Cross posted at Racialicious.
In many places in the midwest the American Indian is very present, but in other places in the U.S., like in California, Disney’s Pocahontas is as close as we get to “Indians.” The idea that American Indians are gone comes, in part, from the ubiquitous representation of them with feathers, buckskins, and moccasins. These anachronisms are everywhere (see, for example, here, here, here, here, and here).
American Indians are as modern as the rest of us, why are representations of American Indians, as they live today, so unusual? And what effect might that have on the psyche of American Indian people?
Via PostSecret.
NEW! One of the commenters at Racialicious pointed us to a cartoon that illustrates how anachronistic images of American Indians may shape our ideas of what they are like:
2 Comments
There’s also the issue of L.A. and San Francisco actually having large American Indian populations, due to being destination sites for people being relocated by the government during the 50s Termination program. And San Francisco was the location of many protests by the American Indian Movement, most famously the occupation of Alcatraz by a group calling itself Indians of All Tribes. So there are people with American Indian heritage all over L.A. and San Francisco, and you might think that the history of AIM in the region would bring more attention to the population there…but no one thinks of urban areas when they think about the lives of American Indians
I don’t know what the status of native Americans in the U.S. is, but here in Canada ties to native heritage (of some sort) are linked to land rights and state benefits for ‘authentic natives’ (who often live in deplorable poverty). Those land rights and benefits (which I definitely don’t mean to criticize) entail ties to a pre-modern past — to an extent — if only more implicitly. That’s the basic point that I’m making here.
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[...] by Guest Contributor Lisa, originally published at Sociological Images [...]
[...] more of her thought-provoking post here. Racialicious picked up the post here, where there’s an interesting conversation going on [...]
[...] evidence that Indians are represented, and expected to represent themself, anachronistically, see this post. tags: art, cultural imperialism/(neo)colonialism, history, modern/primitive, [...]
[...] First, as Angry Asian Man asks, why is the Asian child in a rice paddy hat? This anachronistic representation reminds me of what we do to American Indians all the time. [...]