Indigenous Peoples in Late-Twentieth Century Science Fiction Television: Is There a Place for ‘’Indians” in Our Visions of the Future?

The last of the research projects I worked on this semester!  :)

     I undertook this project because science fiction television in general and the shows analyzed specifically were formative influences in my life.  Watching the original Star Trek movie franchise or Star Trek: The Next Generation on television was a family activity and facilitated bonding between my father, my younger brother and I.  As I grew older, the X-Files encouraged me to think critically about the world around me and reinforced my suspicion of authority and those in power.  In particular I recall being fascinated by the episodes which dealt with Native American characters and themes; a fascination I have discovered since is echoed by many white fans, often in a way that echoes the worst of colonialist narratives.  In this way, investigating these portrayals in the television shows of my youth is a kind of personal exorcism; a bringing to light what I would rather keep in shadow (Jung 145).  But while my stakes in this project may be personal, the implications reach beyond me to the very function of science fiction in the social imaginary; as a space where we collectively consider and entertain ideas of what a better world might look like.  Misappropriated, this space instead aids the genocide of Indigenous people, a process which I must argue has been furthered by the texts examined herein.

     Science fiction stories are tales of the possible.  Fantasy operates in a similar space, but fantasy often presupposes the intervention of the fantastic or supernatural to facilitate its reimagining; whereas science fiction (especially in the case of Star Trek) more often looks to the future.  Science fiction stories also always operate within a uniquely constructed universe with well defined rules; necessitating conscious choices about the state of that universe (Johnson-Smith 19-20).  Whereas we (as audience) know that many of the elements of fantasy which make it so appealing do not really exist,[1] we know that the future will happen someday and that how the future will look is undetermined, leaving much room for creativity and possibility, and, perhaps, social justice.  This potential within science fiction for imaging the world as one would remake it subsequently makes the sexism, racism, heteronormativity and cisnormativity[2] (just to name a few common tropes) all the more glaring. 

     However, these tropes are glaring only if one is able to see them at all, which is not always the case.  Too often the bigotry disseminated through science fiction is invisible to the “mainstream”[3] audience because that bigotry echoes the webs of power the audience already considers normal.  That so often science fiction writers cannot think beyond these tropes (while simultaneously selling a product to their audience that is purportedly a utopian reimagining) and that these writers so often manage to succeed in maintaining this contradiction in the minds of the audience (and in the cases of the studied texts become wildly successful by doing so) is a testament to the power of hegemony, a power I hope this investigation will undermine.

Rant rant rant

I haven't posted a pure rant here in... ages.  Some little off the cuff thing.  Those have increasingly gone on Tumblr.  This started there but I thought, why not, see what the wider world thinks too...

You know, people talk about how always “having discussions with people who agree with you” is some kind of bad thing. And they don’t usually even apply it to like, “people who agree with you on EVERYTHING” (ARE there any of those??) but just seem to mean “people with similar political/social philosophies”.

Increasingly, I’m like, fuck that.

It’s so fucking FRUSTRATING having conversations with people who aren’t at least on a similar wavelength. It’s the SAME FUCKING CONVERSATION OVER AND OVER!
Explaining the same basic shit over and over and arguing about it!

Explaining that racism is a systemic thing.  Explaining that gender isn't just what your doctor assigned to you.  Explaining that violence is something beyond just violent crime statistics.  On and on....

It’s me, well in this case me, fucking giving that person an education they don’t fucking appreciate and me never getting anything out of it but honing my rhetoric.*

Deepest, best, most challenging conversations I’ve EVER HAD were with people with SIMILAR foundations/starting points discussing the nuances and challenges and YES DISAGREEMENTS we had about topics.

FACT.

And you know, I could use more of THAT and less of this frustrating bullshit.


*With the exception of people with whom I am mutually invested through friendship.  Because that also invests us in trying to understand where the other is coming from, something the conversations I'm talking about generally totally lack.  And that investment is, I think, similar to what you have between people who are working towards/from a similar place as you.

