are murdering, and why they are allowed to get away with it. I don’t much care what any ‘suspect’ does, it’s going to be a very rare case indeed which actually calls for being gunned to death. There are plenty of examples of cops handling highly dangerous people, and everyone gets through it alive. We need to asking why, if cops are so darned scared, why are they being allowed to wander about with weapons, and interacting with people? This has to stop, and if police, as they have so far shown, continue to be unwilling and unable to police their own, we will have to do it for them.

My heart and thoughts go out to Mr. Crutcher’s family and friends, who must be lost in shock and grief.

Via Tulsa World and Raw Story. There’s ground and air video at Tulsa World.

And then you have things like this, a cop viciously assaulting a person on the ground, and who was left to carry on as a cop until late August (the assault took place in April this year) because

“It all had been documented,” Lawson said. “It just did not move as quickly as it should have.”

Via Raw Story.

Facebook, Oh Facebook VII

dellrapidsfirerescue

Dell Rapids- A firefighter from Dell Rapids Fire Rescue was fired this weekend for racist comments he posted on Facebook.

Those posts sparked outrage in the community and abroad.

“You’re a public servant and your putting stuff like that on Facebook, that’s not good,” said resident of Dell Rapids, William Dezee.

Many people in Dell Rapids were shocked when they learned one of their firefighters posted racists comments on Facebook.

Several say it’s disturbing that the remarks were made by someone who is supposed to come to their rescue during an emergency.

“There’s enough problems going on, we don’t need racial slurs or people wearing masks or saying something that’s what 160 years old, leave it alone. That’s the way it should be,” added Dezee.

The comment was posted to the Facebook account of a Kansas State student.

The girl was expelled after posting a racist photo.

Dell Rapids fire rescue took to Facebook to announce their decision to terminate john Nygaard.

“John is no longer a member of our volunteer organization. Dell Rapids fire would like to apologize on behalf of our former member for his insensitive and narrow minded comments on Facebook. This is something we take very seriously and this type of thinking will not be tolerated by our members.”

[Read more…]

Marc Jacobs Apologizes. Sorta.

FILE - In this Sept. 15, 2016, file photo, the Marc Jacobs Spring 2017 collection is modeled during Fashion Week in New York. Jacobs was criticized for showcasing white models in dreadlocks during the show. A screengrab showed Jacobs later responding on Instagram that he doesn’t see color or race. In a separate post on Sunday, Sept. 18, 2016, Jacobs said he was sorry for “the lack of sensitivity” in responding to critics. (Mary Altaffer, File/Associated Press).

FILE – In this Sept. 15, 2016, file photo, the Marc Jacobs Spring 2017 collection is modeled during Fashion Week in New York. Jacobs was criticized for showcasing white models in dreadlocks during the show. A screengrab showed Jacobs later responding on Instagram that he doesn’t see color or race. In a separate post on Sunday, Sept. 18, 2016, Jacobs said he was sorry for “the lack of sensitivity” in responding to critics. (Mary Altaffer, File/Associated Press).

NEW YORK — Marc Jacobs has apologized for his response to criticism over showcasing his models in dreadlocks during the final day of New York Fashion Week.

The white designer was criticized on social media after his mostly white lineup of models was outfitted with rainbow dreadlocks for his Thursday show. Some accused Jacobs of appropriating black culture.

A screengrab shows Jacobs responding to his critics on Instagram by saying it was “funny” that they don’t “criticize women of color for straightening their hair.” Jacobs also wrote that he doesn’t see color or race and that he was “sorry to read that so many people are narrow minded.”

Jacobs apologized Sunday on Instagram for what he called “the lack of sensitivity unintentionally expressed by my brevity.”

“Unintentionally expressed by my brevity”? Really? There wasn’t much brevity to Mr. Jacobs’s initial bristly response, which was very defensive and disrespectful. Oh, he’s another one of those magical white people who don’t see colour or race. Thanks for another stroke of the eraser, Marc. In a world which is seeing its 21st century, women of colour around the world are still being horribly punished for daring to sport natural hair. So, here we get another white male idiot, who thinks they are far above such nonsense, floating about on lofty ideals. No. I can say exactly what was going on – Marc Jacobs liked the look of dreadlocks, thought they suited his clothing designs, and didn’t think even once about doing what he wanted. If Mr. Jacobs knows any people of colour, he certainly didn’t ask them their opinion about freely appropriating a cultural style. Apparently, there’s not going to be any actual apology, either. I fully expect that sometime in the future, Mr. Jacobs will do something equally boneheaded.

