Preservation - Tribes protect, revive cultural heritage (fwd)

[phil cash cash]

   SUNDAY, DECEMBER 03, 2006
PRESERVATION
_Tribes protect, revive cultural heritage_
BY ALLISON COX[1]
of the East Oregonian
SUNDAY, DECEMBER 03, 2006

 
http://www.eastoregonian.info/main.asp?SectionID=27&SubSectionID=92&ArticleID=56977&TM=78692.78

	Jess Nowland, visitor services coordinator, holds a hand woven traditional
basket made of cedar root, corn husk and bear grass that dates back to the
1940s in the artifact vault at the Tamastslikt Cultural Institute. Photo by E.
J. Harris.		

	Master teacher Cecelia Bearchum, a native Walla Walla speaker, listens in on a
Walla Walla language class at the Nixyaawii Community School in Mission. Photo
by E. J. Harris.		

Say the word "culture" and most people think of pageants, religious practices
and colorful clothing. To certain members of the Confederated Tribes of the
Umatilla Indian Reservation, culture means much more, and they're doing what
they can to preserve it.
Tamastslikt Cultural Institute, located near Wildhorse Resort & Casino, is
dedicated to preserving American Indian culture, historical accuracy and
contributing to the tribal economy. The museum is recognized around the world
as a boiler plate of American Indian cultural preservation and restoration.
Institute Director, Roberta Conner, explained preserving culture is not just a
romantic whim.
"People think of our culture as quaint customs, instead of the backbone of
survival," said Conner. "Stereotypes include the belief that our reverence for
our historic cultural lifeways is a desire to return to the past, and it's not.
We've lived in this landscape for so long there's knowledge, the equivalent to
an enormous library, imbedded in the culture."
Conner said the accumulation of information gathered over eons is as valid
today as it was in the past - and is relevant to every aspect of life in this
geographical region.
"Look at the tribal languages and understand that not only is there a window
into the philosophy, culture and law, but also into vast amounts of information
about this ecosystem, " she added. 
That tie to the land, expressed as culture, provides knowledge regarding
stewardship of the land and the animals and people who dwell on it. With the
arrival of Lewis and Clark, and the subsequent invasion of non-native people
that followed, that connection to the past was almost severed.
"While it's changed our lives drastically, the core values remain intact - this
tie to the land," Conner said of the years between the Lewis and Clark
expedition and today. "If our culture hadn't kept us together and sustained us,
we would be culturally extinct, and 50 years ago that's what experts expected.
I'm delighted they were wrong."
While the museum provides a way to preserve items of historical importance, and
at the same time educates the public at large, the tribes are pro-active when it
comes to using other methods to ensure the continuation of the culture. 
In the same complex as Nixyaawii charter school, and in the same building as
Cay-Uma-Wa Head Start, is a modern language and computer lab. Next to the lab
is an office, which doesn't feature desks but instead a large conference table.
This is the elders' office. 
The elders, revered for the wisdom of their years and their memories, are a
vital and treasured part of the tribal cultural preservation plan. Not only is
it evident in the way they are deferred to by younger tribal members, it's also
evidenced by the central location of their office and the reserved parking
spaces for them out front.
Out of the office, a group of about nine elders, men and women, work as
language teachers. They, and everyone else, understand time is of the essence.
While there are elders to teach the Umatilla and Walla Walla languages, the
Cayuse language is considered lost. Only 400 words remain, contained in a small
dictionary. 
The elders teach high school students, as well as the preschool children at
Cay-Uma-Wa, who often overflow into the elders' office.
"The little ones that we have here, the Head Start students, are real good
students," said Elder Cecilia Bearchum, who teaches the Walla Walla language.
"Their little brains are just like sponges, they catch on easy."
But, as with other aspects of American Indian culture, it's not just about the
language. The language is a valuable and important reason to encourage
closeness between the young ones and the elders, but it's by no means the only
reason. The benefits of pursuing the language are far-reaching and complicated,
