The church at San Gabriel Mission burned. They haven't said anything about the origins of the fire (that I've seen), but I read this article from NY Times that had me boiling. nytimes.com/2020/07/11/us/…
The entire tone of the piece is lamenting the loss of the church, and the cultural importance of the "landmark" to the town, and the only mentions of the atrocities brought by Junipero Serra and the Mission system are these lines:
"...in 2015 that the Catholic Church planned to canonize Father Serra. The announcement was met with derision by Indian historians, who blame Father Serra for the suppression of Native American culture and the premature deaths at his missions of 1000s of their ancestors."
HOLY ISH. 1)First of all, it wasn't *just* "Indian historians" (also wtf kind of dismissal is that, "Indigenous scholars" works just as well thanks), it was MASSIVE coalitions of CA Native people and their allies. See this collection from the Amah Mutsun: amahmutsun.org/news/oppositio…
2) "who blame Father Serra for the suppression of Native American culture [pluralize that, there's 1000s of Native cultureS] and the premature deaths at his missions of 1000s of their ancestors." Wow. Holy colonizer language, batman.
They/we don't *blame* him--talk about careful twists and turns of language there--he WAS responsible. "Suppression of Native culture"=cultural genocide. "Premature deaths"=murder, enslavement, malnutrition, disease...genocide. hoodline.com/2016/03/the-le…
I went to elementary school in California, where there was a required "mission" unit. We learned about jolly friar Junipero Serra, spreading his message of God along El Camino Real. We had "mission day" where we built model missions ...I don't remember one mention of Natives.
There has been activism since the 1960's from Mexican American and Native groups to change the "mission project" and CA Native curriculum, and the pedagogical value of building missions without contexts has always been in question. online.ucpress.edu/scq/article/92…
There has been immense work over decades to get this curriculum changed. The "California Indian Curriculum" at Sacramento State has a lot of this history and alternative curricula: csus.edu/college/educat…
In 2017, the state's guidelines changed to encourage moving away from the mission replicas, which was a big win, but the change in practice has been slow. www2.calstate.edu/csu-system/new…
My colleague @HarperKeenan has some amazing academic pieces about the CA curriculum that I teach in my classes: "Selective Memory: California Mission History and the Problem of Historical Violence in Elementary School Textbooks" tcrecord.org/Content.asp?Co…
and "Visiting Chutchui: The making of a colonial counterstory on an elementary school field trip": tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.108… (Let me know if you'd like the PDFs and can't access--I'm sure @HarperKeenan or I could send them over)
There are also many representational campaigns to challenge Serra's legacy: For example. At Stanford, Native students campaigned to remove Serra's name from buildings/roads on campus. They ultimately won, which brought this Stanny Native alum such pride. news.stanford.edu/2019/12/12/loo…
And in the current moment, Serra statues are being pulled down by protestors: religionnews.com/2020/07/07/we-…
This is an ongoing battle to properly address and heal from the legacies of the Mission system for CA Natives, and I'll link to folks to follow (since I'm not a CA Native, just a Native-who-grew-up-in-CA).
On 7/15 there is an important conference/symposium, "Toppling Mission Monuments and Mythologies: A Conference": facebook.com/events/2691648…
It's hosted by the "Critical Mission Studies" program at UCSD, which "supports Indigenous perspectives on the California colonial missions and their aftermath." criticalmissionstudies.ucsd.edu
A tiny few CA Native folks (please include more in the replies!): @badndns, @Nativeprof, @weshoyot, @cutchabaldy, @KennyRayRamos, @takimilxwe, @makamham, @emiliotongva, @desireerm, @MiwokDancer62, @dahltondahlton, @Brujascholar1...& so many that aren't on twitter/I'm blanking rn.
"Bad Indians" written by (appropriately named) @badndns was a really important book in my learning and growth about CA Native history: bookshop.org/books/bad-indi…, and there's a section on the mission curriculum, adapted for the @ZinnEdProject here: zinnedproject.org/if-we-knew-our…
In addition to all of this, the Kumeyaay nations whose peoples span the US-Mexico border are fighting to stop the desecration of burial and sacred sites by 45's border wall. More info here, and if anyone has direct links to support please let me know! nativenewsonline.net/currents/kumey…
One more disclaimer that this thread started as a "I'm mad at the NY times" and became me trying to capture the whole history of colonization in CA in a single thread so this is so woefully incomplete and not meant to be comprehensive. If this is news to you, learn more!
(And if I linked to anything bad or included folks I shouldn't or got something wrong, please let me know so I can correct/add.)
IN CONCLUSION, that article was 🗑️ and reporters should talk to Native folks.
Also:
Yesterday I was tweeting about the burning of the San Gabriel mission and @weshoyot offered her beautiful thoughts as a Tongva person, but the threading got messed up--so I'm going to RT all of her comments here so they can live as part of the thread. So grateful for these words.
