News from Indian Country
Pqge7 5pi lyqy Ty moo Jqnuqry 20, 2005
Road part of Indian burial site
Cherokee Nation plans to begin
no-limit blackjack, poker games
CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas
(AP) - Construction on an area
road has been delayed partly
because of its location on an
ancient American Indian burial
site, state transportation officials
said.
"There was the potential for
Indian artifacts all through this,"
Texas Department of Transpor
tation district engineer Craig E.
Clark said last week.
The transportation depart
ment knew about the burial
grounds before construction
began in June 2000, but it didn't
become public until last week.
Clark said Ennisjoslin Road
has been delayed because the
department had to move utility
pipes that were in unexpected
Gay marriage
debate comes to
Navajo Nation
WINDOW ROCK, Ariz.
(AP) - The debate over same
sex marriage is coming to the
Navajo Nation.
Tribal Council delegate Larry
Anderson Sr. has proposed leg
islation that would restrict a rec
ognized union to a relationship
between a man and woman.
"Navajo Nation laws.. .are
outdated and need to be up
dated. That's why I'm asking for
an amendment that states it is
unlawful to have a marriage
between two (same) sexes,"
Anderson, the delegate from
Fort Defiance, said.
Critics of the proposed leg
islation say Anderson is attempt
ing to rewrite cultural history to
parallel conservative Christian
backlash against gay rights
across the United States.
Wesley K. Thomas, a Navajo ,.
originally from Mariano Lake
and an assistant professor of
anthropology at Indiana Univer
sity at Bloomington, Ind., said
same-sex relations among Na
vajo and other native peoples did
not become an issue until Chris
tian values were forced upon
tribes 150 years ago.
"It wouldn't have been a
question since it was a normal
part of life," Thomas said. "It
wasn't hidden. It's being ques
tioned because of the immer
sion and acculturation of the
dominant society. This (pro
posed) legislation is a romantic
image that Anderson is trying to
instill."
Anderson said his legislation
is intended to "promote strong
families and strong family val
ues" not discriminate.
He noted that members of
the Navajo Nation Council who
are homosexual or who have
issues with the proposed legisla
tion will be allowed to express
their concern before the vote,
which will take place during the
Navajo Nation Council winter
session Jan. 24-29.
"They're going to be submit
ting their comments on the Na
vajo Nation Council floor,"
Anderson said.
President Joe Shirley Jr.
couldn't be reached for com
ment. His chief of staff said
Shirley is a traditional man who
is also respectful of today's so
ciety, but he didn't know which
position Shirley would take on
the issue.
Thomas said he believes the
proposed legislation will pass
because Navajo people have
become conditioned to accept
Western values.
Anderson said he used tradi
tional Navajo teachings as a ba
sis for his proposed legislation.
"Traditionally, Navajos have
always respected the woman and
the man union. Family values
are important The Navajo el
ders said we should respect both
men and women," he said.
places and because of the ex
tent of the burial site. Initially,
the project was expected to be
complete in late 2003. It's now
expected to be complete in Sep
tember. Clark said that the site be
neath the road runs almost the
entire stretch from South Padre
Island Drive to Ocean Drive.
Transportation department
officials did some test excava
tions to find out the extent of
the burial site in the late 1990s,
before construction began, said
Nancy Kenmotsu, director of
cultural resources for the trans
portation department. "They
probably are ancestral to the
Karankawas," Kenmotsu said.
The department met with
members of the Karankawa
tribe before construction
started, she said.
The transportation depart
ment contracted with the Uni
versity of Texas at San Antonio
Center for Archaeological Re
search to preserve the artifacts.
Archaeologists have found
skeletal remains of a few indi
viduals, along with several tools
made from shells and rocks,
Kenmotsu said. But most of the
bodies are buried below where
the construction contractors are
Archaeologists will likely do
carbon testing to date the arti
facts once construction is fin
ished. The burial site probably
dates from 2500 B.C. to 1000
A.D., said Robert Drolet, an ar
chaeologist at the Corpus Christi
Museum of Science and His
tory. "They're ancestral to the
Karankawa, but we can't call
them by name because they
may not have gone by that
name," Drolet said.
Ennis Joslin was widened
from two lanes to five lanes to
allow a better flow of traffic
from South Padre Island Drive
to Texas A&M-Corpus Christi
and Naval Air Station Corpus
Christi. Transportation officials
said they didn't mention the
burial ground earlier because
they were concerned looters
might scavenge bones and an
cient tools.
Indian artists discuss future
SANTA FE (AP) - A facili
tator at a gathering of Ameri
can Indian artists said they should
not be afraid to cross the thresh
old between contemporary and
traditional art
"We need to beware of the
danger of being museum-ized ...
of being under glass," Steve
Fadden, a faculty member at
the Institute of American Indian
Arts here told the gathering Sat
urday. The common themes raised
among participants were the
importance of preserving
American Indian languages and
respecting elders and traditions.
Fadden said he learned late
in life how to communicate in
the Mohawk language of his
ancestors. His first language was
English.
Several participants agreed
with Fadden's call to branch out
with their art, saying that they
need to explore multimedia.
Steve Wall said the public
often thinks of Indian art in
terms of ethnic stereotypes,
rather than expressing how
American Indians live and inter
act with other people.
The participants also dis
cussed their desire to use art and
education to pass on history and
knowledge from an American
Indian perspective, They said
students receive a distorted ac
count of American history in
typical classrooms.
"We have to work on break
ing down the internal biases
placed on us by outside forces,"
said Jessie Ryker-Crawford.
"Art plays an important role
in that."
CATOOSA, Okla. (AP) -The
Cherokee Nation plans to
begin games of blackjack and
poker with no-limit betting at its
Catoosa casino next week, tribal
officials said.
