Indigenous Peoples' Day 2020
Schedule of Events
This year's annual Indigenous Peoples' Day Teach-In was held virtually over two days, October 12-13, 2020, to enable wider participation and to adhere to social distancing guidelines.
The teach-in also included a Land Acknowledgement by the Dean of Arts & Sciences and a workshop on Land Acknowledgments with Brandeis student activists. Additionally, the Massachusetts Center for Native American Awareness (MCNAA) hosted a virtual information booth.
This event is co-sponsored by the Department of Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; The Intercultural Center; and the Asian-American and Pacific Islander Studies Program. Additional generous financial support is provided by our colleagues from: the Dean of Arts and Sciences; the Department of Anthropology; the Department of Art History; the Department of History; and the International and Global Studies Program.
October 12, 2020
Land Acknowledgment with Dorothy Hodgson, Dean of Arts and Sciences.
Claudia Fox Tree (Arawak/Yurumein) will speak about, "Indigenous Perspectives on Settler Colonial Monuments, Statues, and Mascots" and the power that these cultural artifacts have in contemporary society and culture.
A land acknowledgment led by Dorothy Hodgson, Dean of Arts & Sciences, will precede Claudia Fox Tree's presentation.
October 12, 2020
Massachusetts Center for Native American Awareness will be available to answer questions, provide information on Massachusetts' Indigenous Communities, and how communities can help support and preserve indigenous culture.
October 12, 2020
Eva Blake (Assonet Wampanoag) will discuss the importance and efforts of Indigenous Language Reclamation.
October 12, 2020
Deborah Spears Moorehead (Seaconke Pokanoket Wampanoag) will give her talk, "Finding Balance: The Genealogy of Massasoit's People and the Oral and Written History of the Seaconke Pokanoket Wampanoag Tribal Nation." Deborah is a direct descendant of Massasoit, an accomplished artist, and activist.
October 12, 2020
Professor Emilie Connolly (History Department) will discuss "Fiduciary Colonialism."
October 12, 2020
Earl Tulley (Navajo) is an environmentalist and activist. His talk will be entitled, "All Our Relations" and he will speak from a Native perspective on current situations we find ourselves in. See Earl's work in, "Sacred Poison."
October 13, 2020
Angela L. Robinson, Ph.D. (Inaugural Mellon-Pasifika PostDoctoral Fellow, University of Utah), will give her talk, "“Remembering Our Bones: Memorial Culture Under Settler Colonialism and the Promise of Indigenous Feminisms." This talk examines how memorial culture within settler states functions as a colonial affective regime through the use of settler memory and temporality. Upon thinking through the particular ways in which memorial culture draws from settler memory in order to create and maintain a national settler affect in the context of Aotearoa/New Zealand, she turns to Māori performance artist Cat Ruka’s 2009 Playing Savage. Utilizing the Māori ontology of corporeal memory, Playing Savage effectively highlights the gendered nature of settler affect, illustrating how Indigenous feminist critiques can at once interrupt the temporality of settler memory and enact expansive notions of Indigenous sovereignty.
Event Recordings
Claudia Fox Tree: The Power of Stereotypes to Shape Identity
Eva Blake: Indigenous Language Reclamation
Finding Balance: The Genealogy of Massasoit's People and the Oral and Written History of the Seaconke Pokanoket Wampanoag Tribal Nation
Fiduciary Colonialism, A Talk with Professor Emilie Connolly
Earl Tulley (Navajo): Conversation
Angela Robinson: “Remembering Our Bones: Memorial Culture Under Settler Colonialism and the Promise of Indigenous Feminisms”