"Word to the Wise" - White Antiracism's White Supremacy

"When grassroots Black activists speak honestly about racism at colleges across this country, we are not met with open arms by administrators and faculty. And most certainly our calendars are not full for the rest of the year let alone for the next three to five. When we speak, we are often met by the deaf ear of white denial. When Tim Wise speaks, he gets applause, standing ovations, awards and proclamations. The fact that schools can’t “hear” us when I and other people of color speak but will search out and roll out the red carpet for Wise is a statement to a kind of racism that doesn’t get discussed much – if at all – in our work. Despite all of the white anti-racist presentations given over the years at colleges and universities across the country, institutional racism at these schools remains intact. All the while, activists of color continue to be muffled and marginalized. Even in the ghetto of race discourse we remain tenants and never owners of an analysis that is ours to begin with"

Read it all: Word to the Wise: Unpacking the White Privilege of Tim Wise

The only thing I would add to the discussion is that there is very little in the way of gender analysis in this piece.  I know from experience that anti-racist white men, like Tim Wise, receive quite a different reception to anti-racist white women, particularly in the example given of being able to show emotion.  

I don't say this to dispute anything in the essay, just to point out that it is definitely centering White men/Black men.

Ghost Stories in the Borderlands: Explorations of Fantasmas with Gloria Anzaldúa as a Guide

Another of the big research projects I worked on this semester.  I was really inspired by the way Gloria Anzaldúa writes and very much wanted this project to reflect that mixture of academic theory and personal and creative that she did so very well.  Overall, I am pretty pleased with the results, some of which will be familiar.

The form says

Choose one:

White (Non-Hispanic)

Hispanic

Choose one.

The mind whirls with what I will choose this time.

I cannot tell you when, where or how old I was the first time I stared at whatever form it was asking me this question and decided

“fuck it”

and checked both applicable boxes.

But I remember that moment.

It is a moment that has been repeated many times over,

but I swear I remember the very first one. 

I remember it in my bones.  

I remember how I felt; I remember my conviction, and my defiance.

And I remember when my conviction wavered. 

“Choose one. Multiple answers will not be counted.” 

I remember choosing White. 

I remember, less often, choosing “Hispanic.” 

Once or twice Other or “Mixed.”

I have filled out this form so many times in my life and every time is a re-run of the first;

anxiety, annoyance, anger, amusement.

Amusement that these form writers cannot conceive of me.

Anger that they demand I choose between what their small minds can fathom.

Anxiety that I will simply be left uncounted.

Annoyance that I have to think through so much just to check a box truthfully.

I remember the first time I saw a form that didn’t ask me to choose one.

Eyes widening.  Small smile. FINALLY.

Such a little thing. 

But I am always acutely aware of the people around me who fly through this thing that stops me dead in my tracks.

Such a little thing, to cause such turmoil.

Such a small thing to think about all these years.

Such a little thing, but these are borderlands too.

Those forms confront my difference.

Those forms demand an answer.

Those forms divide me, cut me up into parts.

How much for the one quarter of Mexican blood and bones?

How much for the Spanish?

How much for la india?

How much for the-who-knows-how-much Irish?

How much for the over fifty percent German?

How much for the Norwegian?

The Scottish?

The English?

Hell, there are Smiths everywhere, who knows for sure just where I came from?

Always an image in my mind’s eye of my naked body with that black pen plastic surgeons use to show people where and how they will be cutting them; black ink dividing me into my respective pieces or at least the ones I know.

Black lines

reappearing anytime I overhear the Spanish I don’t speak,

or the insults it is imagined won’t offend a white person.

Colonizer and colonized.

Both. Together.

I feel them glaring warily at each other over the borders of blood and bones inside me.[1]

The borderlands are a blurred together place; a place where worlds interact and overlap.    While on a map borders are solid black lines, this representation does not reflect the reality of the borderlands.  This is because borders are constructed.  The borders I find myself grappling with in trying to fill out a form honestly are a reflection of this construction.  The nature of the “immigration debate” within the United States is another reflection; wherein people who have lived in the same place for generations are deemed “immigrant” and “illegal” when literal borders are redrawn and cultural borders exclude “them” from being an “us.” 

     Yet, construction does not make the borderlands less real for the people who live there.  Borders create material effects on those who live within and upon them.  Borders delineate the boundaries of identity; they only make sense if they divide what something “is” from what that same something “is not.”  Thus, the United States is the United States in part because it is not Mexico.  Mexicans within and a part of the United States blur that boundary; challenge that (White) United States identity.  And yet, despite the lines on a map, Mexicans are within the borders of the United States, and White Americans (corporations) are within the borders of Mexico. 

