Rezistance: Diné Grassroots Organization and Modes of Activism
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Bard College Bard Digital Commons Senior Projects Spring 2020 Bard Undergraduate Senior Projects Spring 2020 Rezistance: Diné Grassroots Organization and Modes of Activism Eric Robert Dougherty Bard College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/senproj_s2020 Part of the Agricultural Economics Commons, Agricultural Education Commons, Anthropological Linguistics and Sociolinguistics Commons, Bilingual, Multilingual, and Multicultural Education Commons, Educational Methods Commons, Food Security Commons, Geotechnical Engineering Commons, Indigenous Education Commons, Indigenous Studies Commons, Infrastructure Commons, Organizational Communication Commons, Organization Development Commons, Social and Cultural Anthropology Commons, Social Influence and oliticalP Communication Commons, and the Structural Engineering Commons This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License. Recommended Citation Dougherty, Eric Robert, "Rezistance: Diné Grassroots Organization and Modes of Activism" (2020). Senior Projects Spring 2020. 360. https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/senproj_s2020/360 This Open Access work is protected by copyright and/or related rights. It has been provided to you by Bard College's Stevenson Library with permission from the rights-holder(s). You are free to use this work in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights- holder(s) directly, unless additional rights are indicated by a Creative Commons license in the record and/or on the work itself. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Rezistance: Diné Grassroots Organization and Modes of Activism Senior Project Submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College by Eric Dougherty Annandale-on-Hudson, New York May 2020 Table of Contents Introduction .................................................................................................................................................. 1 The Route to Dzil Yijiin Living (DYL) ........................................................................................................... 1 Language as Identity ................................................................................................................................. 4 “Transition is Inevitable, Justice is Not”: Engaged Modes oF Activism ..................................................... 7 Arriving at Bitterwater ............................................................................................................................ 11 Ethnographic Representation ................................................................................................................. 14 Chapter Organization .............................................................................................................................. 17 Chapter One—Active Spaces: Hogans as Worldview ................................................................................ 20 Bringing a Hogan to LiFe: In the Field and on the Road .......................................................................... 21 Quality CraFtsmanship ............................................................................................................................. 35 DYL and Hogans: A Working Relationship ............................................................................................... 42 Hogans as Worldview .............................................................................................................................. 49 Arriving at Bitterwater ............................................................................................................................ 11 Ethnographic Representation ................................................................................................................. 14 Chapter Organization .............................................................................................................................. 17 Chapter Two—The Social Misfits: Diné Youth and Activism .................................................................... 56 Functioning in a Dysfunctional Society ................................................................................................... 57 Getting to Know the Restoration Crew ................................................................................................... 59 Social Misfits ........................................................................................................................................... 84 DYL’s Legacy ............................................................................................................................................ 89 Arriving at Bitterwater ............................................................................................................................ 11 Ethnographic Representation ................................................................................................................. 14 Chapter Organization .............................................................................................................................. 17 Chapter Three—Recognizing Ourselves: Reflections on an Indigenous Anarchist Convergence ............ 97 DiFFerent Spaces Building Similar Communities ...................................................................................... 98 Opening the Doors of Ya’at’eeh ............................................................................................................ 104 What Do We Even Mean by “Indigenous”? .......................................................................................... 109 Listening as Ethnographic Discipline ..................................................................................................... 111 The Shortcomings of Reconciliation...................................................................................................... 115 Moral and Multicultural Mistakes ........................................................................................................ 123 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................................ 127 Acknowledgments I would like to thank my wonderfully supportive parents, Bob and Diane, and my brother, Kyle, for their encouragement through all walks of my life. My childhood friends for their kindness and dependability. Alex, Ross, Steve, Rund, and Dilernia—you all rock! My mentors, both academically and musically, who have taken me to places of amazement and inspiration, giving me skills and ideas I never would have imagined possible. Jay, Abbot, Drs. Frances O’Neil and Paul Wittmer. The brilliant minds of Tunxis Community College. In no particular order—Helen Lozada, Kirk Peters, Lisa Lavoie, Rafaele Fierro, Amy Hofmann, and Loup Whitesides. My advisors at Bard College—especially Laura Kunreuther, Gregory “Duff” Morton, and Christian Crouch for continuing to push me to think deeper, open my perspective, and seek nuanced understandings. Cammie Jones and the rest at CCE and Brothers at Bard for providing me the space and resources to connect with others in the College network and share my research. This work would be meaningless without the warm welcoming of my friends along the Navajo Nation. The Chee family, Born For Water, Yucca Boy, Riko and his family, and the rest of the people at Dzil Yijiin Living who opened their doors to me. Ahéhee' 1 Introduction The Route to Dzil Yijiin Living (DYL) The sun had already long disappeared to the west, behind Do’koo’osliid (the San Francisco Peaks) by the time we made that right turn off the lone paved street and onto a dirt trail leading to Pinon. It may have once been a spillway given the deep trenches on either side of the path and the way the road rises and falls like a steady current, or perhaps an old carriage road bearing the worn, deeply sloped marks of countless travelers tracing one another’s trails. On such a moonless stormy night, however, it is difficult to really make any such definite conclusions— and the mind tends to wander. The only features I could really make out for sure were the two slowly fading red taillights, like the fiery eyes of a dragon, of a rental car belonging to Born For Water with his young group of fellows and employees who made up some of the restoration crew. Born For Water, a Pinon resident, knew these roads all too well and traversed the rugged terrain, with its slippery sand and disorienting hills, as if a surfer gliding across a wave. I, on the other hand, tightly clung to the steering wheel of my own vehicle desperately trying to keep up as a storm brewed overhead. My journey to Pinon begins with Dzil Yijiin Living (DYL), an inter-tribal, multiethnic, fiscally-sponsored Indigenous grassroots organization that coordinates with various communities in and around the federal boundaries of what is known as the Navajo reservation implementing sustainable projects modeled around three core values that inform various modes of activism: just transition, regenerative ecology and restorative economy. These projects, while dynamic and 2 Figure 1: Mape of the Navajo and Hopi reservations with four Diné sacred mountains, the presence of public and private schools, and areas affected by mining. innovative, are particularly focused toward land reclamation and restoration, public health,