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About Spilyay tymoo. (Warm Springs, Or.) 1976-current | View Entire Issue (March 15, 2007)
News from Indian Country . ■ ■ ■ ■ ■■■■H i ‘Macbeth’ production explores cultural ties with Alaska Natives JU N E A U , Alaska (A P)— Battles are waged to the beat o f drums, witches as land otters slink acro ss the stage and Banquo’s ghost dons a raven mask in a Tlingit language ad aptation o f Shakespeare’s bru tal and bloody tale o f a mur derous Scottish lord. Sprung from the rain forests o f southeast Alaska, this Wash ington, D.C., bound production o f “M a cb e th ” m arries the Elizabethan tragedy with an an cient indigenous culture— an elaborate conceit that its players say brings new life to both worlds. The idea took root more than 25 years ago w hen director A nita M aynard-Losh, a San Francisco transplant, came to live in the remote community o f H oonah, Alaska, a largely T lin g it village bounded by Tongass National Forest and the icy waters o f the Inside Passage. She knew “M acbeth” well, she had taught Shakespeare, and as she began to learn about the Tlingit culture she was struck by certain similarities. “When I was in Hoonah, I started seeing these connections, the society built on clan systems, the connection with the super natural, which is very strong and the fierce w arfare th at the Tlingits were famous for, the Scots also were quite renowned for,” Maynard-Losh said. Northwest native lore also abounds with moral tales o f the treacherous host, she said, as w hen M acb eth m urders Duncan in his casde. B u t the basic elem ent o f what it means to be a tribal so- ciety, putting the well-being and Chilocco Indian School celebrates historic recognition ARKANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP)— About 300 alumni o f a tribal school that taught gen erations o f American Indians along the Kansas-Oklahoma boarder gathered recently to celebrate its recent addition to the National Register o f Historic Places. The former Chilocco In dian School opened its doors again to form er students, employees, tribal leaders and O klahom a state o fficials. American Indians were edu cated at the school just across the Oklahoma border south o f Arkansas City from 1884 until it closed in 1980. Dignitaries on hand in cluded leaders o f all five o f the Council o f Confederated Chilocco Tribes, two Okla homa legislators and Deputy Director Melvena Heisch, o f the Oklahoma State Histori cal Preservation Office. A group o f Native Ameri can singers and drummers performed several traditional songs during the ceremony. Josephine Wapp, a former arts and crafts teacher at the boarding school who is now 95-year-old, traveled from Lawton, Okla., to attend the ceremony. She said she was happy Na tive American groups plan to renovate the campus where she taught for nearly 30 years, but was sad to see that buildings on the 10,000-acre site are in such disrepair. “It’s going to need a lot o f work to fix it all up,” Wapp said. An alliance has been formed between the Confed erated Chilocco tribes and the Chilocco Alumni Associa tion to renovate Chilocco, said Ron Rice, president o f the Pawnee Nation. C hairm an M ichael H arw ell, o f the O to e - Missouria Tribe, said the ef fort to renovate Chilocco will be a national one. “The national historical designation does something for us. It’s a tool to make this place into som ething like what we remember it used to be,” Harwell said. “But it also is a chance to make it into a place that is a national draw for the American Indian. We want people to come from all over n o t ju st the U nited States but the world.” survival o f the group over in dividual liberties, is what really struck her. “T hat seemed like a huge piece o f this play: What happens when somebody starts not car ing about the good o f the group and just caring about their own success,” she said. In January 2004 and again on a statewide tour later that year, M aynard-Losh first put her ideas on stage directing Tlingit “M a cb e th ” in E n g lish fo r Juneau’s Perseverance Theatre. Though now Director o f Com m unity E n gag em en t at Washington’s Arena Stage, she agreed to return to Juneau this winter to restage the Persever ance production for p erfo r mances March 8-18 at the Na tional Museum o f the Ameri can Indian. Pd^e 10 Spilygy Tymoo Match 15, 2006 ■ I ■ MMH MM 1 Ml Gambling compacts head for vote SANTA F E (AP) - A com mittee o f lawmakers has en dorsed proposed changes to state-tribal gambling agree ments that critics complain would lock the state in for three decades. The changes, negotiated betw een Gov. B ill R ich ard so n and m o st o f New Mexico's tribes with ca sinos, were endorsed 11-4 by the Committee on Compacts last week. The package now goes to the House and Senate floors, where lawmakers can vote for or against it but cannot alter it. Richardson has urged law makers to approve the com pact changes before the ses sion ends March 17. The new compact would be effective until 2037. It would increase the revenue shar ing payments from tribes to the state, and limit the number o