Re-casting the Hollywood Indian: Technology integration at Sequoyah Schools Lee M. Adcock III A dissertation submitted to the faculty of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the School of Education. Chapel Hill 2012 Advisor: Cheryl Mason Bolick Reader: John Lee Reader: Bill McDiarmid Reader: George Noblit Reader: Jim Trier ©2012 Lee M. Adcock III ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ii ABSTRACT LEE M. ADCOCK III: Re-casting the Hollywood Indian: Technology integration at Sequoyah Schools (Under the Direction of Cheryl Mason Bolick) In this dissertation I will examine the experiences of three Cherokee Nation teachers as they integrate technology within the context of a tribally controlled school. The proliferation of technology into K-12 education has provided a unique opportunity for tribally controlled schools to foster language revitalization, support traditional ways of knowing, and repatriate tribal history (Allen, Resta, & Christal, 2002; Christal, Roy, & Cherian, 2004; Corbett, Singleton, & Muir, 2009; Thater-Braan, 2007). However, research about technology use in Indian Education has not been an articulated priority (Keenan, 2004). Additionally, research that documents the complexity of negotiating, providing and integrating technology into instruction for Native students is limited. Using a methodology of portraiture this study is a direct attempt to counter historical trends that view Native students and teachers from a deficit model perspective. Instead, this study repositions the traditional marginalization of Native students in schools as spaces of resistance and hope. Thus, this dissertation challenges popular representations of Native Americans as child-like, savages far removed from the modern world and instead, suggests that “Indians are people, just plain folks” (P. C. Smith, 2009, p. 18) struggling to teach, learn and prosper. No Feathers Necessary (Perdue & Green, 2011). iii In memory and in honor of azxl afjc William Franklin Langley (1874-1963) & azxl aflR Opehlia Warren Keyes (1875-1945) iv Zylel} There are countless individuals to thank for guiding me through this work. To the faculty, staff and students at Sequoyah Schools— these stories are your stories. Thank you for sharing your time, energy and hearts with me. I must especially thank my colleague and friend Samantha Benn-Duke. This project would never have happened without your council, patience and friendship. Zylel}. To the teachers that are at the center of this project, thank you for your warmth, your openness, and for letting me into your academic and personal lives. Words are not enough. To my faculty advisor Cheryl Mason Bolick, you have provided me numerous opportunities to explore and express my academic self. Thank you for your guidance and patience along the way. I would like to convey my gratitude for the continuous feedback and encouragement from my committee members: George Noblit, Jim Trier, John Lee and Bill McDiarmid. The greatest tribute I can give is for you all to see yourselves in the work that follows. I must acknowledge those friends that have mentored me in the Cherokee language. I am grateful to Bo Taylor at the Eastern Band of Cherokee Museum, Tom Belt and Hartwell Francis at Western Carolina University and Louise Brown. To those Indian scholars who have come before me and continue to inspire me, thank you for opening the door. I would also like to express my gratitude to the students, faculty and staff of the American Indian Center. Thank you for your ideas. You helped to make this project vi better. I must also thank the members of the Royster Society and the Sequoyah Dissertation Fellowship Committee for generously funding and supporting this project. This work would never have been undertaken nor completed without the love and support of my family. You have walked this walk with me. To my mother and father for your faith and constant support during this process. To my brother, Jon, for paving the way. I give thanks for my “second family”, Susan, Deborah, Brittany and Ali. To my greatest accomplishments, Mateo and Wahya, for providing perspective and reminding me what is most important in life. I hope I made you proud. Finally, to my wife Andrea, I could never have done this without you. You are the love of my life and everything I do, I do for us. I am truly blessed. vii ᏣᎳᎩ ᎠᏴ “No matter how much you study, no matter how much you read, you have to go home, because that’s where theory becomes story and moves into your bones” Daniel Heath Justice, (2006) In Margaret Kovach’s book (2009) Indigenous Methodologies: Characteristics, Conversations and Contexts she argues, “a [preface] can serve as an introduction to indigenous readers while also bridging function for non-indigenous readers” (p. 