as everything associated with American Indian culture seems to be.
"That is where they learn traditional values such as respect, from the elders,"
said Sophia Enos, a teacher at Cay-Uma-Wa. "It's part of their lives and part of
their heritage."
"A lot of them don't have grandmas, so we're grandmas to them all," Bearchum
said. "Once in a while they'll come in and shake hands and say good morning in
whatever language they remember. It makes our day."
Conner believes, and hopes, that in preserving the culture, the people will be
preserved as well.
"The part of our culture that we are still trying to restore is how we take
care of one another," Conner said. "It's a tenet of our culture that no one
goes hungry or is orphaned. But our current social ills make that no longer
true. When we examine our modern problems, addictions and self-destruction, we
look at the culture that we once had, we recognize that our once strong,
wholesome, well-rounded people have been broken by acts of history. And the
culture can make them whole again."
Jess Nowland, Tamastslikt Visitors Services Coordinator, is immersed in the
culture of his people. During the day he has access to some of the most
treasured artifacts and information his people possess, and a venue to learn
about the ways of his people. During his off time, he remains absorbed in the
culture as an involved, engaged member of the modern tribal community.
But Nowland wasn't raised in the culture. He spent most of the first 15 years
of his life on a ranch near Rock Springs, Wyo., where he was the only American
Indian for miles around. 
"When I went to high school in Wyoming, all you had to do was say you were
Indian, and that was enough," said Nowland. "But here people ask you things. It
was embarrassing not to know, and that sort of inspired me to learn about my
heritage."
At the age of 15, he embarked on a mission to learn as much as possible about
his people. It started with spending time with five uncles.
"That's when I was introduced to the sweathouse, hunting, fishing, language,
dancing - our ways," he said.
Each of the customs is but a piece in the whole cloth of culture, according to
Conner, which is why it's so important to preserve and integrate all of the
culture into modern life.
"There is a knowledge of how and where and when that comes from through
thousands of years of exposure to one homeland," Conner said. "Look at the
tribal languages and understand that not only is there a window into the
philosophy, culture and law, but also into vast amounts of information about
this ecosystem."
And still, as always, there's more to it.
"So, when you ask why is it important to preserve the culture? We have to do it
to save our people. Our culture is not static, it's dynamic," Conner said. "In
an age when all people are transient, we don't expect our people to live here
all the time. But there's a sense of belonging and a state of grace that comes
from belonging to a place."
Suggested reading
Recently released, "As Days Go By, Our History, Our Land and Our People" is a
look at the Cayuse, Umatilla and Walla Walla people, as written by nine tribal
and three non-tribal members.
"It's unique in that it's about us and by us," said Roberta Conner, one of the
contributors to the book. 
Conner said an atlas of native places and names, also developed by tribal
members, will come out in 2007.
"The idea was sparked by the Lewis and Clark Bicentennial," Conner explained.
"We were reminded during the observance that Lewis and Clark were naming rivers
and places. Since we want our people 100 years from now to know the names we
called places, we began this project."
Conner suggested the following books for those interested in learning about
American Indian population, culture and history:
• "Nch'i-Wana: The Big River," by Eugene S. Hunn.
• "The Si'lailo Way: Indians, Salmon and Law on the Colorado River," by Joseph
C. Dupris, Kathleen S. Hill, and William H. Rodgers, Jr.
• "Columbia River Basketry: Gift of the Ancestors, Gift of the Earth," by Mary
Dodds Schlick.
• "A Song to the Creator: Traditional Arts of Native American Women of the
Plateau," by Lillian A. Ackerman.
• "Peoples of the Plateau: The Indian Photographs of Lee Moorhouse,
1898-1915," by Steven L. Grafe.

	RELATED LINKS		

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Content © 2006 East Oregonian 
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Links:
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[1] MAILTO:ACOX at EASTOREGONIAN.COM
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