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User:Pingnova/sandbox/What Does Justice Look Like?

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AuthorWaziyatawin
Cover artistCover design by David Spohn
Subject
Published2008
PublisherLiving Justice Press
Publication placeUnited States
Pages192
ISBN9780972188654
OCLC228701329
323.11970776
LC ClassE78.M7 W553 2008
Websitelivingjusticepress.org/product/what-does-justice-look-like/

What Does Justice Look Like? The Struggle for Liberation in Dakota Homeland is a book by Wahpetunwan Dakota scholar and activist Waziyatawin about the history of the Dakota people and avenues for decolonization in their historical homelands.

Overview

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Waziyatawin recounts early relations between Dakota and non-Dakota which inform an argument for Dakota experiencing genocide at the hands of European and Euro-American white settlers. The bulk of the thesis concerns decolonization actions that must be undertaken in reparation, such as tearing down Fort Snelling, education reform which is inclusive of Dakota experiences, and returning public land to the Dakota people.

The print paperback book is 194 pages split into eleven sections, five of which are the primary content and the majority of pages. The book opens with a note from author Waziyatawin explaining her reasons for writing it, leading into an introduction that summarizes the main points of her thesis. Pages 17 through 176 are her argument split into five chapters, formatted with footnotes and citations. The book concludes with a topic index, author profile, publisher profile, and a book listing from the publisher, including Waziyatawin's earlier book on Dakota justice In the Footsteps of Our Ancestors (2006).

Summary

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Waziyatawin recounts a Bdewakantunwan Dakota creation story as told by storyteller Dale Childs of the Prairie Island Reservation to illustrate the Dakota connection to Mnisota Makoce–the land that makes up the US state of Minnesota. It details the water of Hahawakpa (Mississippi River) and the four winds working together to carve clay out of Ina Maka (Mother Earth), which she offers her husband Wakantanka (The Great Mystery) to craft into humanity. The sacred location where this occurred is today known as Bdote or Maka Cokaya Kin (Center of the Earth). This creation story is core to Dakota spirituality and culture; Waziyatawin shares it to demonstrate "there is absolutely no ambiguity about Mnisota as Dakota homeland."[1]

Based on the Dakota creation story and the work of anthropologists such as Elden Johnson, which affirm a prehistoric Dakota presence in Minnesota, Waziyatawin disputes the popular narrative of Dakota origins which claims they migrated from the Eastern seaboard or Asia via the Bering Strait. Scholars such as Guy Gibbon, Royal B. Hassrick, Albert E. Jenks, and Llyod A. Wilford have popularized such claims. Waziyatawin argues that Dakota people have the inherent right to decide who is Dakota, and that US courts and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples further affirm this. Scholars "wrest[ing] interpretive control away from Dakota people" about their own history and identity by redefining and renaming Dakota landscapes and ancestors is colonialist and furthers the US "imperial enterprise."[2]

Prior to mass wasicu (white) arrival in Mnisota, Dakota populations had already dropped by an estimated 35%, which Waziyatawin attributes to Anishinaabe conquest. Anishinaabe were driven westward by early white settlement, which depleted the land base required to sustain their population. Having embraced the fur trade and guns earlier than Dakota, they had the upper hand in economics and battle. By the Battle of Kathio sometime between 1745 and 1750, Dakota were mostly driven out of the northern portion of the territory. Losing a resource rich land base deprived Dakota of their subsistence, primarily wild rice and maple syrup, which are more abundant to the north. Dakota population fell as a result. Anishinaabe occupation of Dakota land was legalized when the US government began treatymaking with the Anishinaabe, legally attributing the land they lived on to the Anishinaabe and not the Dakota. Waziyatawin notes that the issue of land claims between Dakota and Anishinaabe people became moot as white people made more treaties, claiming more land from both peoples, until Dakota were exiled from the territory after the US–Dakota War of 1862.[3]