3). A preface acts as a signal-- that woven throughout the varied forms of this writing there is a story. “The truth about stories is that that’s all we are”, argues Cherokee writer Thomas King (2005, p. 2). Story is method. I must go back. I feel compelled to go back. To serve my Nation. Hermes (1998) defines the process of “going back” as “touching a place of the past and the future that belongs to all of us detribalized, adopted out, colonized and made-not-to-feel-at-home people. “Going back” means remembering to touch places that bring us together, “going back” means I am not from there, the way someone raised there is, means I will never be a part of that community in that same way, but it also means no better and no worse” (p. 155). In many ways I am both an "insider" and an "outsider" to the Cherokee community and the school in which this work takes place. I am an insider based on my family’s history and being a registered member of the Cherokee Nation. I have family in and around Tahlequah. However, I am also acutely aware that, as someone who grew up outside the Cherokee vii Nation, I do not have the longstanding family-tribal connections that are inherent in the question, “who are your people?” I must touch the earth and retrace their steps One of the first lessons you learn, as a Cherokee Indian, is that you better know who your people are. Each time I arrive in the ancestral lands in Western North Carolina or in Tahlequah, Oklahoma I am met with an inquiry into “who are your people?” Who are my people? ᎠᎩᏥ (My mother) is a Cherokee woman from Oklahoma. My father is a Scotch-Irish, born and raised in Georgia. I do not subscribe to the binaries that have been constructed around this mixed identity: full-blood or not really Indian, traditional or sellout. I am neither one or the other. I am fully both. As a registered member of the Cherokee Nation my roots are firmly planted in Oklahoma. ᎠᎬᏴᎵ ᎠᎩᏚᏓ (My great grandfather) William Franklin “W.F.” Langley and ᎠᎬᏴᎵ ᎠᎩᎵᏏ (great grandmother) Ophelia Warren Keyes, both Cherokee, resided in Wauhillau, OK a small settlement area just east of Tahlequah. Each of their families migrated from ᏣᎳᎩ ᎤᏪᏘ (the Old Cherokee Nation) to the Going Snake District in the 19th century. Stories of their hardships and efforts to rebuild have lingered in our family consciousness since I was young. By the time I was five years old my great- grandparents and grandparents had passed. Their lived struggles reside in the grainy pictures, worn letters, illegible birth certificates, and other artifacts from “Indian Territory”. These historical relics constantly remind me of “who my people are” and where we come from. I have also learned about my family in Indian territory through oral histories passed on by aunts, uncles, cousins and my mother. I often close my eyes and search the viii faces in the scenes of those stories. W.F. had “hands made of stone” and “always wore a ten gallon hat”. He also staunchly supported his people through resisting Oklahoma statehood and served as an alternative representative from the Going Snake district to the State of Sequoyah Council at the turn of the 20th century1. Ophelia was a “tiny woman” who, my aunt recalls, would sit on her porch with a shotgun across her lap keeping watch in anticipation of KKK members who roamed many parts of Eastern Oklahoma. Her great uncle was Judge Riley Keyes, one of the first Chief Justices of the Cherokee Nation, who is buried in the Ross Family Cemetery. Their legacy endures as members of both the Langley and Keyes families continue to be active in Cherokee Nation politics and reside on allotment lands just outside of Tahlequah. ᎠᎩᎦᎦ (My grandfather) was born and raised in Adair County and coached the Westville High School football team in the 1930s. “Langley Field” still lies behind the school where he taught history. He received a scholarship to play football at Northeastern State University (NSU) and was the first male in his family to receive a college education. He passed before I was born, but his legacy has shaped and formed my Cherokee identity. My mother can recall my grandfather and his brothers greeting each other in the Cherokee language, “O siyo tsutsa”. Bits and pieces of the language have been handed down to me like a sacred gift. The language was one of the first signifiers for me that I was Indian. The words— osiyo, tsutsa, and wado— have linked me to a past and identity that continue on in my own children. 1 The State of Sequoyah was the proposed name for a state to be established in the eastern part of present-day Oklahoma. In 1905, faced by proposals to end their tribal governments, Native Americans of the Five Civilized Tribes in Indian Territory proposed such a state as a means to retain some control of their land.