David Stewart, chief execu
tive officer of Cherokee Nation
Business Enterprises, said games
should begin as early as Wednes
day and no later than Friday.
The first cards in the no-limit
games are expected to be dealt
at the Cherokee Nation Casino
Resort in Catoosa, an $80 mil
lion gaming facility which
opened earlier this year.
"It is going to be mayhem and
chaos," Stewart predicted about
the first day of card playing in
Catoosa. "I don't know what the
other tribes will offer, but they
will eventually experience the
same thing."
Stewart said the Cherokee
Nation is remodeling all tribal
gaming facilities to accommo
date card tables. At the Catoosa
site, plans are to immediately
open 12 blackjack tables and
eight poker tables. However, the
facility will eventually have 30
each of blackjack and poker
tables.
The announcement of the
card games by the Cherokee
Nation would appear to make
it the first tribe to offer card
games among local Indian gam
ing facilities.
Such card games are allowed
under a compact agreement
with the state of Oklahoma.
State Question 712 established
the compact, which allows In
dian tribes to compact with the
state for card games.
Meanwhile, the Cherokee
Nation has been preparing for
the day when the tribe would cut
its first deck of cards.
Stewart said the tribe has
been training card dealers for all
Cherokee casinos, including ca
sinos in West Siloam Springs and
Roland near the Oklahoma-Arkansas
border. Other tribes
thinking about expanding their
gaming operations into black
jack and poker are close behind
the Cherokee Nation.
Gov. Bill Anoatubby of the
Chickasaw Nation announced
Friday at an intertribal council
meeting that his tribe's gaming
compact was approved Thurs
day by the Bureau of Indian
Affairs. "I think you will see
some very positive results from
the compacts, which would not
have been possible without the
support of our people and the
legislative councils," Anoatubby
said.
Indian man first to earn doctorate at S.D. Tech
(AP) - The first American
Indian to earn a doctorate from
the South Dakota School of
Mines and Technology consid
ers himself an Indian man who
practices science rather than a
scientist
Timothy Bull Bennett says
he can relate to what the great
Boston Celtic coach and player
Bill Russell meant when he said:
"I'm not a basketball player. I'm
a black man who plays basket
ball." "That has always stuck with
me," Bull Bennett says. "I'm not
a scientist. I'm an Indian man
who practices science. I am very
comfortable with who I am as
an Indian man, strong in my
convictions. I am also a believer
in science and the scientific
method and know how to apply
it."
He looks at what he does as
a scientist through the perspec
tive of an Indian. This insight
interests officials at the South
Dakota college, which is trying
to recruit more American Indian
students.
Last May, Bull Bennett be
came the first American Indian
to earn a doctoral degree from
South Dakota Tech. He is a
member of the Mi'kmaq Tribe
from northern New England
and eastern Canada. Born in
Maine, he grew up in Wyoming
and attended college at Casper
College and the University of
Wyoming before completing an
undergraduate degree at Black
Hills State University. Bull
Bennett returned to the Univer
sity of Wyoming to earn a
master's in wildlife and range
ecology.
In 1998, South Dakota Tech
recruited him. Now, they see
him as a harbinger. The school
has created a multicultural com
mittee to develop strategies to
attract more Indian students.
This spring, recommendations
will be made to President
Charles Ruch.
Bull Bennett was recruited
into a multidisciplinary Ph.D.
program at the university in
volving atmospheric, environ
mental and water resources. His
doctoral research was on bison.
Now, he is the science edu
cation coordinator for five
North Dakota tribal colleges. In
a program funded by the Na
tional Institutes of Health, he is
working to increase the number
of Indian students enrolled in
higher-education biomedical re
search programs. ; ,.,.
In the past two years, South
Dakota Tech has set records for
enrolling and graduating Indian
students. But it still falls short.
In fall 2003, Tech enrolled 22
first-time Indian students, the
most ever, and had a total In
dian student enrollment of 65,
also a record. But that repre
sented only about 4 percent of
the student body; Indians make
up 8.3 percent of the state's
population.
Last May, nine Indian stu
dents earned undergraduate or
graduate degrees. This semester,
there are 10 Indian graduate stu
dents at Tech and 65 under
graduates. "As a university, we are mak
ing progress. But this issue is so
important, we can't sit back and
say we've done our job," says Al
Boysen, a professor in Tech's
humanities department and the
multicultural committee chair
man. Bull Bennett says it is espe
cially important the institution
make a commitment to bring
ing Indian students to science
and engineering, because the
university, founded in 1885, was
largely created to produce engi
neers for the gold-mining indus
try that had a key role in ending
the traditional lives of North
ern Plains Indians.
"Really, that stood against
everything the 1868 Fort
Laramie Treaty stood for," Bull
Bennett says of a higher-education
institution established to
educate mining engineers. When
the U.S. abolished the 1868
treaty and opened the Black
Hills to mining, it paved a path
that ultimately led to the Battle
of the Little Big Horn and the
Indian wars of the late 1870s.
In that conflict, regional tribes
lost both their homeland and
nomadic way of life.
If Indians since then have
been forced to live in a culture
founded on European thinking
with its high regard for logical
procedure and science, many of
them in the 21st century can
enrich that intellectual approach
with traditional insights, Bull
Bennett says.
"We are very connected to
the land and'the resources
around us. Our society is built
on that. Our sense of space is
what drives us, as opposed to
the sense of time that drives
Western societies.
"There's a contingent of very
talented and intelligent people
within American Indian commu
nities. They bring a diverse
knowledge of who they are.
They can make great students
of science, if opportunities were
provided."
Such thinking resonates at
South Dakota Tech.
"Historically, the work ethic
of South Dakota Tech students
was enough for them to get a
start on a great career," Boysen
says.
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