     Although boundaries are constructed to keep these two groups separate, they are not separate.  That is the nature of the borderlands.  That is why (in part) Gloria Anzaldúa uses the United States and Mexico border as symbol for the myriad borderlands we as human beings must negotiate every day; because it is “a place where the Third World grates against the first and bleeds. And before a scab forms it hemorrhages again, the lifeblood of two worlds merging to form a third country” (Borderlands/La Frontera 25).  The borderlands will make hybrids of us, she says, and suggests that instead of fighting that process that we embrace it and allow it to heal us our divisions by coming to a mestiza consciousness (Anzaldúa, Borderlands 101-102).  Like the Spanglish Anzaldúa speaks: pieces of Spanish, pieces of English, pieces of Nahuatl, brought together into a new something; “greater than the sum of its parts” (Anzaldúa, Borderlands 101).

     This coming together is also one of the functions of the magical realism present in Johnson’s Fantasmas, and it is no mere coincidence that these “type” of tales are also commonly referred to as “border stories” (Sellman).  As a technique of story-telling, magical realism lives in the borderlands; a place in which “[writers] make connections between the material and spiritual world” (Johnson xi) in rejection of the “white rationality” that is touted by mainstream society as desired and true (Anzaldúa, Borderlands 58).  In particular, the collection of stories in Fantasmas occupies a borderlands space “between worlds,” as well as within the literal border towns of American Chicano/as.  In this essay, I argue that selected stories from Fantasmas use their “borderland” location to articulate new ways of understanding and being within the world.

Poetry just keeps coming out when I sit down to write this paper

So here's some more (also because Cecelia said I should. <3).
Tentatively titled "Samhain de los Muertos".

Dia de los Muertos

Also Samhain to me

Days that the Veil between the worlds grows thin

As so many cultures knew

As the Ancestors demand we remember

If we can hear them

If we listen

The smell of sage floats through the air

Candles flickering

Illuminating so much more than their small flames should

Like stars in the sky

Fotos, food, and flowers

Holiday(s) you never taught me to celebrate

A day I honor you anyway

And the ever increasing others on your side of the veil

Review: "Indian" Stereotypes in TV Science Fiction: First Nations' Voices Speak Out

"Indian" Stereotypes in TV Science Fiction: First Nations' Voices Speak Out by Sierra S. Adare

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


A very intriguing study for any who are interested in the depictions of native peoples in science fiction television. This is not a highly "theoretical" book, but a study of every day First Nations people's responses to depictions supposedly of themselves in 7 specific episodes of science fiction television (including one original Star Trek episode, one Star Trek: The Next Generation episode, two Star Trek: Voyager episodes, one episode of My Favorite Martian, one of Quantum Leap and one of The Adventures of Superman). The only thing that would have made this book better in my view is if they had included one or two of the X-Files episodes that revolved around native characters/themes etc.



View all my reviews

Freewrite on idea of borderlands ala Anzaldua

Choose one:
White (Non-Hispanic)
Hispanic

These are my borderlands.

Choose one.

And the mind whirls with what I will choose this time.

I cannot tell you when, where or how old I was the first time I stared at whatever form it was asking me this question and decided “fuck it” and checked both applicable boxes.

But I remember that moment. That is a moment that has been repeated many times over, but I swear I remember the very first one somehow.

I remember it in my bones, I remember how I felt, I remember my conviction, and my defiance.

And I remember when my conviction wavered. “Choose one. Multiple answers will not be counted.”

I remember choosing White. I remember, less often, choosing “Hispanic.” Once or twice Other or “Mixed.”

I have filled out this form so many times in my life and every time is a re-run of the first; anxiety, annoyance, anger, amusement. 

Amusement that these form writers cannot conceive of me. Anger that they demand I choose between what their small minds can fathom. Anxiety that I will simply be left uncounted. Annoyance that I have to think through so much just to check a box truthfully.

I remember the first time I saw a form that didn’t ask me to choose one. Eyes widening. Small smile. Surprise. FINALLY.

Such a little thing. Always so aware of the people around me who flew through this portion that stops me dead in my tracks. Such a little thing, to cause such turmoil. Such a small thing to think about all these years.

Such a little thing, but these are my borderlands. Those forms confront my difference. Those forms demand an answer. Those forms divide me, cut me up into parts.