Waziyatawin calls the arrival of mass amounts of white settlers an invasion, led by traders and firmly established by military forts, which protected soldiers, Christian missionaries and white settlers whose goals were not benign.[4]

Whites who came to Minnesota had no intention of living side by side with either Dakota or Anishinaabe Peoples; rather they arrived believing that the "Indian problem" would be dispelled in short order.[5]

The US government prioritized treaties with Native peoples to more efficiently seize their lands. For Dakota this culminated in the 1851 treaties: the Treaty of Traverse des Sioux and the Treaty of Mendota, after which only a twenty mile long strip of land belonged to Dakota. Waziyatawin details the deceit involved in these treaties, including the US government negotiators threatening starvation and war, as well as lying about what signed documents said. Funds from the land sale were never given to the Dakota, rather money was directed to traders and negotiators.[6]

Enumerating genocide

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To open her core argument, Waziyatawin recounts the United Nations Convention on Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Addressing each item of the convention, she argues that white Minnesotans perpetrated genocide against the Dakota people. Primarily the events she cites occurred after the Dakota War concluded, although she includes pre-war events in her argument as well.

Following the war, Minnesota Governor Alexander Ramsey declared that Dakota should be "exterminated or driven forever beyond the borders of the State", an unambiguous and concise decree of intent to kill Dakota. After a contested military tribunal of Dakota men, 300 were sentenced to death, and later all but thirty-eight pardoned by President Abraham Lincoln. The execution is still the largest execution in US history. Neglect of Dakota prisoners, including vulnerable people such as the young and elderly, killed many more Dakota in a concentration camp at Fort Snelling, various other prison camps, and forced marches.[7]

Waziyatawin disputes white accounts such as from Corinne Monjeau-Marz that the concentration camps and forced marches benefited the Dakota: "Fort Snelling did not protect Dakota people. Rather, it served to concentrate and subjugate our population as Minnesotans prepared to remove us from our homeland."[7]

Multiple Dakota experiences meet the second criterion for genocide, that of serious bodily or mental harm, however Waziyatawin focuses on the US government's use of Indian boarding schools. Native children were conscripted to far away boarding schools, where they were subjected to ethnocide or cultural genocide. Indeed the policy was "kill the Indian, save the man". Students were forbidden from their culture and made to dress and act as a white Christian. Waziyatawin attests this created multigenerational "confusion, self-hatred, identity conflicts, and trauma".[8]

Government officials and others charged with the concentration and forced removal of Dakota were well aware from previous efforts across the continent that it would cause many Dakota deaths. Waziyatawin concludes that the deaths were "foreseen and disregarded", even "an added bonus." Combined with rampant illness, ability to reproduce decreased. Men and women were incarcerated in separate camps, further reducing the birthrate. Most were gender segregated for four years. She likens the historical segregation to modern forced sterilization of Dakota people, a sign that genocide continues.[9]

Removal of Dakota children to boarding schools or white foster or adoption families fulfills the final criterion of the genocide convention. Waziyatawin says that while the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 stemmed the effect of removals on Native people, it never fully ended the practice.[10]

The practical effects of this genocide on Dakota today result in a Dakota diaspora, with very few Dakota remaining in their historical homelands. Diaspora communities include those in Canada and five US states. Waziyatawin describes this as an exile, and that "every generation of Dakota has experienced this injustice since 1862." Dakota continue to face disproportionate rates of incarceration, early mortality, low academic achievement, and more. Dakota oppression continues beyond 1862.[11]

Reparations

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The second half of Waziyatawin's thesis details actions she imagines will begin to recognize and repair the injustices done to the Dakota people by Minnesotans. Citing the "transformative power of education", Waziyatawin contends that education reform in Minnesota which includes Dakota history from Dakota points-of-view, which recognizes the genocide, will reach white Minnesotans of conscience who will then work for justice. Minnesotans are not given the tools to constructively react to learning about Dakota genocide; changing that will lead to justice. Waziyatawin outlines specific issues with Minnesota education, including the messaging of the Minnesota Sesquicentennial in 2008, which did not include Dakota perspectives on the genocide. She calls the collective effort to broaden Minnesota history "truth telling".[12]