f casinos per tribe and the num ber o f o ff-reservation race tracks. The proposal has the back ing o f ten o f the 13 tribes that are operating casinos. I f the other three don't sign the new compact, they would continue to o p erate under the 2001 agreement, which expires in 2015. Opponents o f the changes worry that once the new agree ments are signed, there is no g u aran tee th a t any o f th e terms could be changed until 2037. Under the law, either the tribes or the governor or the Legislature can seek to have n eg o tiatio n s reop en ed , but nothing mandates that. Lawyer Paul Bardacke, one o f the governor's nego tiators, assured the commit tee o f H ouse and Senate members that if lawmakers want changes to the compacts in the future, “I believe the tribes, and certainly the ex ecutive, are going to listen.” But Rep. Larry Larranaga, R-Albuquerque, who voted against the proposed changes, said it was conceivable law m akers' future co n cern s could be ignored. “How many issues are go ing to be coming up between now and the year 2037? ... It's too long a period,” he said. Tribes want a long term because they say they could get more favorable financing terms for resorts or other big infrastructure projects. Tribe attaches massive steel bridge at edge of canyon P H O E N IX (AP)— An In dian tribe will fasten a massive glass-bottomed walkway to the edge o f the Grand Canyon on Wednesday as part o f an ambi tious $30 million tourism cen ter that has angered environ mentalists and some tribal mem bers. The Hualapai (pronounced WALL-uh-pie), an impoverished tribe o f about 2,200 people at the canyon’s remote western edge, allowed a private developer to construct the “Skywalk” in hopes o f luring tourists to the region. The tribe will open it to the public later this month, charg ing $25 per person in addition to other entry fees. Organizers expect the Skywalk to become the main draw in a community o f tribal attractions that includes a cowboy town, an Indian vil lage, helicopter tours and Hum mer rides through the outback. “T h e G rand Canyon has name appeal, and since part o f the reservation lies in that, it only seems natural that we use the attraction to die benefit o f the trib e ,” Flualapai C hairm an Charlie Vaughn said. At 1.07 million pounds, the Skywalk is about as heavy as four Boeing 757 jets stacked on top o f each o th er. I t ’ll be perched over the canyon and fastened to the rock using an elaborate system o f pulleys con nected to four tractor trailers. U n d ern eath , hydraulic “shoes” will lift the Skywalk above a cement track and roll it across a bed o f metal rods. As the tmcks push it out, the walkway will not be anchored to the canyon wall. To keep it from tipping over the side, engineers have loaded the back end with a half-million pounds o f steel cubes as counterweight. “It would take something horrific” to tip the bridge, said Mark Johnson, a Las Vegas ar chitect who worked on the Sky- walk. “It’s not going anywhere.” When the move is complete, the Skywalk will extend about 75 feet over the rim, almost a mile over the canyon floor. It’s designed to withstand 100 mph winds and is loaded shock ab sorbers to keep the walkway from wobbling as people walk through. Construction began in April 2005. David Jin, a Las Vegas devel oper, came up with the idea for the Skywalk a decade ago. He approached the Hualapai in 1996 with a plan to build it us ing his own money. The tribe agreed on the condi tion that it will own the walkway. Jin will get a cut o f the profits. As it was being built this year, some Hualapai elders said they began to question the wisdom of the project. The tribe considers the canyon sacred ground, and the construction cut into land scat tered with Hualapai burial sites. “You have to be real gentle with the land,” said Flualapai spiritual leader Frank Mapatis. “It’s a living being, and it can feel those things.” Environmentalists also have criticized the project for dimin ishing the canyon’s majesty. Descendants of freed slaves to challenge special election T U LSA , Okla. (AP)— D e scendants o f people the Chero kee once owned as slaves said they will challenge a special election that kicked them out o f the tribe. They also promised to lobby the U.S. government to cut fed eral ties to tribe, a move that could cost the Cherokee Nation millions o f dollars. “We’re not going to go away,” said Marilyn Vann, president o f the Descendants o f Freedmen o f the Five Civilized Tribes. ‘W e are calling on the Am erican people to bombard Congress, the Bureau o f Indian Affairs, all media outlets, that justice be done.” But one Cherokee Nation of ficial called those threats a scare tactic brought by people more interested in seeing the Cherokee Nation lose funding than seeing the will o f the people done. For decades, descendants o f freed Cherokee slaves fought to reclaim their citizenship, even though they were adopted into the tribe in 1866 under a treaty with the U.S. government. Next deadline to submit items for publication in the Spilyay is Friday, March 23. Thank you. 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