We will greatly miss Professor Macri and we wish her all of the best during her retirement.
Pinigigi Professor Macri! Thank you!
Left to right: James Sarmento; Martha Macri; Cuauhtemoc Lule; Stephanie Lumsden; Angel Hinzo; Patricia Killelea; Vanessa Esquivido. Photograph taken by Professor Hulleah Tsinhnahjinnie
Yesterday, the Native American Studies Department held the retirement celebration for our beloved faculty member Dr. Martha Macri. Professor Macri (Cherokee Nation) began her career in 1988 as a lecturer for Native American Studies and Anthropology. She was a University of California President's Postdoctoral Fellow at UC Davis from 1990-1991 and joined the Native American Studies Department shortly after. Professor Macri served as the Rumsey Endowed Chair in California Indian Studies from 2007 to 2013. She specializes in Native American language revitalization, California Indian Studies, electronic data archiving, and non-alphabetic scripts (especially in ancient Mesoamerica). We will greatly miss Professor Macri and we wish her all of the best during her retirement. Pinigigi Professor Macri! Thank you!
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Possible Spoiler Alert!!!
My name is Stephanie Lumsden and I wear many basket caps (HA!). I am a graduate student in the Native American Studies program at the University of California, Davis, an enrolled member of the Hoopa Valley Tribe, and a total Walking Dead geek (AMC’s television series). In fact, I often find myself in heated conversations with my colleagues at UC Davis about the inevitable Zombie Apocalypse and possible survival tactics – we are an interesting and tenacious group. All of the episodes of The Walking Dead contribute to a complex and intense storyline of survival that drags the viewer through emotional highs, lip biting cliffhangers, and groans of displeasure when a favorite character gets eaten by zombie antagonists (I’ll try not to say too much). One episode in particular grabs my attention; that episode is called Cherokee Rose. It is the fourth episode of season two during which time the loveable and not so loveable cast members find themselves on Hershel’s farm fighting for survival. By this episode Carol’s daughter, a pre-teen girl named Sophia, has been missing for some time and her disappearance has taken a huge emotional toll on the other survivors. Everyone is worried for Sophia’s safety but it is Daryl Hixon’s emotional response and efforts to console Carol which provide the scene that piques my interest as a scholar of Native studies. When Daryl is comforting Carol over the disappearance of her daughter he presents her with a white flower and tells her a story about the titular Cherokee rose. He tells her about the infamous Trail of Tears that the Cherokee walked during their forced removal from their homelands in the American Southeast. He truthfully says that the Cherokee lost many of their children along the way due to the brutal conditions of removal. The conditions were so horrible and the spirits of the Cherokee were so low that their Elders prayed for a sign that would grant the women who had lost children strength and hope. The Cherokee mothers who lost children, Daryl explains, wept as they were marched westward by American soldiers and wherever their tears fell white Cherokee roses bloomed. Daryl nods toward the flower he gives Carol and says that he believes this one bloomed for her lost daughter Sophia. This scene is only about three minutes of the entire episode, but it is heavy with political significance. By telling the story of the Cherokee rose, the character Daryl appropriates the genocide endured by the Cherokee as a metaphor for the loss of one white child during the zombie apocalypse. And since actual Cherokee people, and all Indians for that matter, are absent from the plot one reasonable conclusion is that the non-Indian survivors of the zombie apocalypse are the new Indians. They are the new tribal people facing massive onslaught and being forced from their homes, and Daryl’s easy invocation of the Trail of Tears for one of the lost survivors makes a strong case for this analysis. In this episode, the Cherokee are ghosts and the survivors become Indians. What does this mean? I think it means that in the event of the zombie apocalypse, the genocide of the Indian peoples of this country becomes an allegory for the suffering of non-Indian people. In fact, by using this story about the Trail of Tears to add depth to an episode of The Walking Dead the writers are contributing to the idea that Cherokee people no longer exist. If Cherokee people no longer exist, then their experiences of genocide can serve as fables for the people surviving in their territory now. This episode of The Walking Dead works to invisiblize the actual Cherokee apocalypse and simultaneously re-invents the survivors on the show as their metaphorical descendants; they are the new Cherokee. Why does this matter? Because to render invisible the actual genocide and colonization that occurred in what is now the United States is to ignore Indian peoples and cultures that have survived and continue to exist in this country. Erasure is a contemporary tool of colonization and it should be treated critically because it results in violence against Indian bodies. Photos courtesy of UCD NAS Grad Student Lori Laiwa (official Doctoral Candidate!)
To learn more about our current students click here. Nikki Morgan is a member of the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes of Fort Hall, Idaho. She received her B.S. in Sociology from Northeastern University and is currently a Ph.D. student at UC Davis. She is interested in studying how Indigenous communities can become self-sufficient through cultural sovereignty and ecologically sustainable food systems. See More on Our Current Students Page An excerpt from the article:
This fall, humanities faculty, graduate students, and undergraduates are contributing to the constellation of events surrounding the book project, including lectures, films, paper presentations, panel discussions and art exhibits, and some are incorporating the text into their courses. The coming week alone will see three related events addressing issues of Native American education and environmental justice. ...The book project was established after September 11, 2001 to promote dialogue and build community by encouraging members of the campus and local communities to read the same book and attend related events and discussions. “The books serve as vehicles to encourage conversations that would not happen otherwise,” said Mikael Villalobos, “The book project brings people together. Events and reading groups happen not only on campus but also across surrounding communities.” ...Native American Studies instructor and PhD student Cutcha Risling Baldy (Hupa, Yurok, Karuk) has assigned Alexie’s book to students in her Introduction to Native American Literatures course. She encourages her students to participate in book project events in addition to reading the text with the class. “The book project brings the author to life and provides a way for students to interact with literature off its pedestal, outside the classroom,” said Risling Baldy. READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE New to the site today: James Sarmento is a member of the Shasta Nation and a graduate student in Native American Studies at the University of California, Davis. He received his BA in Anthropology and in Ethnic Studies from CSU Sacramento. He is the executive director of the Native American Language Center and the project coordinator for the J.P. Harrington Database Project. His research focuses on language revitalization, specifically the Shasta language. You can find out more about all of our students by visiting the current students page.
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Welcome!
Welcome to the Davis Native American Studies Graduate Student Blog. This blog was started as a place to update on all of the amazing work that is being done by the Graduate Students in the UC Davis Native American Studies Department. The Graduate Program in Native American Studies was approved in 1998, making UC Davis only the second university in the nation to offer a Ph.D. in Native American Studies. In Fall 1999, the Department welcomed its first group of students enrolled in the M.A. and Ph.D. Programs in Native American Studies.
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DisclaimerThis blog is an independent site run by the NAS Grad Students at UCD. The views expressed on this website are not the views of UC Davis Native American Studies nor the University of California Davis and/or its affiliates. |