While we were still in the camp, I noticed, among a new influx of people, a number of young, obviously privileged, blonde white people, sporting dreadlocks. After I made sure I wasn’t going to choke on my coffee, I spent time being stunned over this arrogant display of privilege. There’s no blindness quite like privilege blindness. Please, white people, check your privilege. Stop appropriating bits of other peoples’ cultures, and if you’re going to pretend to care about the problems that indigenous people face, it might be a really great idea to not wander in advertising your arrogant appropriation on your head.

Via The Washington Post.

Erehwon Stairway.

Influenced by the M.C. Escher-esque designs of Indian stepwells, British architect Thomas Heatherwick has unveiled plans for a giant stairway to nowhere in New York City’s Hudson Yards. Tentatively titled “Vessel,” the public landmark will consist of 154 intersecting flights of stairs and 80 landings zigzagging up above a plaza and garden on the far west side of Manhattan. Made of bronzed steel and concrete, the structure is slated to open in 2018.

Resembling a giant bronze ribcage — or a beehive, or a basket, depending on whom you ask — “Vessel” will weigh 600 tons and cost $150 million. It will be among the least utilitarian structures of its size in a space-starved city: its 2,500 steps don’t lead to any offices or condominiums or retail spaces. Instead, the sculptural “Vessel” will essentially function as a massive observation tower and jungle gym. While hiking the miles worth of stairs to the top, 16 stories up, visitors will get 360-degree views of the surrounding city and a free workout. A curving elevator will make the structure wheelchair accessible.

In addition to Indian stepwells, Heatherwick’s design was inspired by a beloved piece of urban detritus from his youth. “When I was a student, I fell in love with an old discarded flight of wooden stairs outside a local building site,” Heatherwick said in a statement about the design. “It caught my imagination and I loved that it was part furniture and part infrastructure. You could climb up stairs, jump on them, dance on them, get tired on them, and then plonk yourself down on them.”

Years later, when Heatherwick’s studio was commissioned by Hudson Yards developer Related Companies to create a centerpiece landmark for the site, this old discarded wooden staircase came to mind. “We wondered whether [the commission] could be built entirely from steps and landings?” Heatherwick said. “The goal became to lift people up to be more visible and to enjoy new views and perspectives of each other. … The idea is that it will act as a new free stage set for the city and form a new public gathering place for New Yorkers and visitors.”

Thomas Heatherwick Studio, rendering for “Vessel” (2016) (all images by and courtesy Forbes Massie).

Thomas Heatherwick Studio, rendering for “Vessel” (2016) (all images by and courtesy Forbes Massie).

While the cost of this piece leaves me feeling on the faint side, I have to say I love the idea of stairs being allowed to be the focus, rather than just a way to get to something else, with the something else always being more important. This makes me feel a childish joy. It’s lovely to look at, too. It’s just the cost of it all that bothers; all that money could do so much good. Well, here’s hoping this does people a lot of good on the spiritual side of life.

Hyperallergic has the full story.

Fashionista Jesus.

A stained glass window at Rochester Cathedral depicts the resurrection of Jesus Credit: Luke MacGregor/Reuters.

A stained glass window at Rochester Cathedral depicts the resurrection of Jesus Credit: Luke MacGregor/Reuters.

People are not at their best when stretching themselves like a rubber band in order to justify and rationalize, and that’s certainly the case with Fashion Jesus. Unlike many people, I’ve read the bible, cover to cover, more than one version.  Given that reading, I can say that the bible is not overflowing with fashion, hot or otherwise. Well, okay, there’s some interesting bits, clothing-wise in Revelation, but other than that, the bible is a bit skint on the fashion side. That’s not stopping people from claiming they are being inspired by Jesus’s great fashion sense.

…But now Jesus is being put forward as an icon of an entirely different sort – in the world of fashion. The Church of England has given its blessing to London Fashion Week with an official video making the Biblical case for the clothing industry.

