Diablo Canyon, John Trudell (Santee Dakota)

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Diablo Canyon, John Trudell (Santee Dakota) John Trudell (1946-2015) was a poet and activist. He participated and became the spokesperson for the United Indians of All Tribes’ nine-month occupation of Alcatraz island. From 1973-1979, he served as the chairman of the American Indian Movement (AIM). In 1979, Trudell’s pregnant wife, three children, and mother-in-law died in a house fire that occurred shortly after Trudell held a protest in Washington, D.C. In addition to writing poetry, Trudell become involved with music, working and recording albums with Kiowa guitarist Jesse Ed Davis, composer Tony Hymas, A Tribe Called Red, and his own band, Bad Dog. In the poem below, Trudell recounts his experience protesting the construction of a nuclear power plant in 1981. The protest resulted in the arrest of 1,900 activists, including musician/activist Jackson Browne. Today I challenged the nukes It was in the way they dressed The soldiers of the state And in the way they acted Placed me in captivity They viewed me as an enemy Or so they thought A threat to their rationalizations They bound my wrists in their I felt pity for them Plastic handcuffs Knowing they will never be free Surrounding me with their Plastic minds and faces I was their captive They ridiculed me But my heart was racing But I could see through Through the generations To the ridicule they brought The memories of eternity On themselves They told me squat over there It was beyond their reach By the trash I would be brought to the They left a solder to guard me Internment camp I was the Vietcong To share my time with allies I was Crazy Horse This time I almost wanted to believe you Little did they understand When you spoke of peace and love and Squatting down in the earth Caring and duty and god and destiny They placed me with my power But somehow the death in your eyes and My power to laugh Your bombs and your taxes and you Laugh at their righteous wrong Greed and your face-life told me Their sneers and their taunts Gave me clarity This time I cannot afford to believe you To see their powerlessness.

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29 WP30 Craig Proofed JR
#30 2018 ISSN 1715-0094 Craig, C. (2018). John Trudell and the Spirit of Life. Workplace, 30, 394-404. CHRISTOPHER CRAIG JOHN TRUDELL AND THE SPIRIT OF LIFE “My ride showed up.” —Posted to John Trudell’s Facebook page just after he passed. The Santee Sioux activist, political philosopher, and poet/musician John Trudell died of cancer on December 8th, 2015. I was sitting in my office when I read the news. His death had been reported erroneously four days before, so it didn’t come as a complete surprise. Nevertheless, I experienced the same kind of sadness I felt when John Lennon died, as though, somehow, I had lost someone close to me even though we had never met. Trudell’s work had inspired me. He fought fearlessly for tribal rights. He also reached across class, gender, and racial lines in order to draw public attention to the oppressive treatment of indigenous people as a symptom of a larger ruling class imperative to colonize the western world. In numerous poems, speeches, and songs, he argues that western society has lost touch with what he calls the “spirit of life.” Industrial capitalism has led to the fall of western society’s natural relationship to the earth. The value of human life no longer resides in the reality that we are made of the earth. Instead it depends on advancing the interests of the very historical forces that had perpetrated our “spiritual genocide.” This learned disrespect for the earth cuts us off from the ancestral knowledge of what it means to be a human being.
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The Seminole Tribune Interviews John Trudell
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RUMBLE: the Indians Who Rocked the World Premieres on Independent Lens Monday, January 21, 2019 on PBS and PBS.Org
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Handout 1 - Diablo Canyon, John Trudell (Santee Dakota) John Trudell (1946-2015) Was a Poet and Activist
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File28.Craig.Qxp Layout 1
John Trudell and the Spirit of Life Christopher Craig “My ride showed up.” Posted to Trudell’s Facebook page just after he passed. The Santee Sioux activist, political philosopher, and poet/musician John Trudell died of cancer on December 8th, 2015. I was sitting in my office when I read the news. His death had been reported erro- neously four days before, so it didn’t come as a complete surprise. Nevertheless, I experienced the same kind of sadness I felt when John Lennon died, as though, somehow, I had lost someone close to me even though we had never met. Trudell’s work had inspired me. He fought fearlessly for tribal rights. He also reached across class, gender, and racial lines in order to draw public attention to the op- pressive treatment of indigenous people as a symptom of a larger ruling class imperative to colonize the western world. In numerous poems, speeches, and songs, he argues that western society has lost touch with what he calls the “spirit of life.” Industrial capitalism has led to the fall of western society’s natural relationship to the earth. The value of human life no longer resides in the reality that we are made of the earth. Instead it depends on advancing the interests of the very historical forces that had perpetrated our “spiritual geno- cide.” This learned disrespect for the earth cuts us off from the an- cestral knowledge of what it means to be a human being. Trudell claims that we must rediscover this knowledge if we intend to take back the land from the ruling class.
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