Women Warriors/Warrior Women

Photo copyright Wings, 2014; all rights reserved.

Today at The NDN Silver Blog, it's (as promised yesterday) more on hearts, but from a very specific perspective: Wings's own very personal, very heartfelt tribute to women.

Its genesis is recounted in the post there, so I won't repeat it here. What I will do is expand upon what's written there. If you read that first, then return here, the link to what I'm about to say will become apparent.

There's a disconnect between how the dominant culture defines — more, presumes to dictate the only definitions — of social justice philosophies and mechanisms like feminism. If it doesn't fit neatly within the dominant culture's worldview and experience, any perceived transgression from that culture's dictates on the matter are labeled accordingly. it's a phenomenon all too familiar to communities of color, one that suppresses our voices and renders us invisible. In 1979, author Alice Walker showed us one way of dealing with the experience of being whitewashed out of the feminist frame by coining the term "womanism." (And she originally defined it, although that definition has been extended and expanded greatly since — and the wiki, predictably, needs some help.)

But indigenous cultures have long dealt with these same issues in a variety of contexts, some of which the dominant culture has had the great good luck and, yes, privilege never to have to experience. And many of them have frankly dealt with them in ways that have been far more successful, and for far longer, than those on the outside. This is not to say that any and all mores and practices of any and all indigenous cultures are either inherently right or inherently immune from the need for self-examination or evolution. It does say that "different" does not equal "wrong."

Coming as I do from three separate ethnic and cultural backgrounds, I'm forced on a daily basis to integrate far more than three separate ways of viewing the world, of locating myself in it, of being true to my own identity as a woman. Outside factors, including the expectations and assumptions that outsiders bring to that identity, mean that on any given day, I may manage that "integration" with more or less success. I've long since let go of the need to conform to anyone else's expectations of what and who I am, but navigating daily life through the morass of colonialist, assimilationist, conversionist influences and attitudes of the broader society as a whole is a greater challenge. No matter who we are, outsiders will presume to "define" us using the markers of their own worldview and attempt to force us into that (to them) comfortable frame: as Indian women, and as Indians generally.

As I said in today's post, Wings addressed this disconnect head-on in the interpretive text that accompanied one grouping of silverwork pieces in his recent one-man show:

It is easy to forget that a wall, a home, a structure, a society endures only through the strength of the cornerstone that serves as its foundation. So it is with our people: The public face is male, but the underlying strength and support, the cornerstones, are the women.

I can hear the objections now: "It's only support!" "It's not the public face!" "Marginalization!"

Is it?

Do the opinions of the women from those cultures count?

These are questions that outsiders need to ask before passing casual white "American" judgment on the values and identities of others and their cultural mores. Because often, you'll get a very different answer from what you likely expect.
It won't be an easy answer. And if you want a short, once-sentence version . . . well, forget about it. These topics are far too complex, too multi-layered for that. Too layered, in fact, in false identities and narratives imposed from without, that must first be stripped away before the unvarnished immanence of cultural identity can be truly revealed.

But this is part of being an ally. It's taking what makes you uncomfortable and looking at it from the viewpoint of the person to whom it actually belongs, as best you can. It's also accepting that there are things you're not entitled to in the process, and that you need to take their word for what they feel and what they are.

It's hard work. But not as hard as the walking in two worlds that we navigate every second of every minute of every our of every day.

And that daily journey is part of what makes us warrior women.