Shrugging off the “sackcloth and ashes” image of clergy’s puritan forebears, it argues that – despite criticism of the industry over size zero models and cases of sweatshop factories – fashion and design are ultimately an expression of God-given creativity.

In one extract, the Church’s de-facto catwalk chaplain says fashion designers have told him that they draw inspiration from church interiors, stained glass windows and even Jesus’s cloaks.

The Rev Peterson Feital, the Diocese of London’s “Missioner to the Creative Industries”, said many had been drawn to the “beautiful clothes” Jesus is often depicted wearing.

“Designers ask me about fashion,” said the Brazilian-born Rev Feital, who also runs “Haven+” a charity working with people in the fashion and entertainment industries.

“They are all so interested when they walk into a church building or a cathedral and they see the stained glass windows and what they see there are beautiful figures and Jesus wearing beautiful clothes – a cloak and all that kind of stuff.

“So right there in the centre of our worship there are so many elements in which fashion belongs in that conversation between church and culture.”

Simon Ward, a former chief operating officer of the British Fashion Council, said that despite questions about how aspects of the industry operate and the “image it conveys”, he was convinced fashion itself is divinely inspired.

“He’s a God of creativity, and fashion is just one of those areas that really focuses on creativity,” he said.

“And what did He do first? He created the seasons, so the idea that fashion changes a lot again I think reflects God’s heart.

“All the way through the Bible clothing and fashion imagery jump out of the pages at us. In the New Testament the first Christian in Europe was Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth … The image we get of Jesus in heaven is what he’s wearing, with a gold sash around his chest, and then the New Jerusalem comes down; what are we told about it? – ‘dressed as a bride’.

“So I think God and fashion really are closely linked and if we think that they’re not we’re getting it wrong.”

No. No, no, no, no, no. None of this has the slightest thing to do with Jesus, and it barely has a connection to any bible. What they are copying, and claiming to find inspiration in is the work of artists. As an artist myself, I can say that there was much exaggeration in stained glass art, and other art found in cathedrals. Artists love colour, we love textural things, luxuriant and rich things. It’s doubtful that Jesus, if he existed at all, wore any of the high status clothing depicted in stained glass windows. Rough cloth, rope sandals, and very dirty feet are probably closer to how any itinerant preacher would appear. There wouldn’t be much fun depicting that. The powers that commissioned cathedrals and similar expected artists to portray everything in an overwhelming way, one that would stir emotions along with stimulating the visual sense. For the olfactory, there is always incense burning, and the scent of flowers. For the aural, the echoing silence and wind of whispers. Not one bit of this artistic creation has so much as a single flake of paint in reality.

I don’t think it’s at all wrong to pull inspiration from the work of previous artists and the stained glass of cathedrals. I do take issue with the whole Fashion Jesus lie.

Via Telegraph.

37.

Richard M. Nixon. Whitehouse.gov

Richard M. Nixon. Whitehouse.gov

I’d be willing to bet that most people had no idea of how progressive Nixon was when it came to Indians. In fairness though, most non-Indians paid no attention to any president’s Indian policies.

Richard Milhous Nixon is perhaps best known for being the only U.S. president to resign from office, but the man forever linked to the Watergate scandal also transformed federal Indian policy.

Eighteen months into his first term, Nixon delivered to Congress a landmark address on Indian Affairs, unveiling policies that ushered in the era of self-determination. In his July 8, 1970, address, Nixon called for a new policy of “self-determination without termination,” instigating lasting changes in federal-Indian relationships.

“The first Americans—the Indians—are the most deprived and most isolated minority group in our nation,” he said. “On virtually every scale of measurement—employment, income, education, health—the condition of the Indian people ranks at the bottom.”

Nixon’s remarks came 17 years after Congress approved House Concurrent Resolution 108, which called for an end to Indians’ “status as wards of the United States” and officially launched the termination era. During the next 10 years, the federal government terminated its relationship with more than 100 tribes, severing tribes’ rights to land, sovereignty and special protections.

Nixon called for congressional action to overturn House Concurrent Resolution 108. Indian policy too often was “ineffective and demeaning,” he said. Instead, it should “recognize and build upon the capacities and insights” of Indians themselves.

[Read more…]