How much for the one quarter of Mexican blood and bones? How much for the Spanish? How much for la india?

How much for the-who-knows-how-much Irish?

How much for the over fifty percent German?

How much for the English? The Scottish? The Norwegian?

Hell, there are Smiths everywhere, who knows for sure just where I came from?

Always an image in my mind’s eye of my body with that black pen plastic surgeons use to show people where and how they will be cutting them; black ink dividing me into my respective pieces or at least the ones I know. Reappearing with little warning anytime I overhear the Spanish I don’t speak; or when I overhear insults it is imagined won’t offend another white person.

Colonizer and colonized. I feel those divisions glaring warily at each other within my very body.

Wizard Rock: "Renting" a Room In J. K. Rowling's Hogwarts

This semester I wrote three big research papers.  This is one of them.  You got a bit of a preview last month but here is the final product.  It's a large post so I am putting in a cut!

Wizard Rock (or “wrock”) is a largely unknown genre dedicated to the creation of music based upon J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter book series.  In this essay I argue that wrock is a unique metaculture which operates as a form of “participatory/productive consumption” (Oakes).  However, while Harry Potter has been of great interest for some years now, very little has been written about Wizard Rock in popular culture, and nothing in the academic realm.  Thus, I am faced with the reality that my readers will most likely have no previous knowledge of my topic, making discussion difficult without some little amount of background and elucidation of form and content.  In addition, as noted by Rebekah Farrugia, there is a troubling pattern in music cultures of overlooking the active participation of women, which repeats itself within wrock (336).  I wish to intervene in that process here.  It is for these reasons that I will begin this essay with a brief definition of wrock and history of the formation of the Wizard Rock community.

In general, a wrock song will be written about events or characters from the Harry Potter universe, most often from the perspective of a character the book-reading audience is already familiar with.  It is the nature of the content that defines a song as Wizard Rock, rather than a specific “sound” to the music in question.  This construction of the genre is what leads me to name this a form of “productive/participatory consumption,” a term originally coined by Jason Oakes to describe tribute events.  Also called “participatory literacy” by Ernie Bond and Nancy Michelson in reference to fan fiction (119), the essence of these concepts is the idea that “consumers” of culture also sometimes carve out their own spaces within it, or “co-author” it.  This process will be illustrated more fully later in this essay. This organization of the genre means one can find any “sound” in wrock; from pop, trance and “wreggae,” to folk, metal and hip hop.

Tracing the history of wrock chronologically[1] the genre was born with “Ode to Harry” by the Switchblade Kittens (Drama) which was released in 2000.  Switchblade Kittens would perform this song in an alternate onstage wrock incarnation called “The Weird Sisters.”  They made this and other early forays into what would become Wizard Rock available to their diehard fans through the internet (Drama).[2]  Unfortunately, Switchblade Kittens were never able to release an album of their wrock songs because the major record label which housed them could not be convinced of its market potential and they were unable contractually to release anything independently (Drama). 

Two years after the release of “Ode to Harry,” in 2002, Harry and the Potters began to tour with a self-titled, independently produced debut album; and we officially have our first wrock band.  Other newly emerging wrock bands were predominantly friends of the members of Harry and the Potters,[3] but a general snowball effect quickly emerged (Wizrocklopedia).  In all “over 20 [bands] were created before the end of the year” (Wizrocklopedia), mostly in a similar “indie” or “garage” rock style (in contrast with the “L.A. pop sensibility” of the Switchblade Kittens (Drama)).  Currently, there are over five hundred Wizard rock bands, representing almost every mainstream genre “sound,” and large annual Wizard Rock themed events such as “Wrockstock.”[4]

Stuff I'm reading: "For America to Live, Europe Must Die"

I detest writing.:

"Revolutionary Marxism is committed to even further perpetuation and perfection of the very industrial process which is destroying us all. It offers only to 'redistribute' the results - the money, maybe - of this industrialization to a wider section of the population. It offers to take wealth from the capitalists and pass it around; but in order to do so, Marxism must maintain the industrial system. Once again, the power relations with European society will have to be altered, but once again the effects upon American Indian peoples here and non-Europeans elsewhere will remain the same."

A small piece of a speech from the '80's by Russel Means, an American Indian activist.  Go check it out, stuff to think about.