Spotlight: A Link to Our Past & Future
Despite the consistent attack on traditional cultures by the modern colonizers, traditional cultures remain strong around the world. Examples of these traditional cultures won't be in the news and can't be found on modern maps. In fact, the colonial map of the world falsely leads people to believe that all areas of the planet lie within colonial boundaries. On their map, every inch of land, some covered with ice, and even areas under water, is under the dominion and control of a colonial government. This impresses the authority of the colonial system on the mind of whoever is viewing their map.
To validate this impression, the colonizer promotes the idea that its authority comes from being representative of the people within its national boundaries. For this to be true, a consensus of all people in a given region must be in agreement prior to the establishment of any boundaries. A history book reveals that the establishment of modern colonial boundaries, or nations, has been decided by the business interests of the colonial powers. History also tells us that the colonial boundaries were imposed by force. It is evident that up until this day, these boundaries are still imposed by force. In fact, force is one of two things that maintains the colonial authority.
Any colonial government, by design, has its military ready to go anywhere within its boundaries and force people to obey its will. The same colonial government, again by design, can be easily corrupted by money to allow business interests to "pull the strings" of politicians. The result is a nation of people held hostage by a military that ensures the continued exploitation of the populace and their natural environment. It is only from the willingness and capability to threaten people by force that colonial governments claim dominion over all territory around the planet.
The second tool that maintains the colonial authority is a dependent populace. The colonial methods of disrupting traditional cultures by force, religion or other means have been detailed in previous articles in this column. The result of this disruption is a migration to the industrial cities of colonial culture. In these cities, people become dependent upon the colonial system and lose their cultural identity. They become incapable of speaking their traditional languages, passing on their traditional knowledge or living in harmony with nature the way their ancestors have done for tens of thousands of years.
Many are impressed by colonial cities; but to illustrate how limited the authority of colonial culture really is, we need to consider the people of the world unafraid of the threat of military force. What then becomes evident is that the colonial authority is limited to urban areas. A "nation" shrinks from its illusory size down to its capital city. Regions between cities are then defined by the culture of people inhabiting the land in a culturally distinct way, as opposed to being defined by the culture of the nearby city. The rural culture is a truer indication of regional control because it is based on sustainability. With sustainability, a culture maintains control of its resources in such a way that the resources become greater. A culture (colonial) that uses its resources so recklessly that few remain after only 200 years is a culture out of control. It is our relationship to our environment that ensures our survival.
As one might imagine, the largest freshwater island in the world is a very beautiful place. Located between the United States and Canada in Lake Huron, Manitoulin Island has its own lakes. The natural beauty found on this island surpasses all expectations. Perhaps that is why you will find something else that defies expectation. One third of this island is not part of Canada, nor is it a part of the United States! Most maps include this entire island as part of Canada; however, a large portion of this island is the Wikwemikong Unceded Indian Reserve. This land is inhabited by The Three Fires Confederacy which consists of Ojibwa, Odawa and Potawatomi.
Traditionally known as Ekaentoten, Manitoulin Island is the largest of 23,000 islands that were designated for native tribes as part of The Treaty of Manitoulin 1836. Just as all treaties between the colonizers and native tribes were broken, this one was as well, leaving only the remaining one third of Manitoulin Island controlled by Three Fires Confederacy as tribal land and even leaving it off the colonial map. It is obvious that great damage has been done to our traditional cultures. The colonizers makes this point to reinforce their notion of the eradication of traditional culture. However, everywhere we look, we see monuments from before colonial times, and even within ourselves we find values that could have been instilled only by a traditional culture because such values are not present within the colonial (lack of) culture.
If we consider all of the good that humanity has to offer, the things that people use to construct a positive life for themselves and maintain harmony with nature, we can trace the origin of these things to traditional culture. Just as every region has a history, within every region is a traditional culture that has survived colonialism to a greater or lesser degree. In the great lakes region surrounding the Wikwemikong, and across the Northern, Western, and Southwestern U.S., there is a patchwork of tribal reservations which, if sewn together, could blanket those regions with a traditional authority that can guide people away from the destructive colonial system. From the plains of the Midwest and Southeastern U.S. (the most fertile land), most tribal reservations have been grouped in Oklahoma, which presents the same opportunity to unite, on a smaller but equally important scale.
This opportunity must be recognized as our responsibility to our ancestors, ourselves, our children and the Earth. The more we engage in our traditional cultural ways and live by our traditional cultural values, the more our children, families and communities will embody a strong and healthy culture. On Wikwemikong, in August, a famous pow-wow has been held annually on the civic holiday since 1960. and on other days for many years before that. The drummers provide the rhythm, or heartbeat, of the festival. The hoop, jingle and rabbit dances are just a few of the inter-tribal dances performed during the pow-wow. There are two lead dancers, one man and one woman, who participate in all the dances. These lead dancers encourage the younger dancers and serve as models for the younger generations to aspire to.
In order to survive through this stage of colonial attack, we all must maintain ourselves as models of the traditional culture that our ancestors have passed on to us. Those separated from their traditional cultures must trace back to them using cultural links like names, values, languages, distinguishing features, etc… Towards building the world we wish to see, we will need to use our minds to sort through the confusion and contradiction that the colonial system presents as a modern culture. To do this, we must continue with what our ancestors have left us.
The greatest difficulty colonizers have, when trying to convert traditional culture, is that suppressing only some is not effective. While all traditional cultures have varying customs, these customs pass along traditional values that all traditional cultures share. They all share the values required to maintain humanity's survival through harmony with the Earth. The modern culture brought forth by colonial powers does not share these values. That is why modern culture opposes traditional culture. Modern culture seeks more and more followers, but with this conversion we also witness the degradation of the individual, family, community, and entire Earth. To correct this, we must identify and connect ourselves to our traditional cultures.
Traditional cultures are the indigenous peoples of a geographical region that have a distinct culture. This is not to be confused with nationality, which is entirely a colonial invention, but a nation may have been drawn along cultural lines. When one looks at the colonial map of Europe one will notice almost as many nations as one will notice in Africa. Were national lines drawn around indigenous cultures, the colonial map of Africa could have 2000 nations. All this reveals the unhealthy truth about consumer culture: it is based on exploiting any environment without regard for anything within the environment being exploited, even if what is in that environment are our human brothers and sisters.
Examples of this exploitation continue to this day; and some can be found posted on web sites such as www.treatycouncil.org, which is the site of the International Indian Treaty Council. Other sites that provide an opportunity for individuals to help our indigenous cultures are www.ienearth.org (Indigenous Environmental Network) and www.7genfund (Seventh Generation Fund), to name a few. It is imperative that all of us help to preserve all our traditional cultures because each one is like a puzzle piece that is necessary to regain the harmony (or balance) that humanity needs. The first step is to bring balance into our individual lives by spending time on what is truly important: ourselves, our family, community and environment. Reducing our wastefulness, increasing our knowledge of our indigenous heritage, gardening and eating healthy, sharing all this with family and friends, will be the change that no politician can deliver.