...many well-intentioned people, who ordinarily would be horrified at the notion of being complicit in the cover-up of genocide and the ongoing denial of justice for Indigenous Peoples, have done just that.[13]

Another proposal is "taking down the fort"–tearing down Fort Snelling, which was the site of Dakota concentration camps and executions, as well as the sacred location Bdote. The fort advertised itself as a "fun-filled tourist destination" and made little mention of Dakota suffering in its programs or materials. Birthday parties, Laura Ingalls reenactments, and similar programs were inappropriate for the site of a concentration camp. Waziyatawin relates Fort Snelling to Mauthausen and Auschwitz and suggests that similar programs focusing on Dakota genocide should be made at Snelling. "Take down the fort" is also a call to remove metaphorical symbols of colonialism, including naming sites after Minnesota's founders, such as Alexander Ramsey.[14]

Background

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Waziyatawin draws from current events in 2008 to illustrate her thesis. She draws close comparisons between Dakota and Palestinans, who are occupied by Israel. She condemns Wolfchild v. United States, also called the "loyal Mdewakanton" lawsuit, in which lead plaintiff Sheldon Wolfchild attempted to claim ownership of land currently belonging to Dakota tribes on behalf of the descendants of Dakota who fought on the side of the US government during and after the US–Dakota War of 1862. Waziyatawin also criticizes the Minnesota Sesquicentennial, the 150th anniversary of the state's founding celebrated in 2008. What Does Justice Look Like?, published in 2008, is in part a response to the settler-focused narrative of the Sesquicentennial.

Reception

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Reviewer Jeff Means of the University of Wyoming praises the work as a "well-written and thoughtful book that sets the tone and level of discussion where it needs to be to achieve final justice in Indian country", although he notes the suggested actions and reparations will be viewed by Anglo-Americans as threats.[15]

Awards

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Editions

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What Does Justice Look Like? is available in ebook (November 2013, ISBN 9781937141066)[17] and audiobook (July 9, 2024, ISBN 9781937141387)[18] format.[19]

The book is also part of Minnesota State Services for the Blind braille catalogue.[20]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 17–21.
  2. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 21–23.
  3. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 23–28.
  4. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 28–29.
  5. ^ Waziyatawin Ph.D. 2008, p. 28.
  6. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 29–37.
  7. ^ a b Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 38–50.
  8. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 50–53.
  9. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 53–59.
  10. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 59–60.
  11. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 60–62.
  12. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 71–79.
  13. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 71.
  14. ^ Waziyatawin, Ph.D. 2008, p. 97–116.
  15. ^ Means, Jeff (2010). "What Does Justice Look Like? The Struggle for Liberation in Dakota Homeland. By Waziyatawin". American Indian Culture and Research Journal. 34 (1). UCLA: 183–186. doi:10.17953. ISSN 0161-6463. {{cite journal}}: Check |doi= value (help)
  16. ^ "2009 Medalists". Independent Publisher Book Awards. Independent Publisher Book Awards. Retrieved August 18, 2024.
  17. ^ "What Does Justice Look Like? by Waziyatawin". Books on Google Play. Retrieved 2024-08-16.
  18. ^ Ph.D., Waziyatawin (July 9, 2024). "What Does Justice Look Like? Audiobook on Libro.fm". Libro.fm. Retrieved August 18, 2024.
  19. ^ "What Does Justice Look Like?". Living Justice Press. April 30, 2019. Retrieved August 18, 2024.
  20. ^ "K-12 American Indian Education and Language Revitalization Working Booklist". State Services for the Blind. Minnesota State Department of Employment and Economic Development. Retrieved August 17, 2024. Waziyatawin. What Does Justice Look Like: the Struggle for Liberation in Dakota Homeland. Living Justice Press, 2008. High School.

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