新澳门六合彩内幕信息

Native American Studies Student Learns Weaving Arts in Her Arizona Homeland

Woman Learns Methods of D颈苍茅 Creative Arts

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A Native Navajo Dine girl in Native clothing
Shawna Yazzie, a 新澳门六合彩内幕信息 Davis doctoral student in Native American studies, photographed at a ceremony in Arizona where she learned Native weaving.

In a Western world that suppresses Indigenous culture, members of the Navajo Nation actively engage in artistic cultural revival as a means to keep their history alive and to create vibrant futures. During a fellowship, Shawna Yazzie, a P.h.D. student in Native American studies at the University of California, Davis, has been looking at and learning the ongoing rug weaving practices at a Body of Water in a Sunken Area, also known as 笔颈帽辞苍, Arizona, her family鈥檚 homeland.

She writes of her family, below, in D颈苍茅 and English:

Ya鈥檃t茅茅h shik鈥櫭┚ d贸贸 shi鈥橠颈苍茅鈥櫭. Totsohn铆铆 nisht艂谋台. T艂aasch铆铆鈥櫭 bashishch铆铆n. Kiny谩谩鈥檃anii ei dashiche铆铆. Tan茅茅zahn谋台谋台ei dash铆nal铆. 脕k贸t鈥櫭〆go D颈苍茅 asdz谩谩 nish艂谋台. Be始ek始id Baa Ahoodz谩n铆d茅茅 naash谩. Sh铆 ei Shawna Yazzie y铆n铆shye. 厂丑颈尘谩 茅颈 Bernita Edgewater 飞辞濒测茅 谩谩诲贸贸 蝉丑颈锄丑茅鈥櫭 i Michael B. Yazzie Sr. 飞辞濒测茅. 厂丑颈尘谩 茅颈 闯谩诲铆迟贸d铆 naagh谩 谩谩诲贸贸 蝉丑颈锄丑茅鈥櫭 ei Be始ek始id Baa Ahoodz谩n铆di naagh谩. 厂丑颈尘谩 s谩n铆 茅颈 Lena James w辞濒测茅 nt茅茅 谩谩诲贸贸 shicheii 茅颈 Howard James 飞辞濒测茅 nt茅茅. 闯谩诲铆迟贸di茅茅 naa鈥檃sh nt茅茅. Shin谩l铆 asdz谩台谩台 茅颈 Helen Mae Yazzie w辞濒测茅 谩谩诲贸贸 shin谩l铆 hastiin 茅颈 Kee Bahe Yazzie Sr. 飞辞濒测茅 nt茅茅. Be始ek始id Baa Ahoodz谩n铆d茅茅 苍补补鈥檃蝉丑.&苍产蝉辫;

Hello to my family, friends, and people. I am of the Big Water. I am born for the Red Bottom People. My maternal grandfathers are the Towering House. My paternal grandfathers are the Tangle Peoples.

I am a D颈苍茅 woman. I am from A Body of Water in a Sunken Area. My name is Shawna Rae Yazzie. My mother is Bernita Edgewater and my father is Michael B. Yazzie Sr. My mother is from Jeddito, Arizona. My father is from 笔颈帽辞苍, Arizona. My maternal grandmother was Lena James and maternal grandfather was Howard James, who were from Jeddito, Arizona. My paternal grandma is Helen Mae Yazzie and my paternal grandfather was Kee Bahe Yazzie Sr., who are from 笔颈帽辞苍, Arizona.

Yazzie is spending time in her native homeland of 笔颈帽辞苍 after being selected for a 2022 Cobell Graduate Summer Research Fellowship. She is one of five fellows from a highly competitive pool of over 100 graduate applicants who were selected for the Sixth Summer Research Fellowship cohort, each receiving $5,000.

Her research project titled, 鈥淭艂鈥櫭∶ch铆鈥櫭 Da鈥檃t艂始贸h: D颈苍茅 Weaving Stories of Survivance through the Warp of a Fingers of Red Bottom Girl,鈥 amplifies D颈苍茅 ways of illustrating history 鈥 privileging D颈苍茅 knowledges and practices 鈥 as a means to Indigenize academic theories, methods and practices. Her project shares how D颈苍茅 women in 笔颈帽辞苍, Arizona, build a long-lasting connection to rug weaving. 

Weaving as healing

She comes by this heritage, and yearning for healing, quite naturally.

鈥淎 few months ago, I sat at my grandmother鈥檚 kitchen table on an early Saturday morning. We discussed the practice of rug weaving and how she wove beautiful rugs years ago. With an ache in her heart, she expressed in D颈苍茅 Bizaad (D颈苍茅 language), 鈥業 once had an auntie who gave birth to a son. Unfortunately, my auntie died in childbirth, but her newborn baby was taken by the missionaries.鈥欌

A handwoven twill-style rug with a diamond-shaped pattern.
Rug created by Grandma Helen to teach Auntie Barbara how to do a twill-style rug. (Courtesy Lorenzo Yazzie)

鈥淲hile I cannot understand what she felt, I understood that healing needed to take place,鈥 Yazzie said. 鈥淏y referencing the violence, my grandmother declared a history of colonial disruptions and acknowledged the survivance of D颈苍茅, a reason why she does not weave anymore. I declare and call on a (re)awakening and art resurgence of rug weaving into existence to bring healing.鈥

Rug weaving as shared with me is a breathing life form, it has a life of its own in which I (as a weaver) embark on creating healing for a vibrant future.鈥 鈥 Yazzie

Through community-based, Native feminism-centered research, her work seeks to understand how D颈苍茅 women continue to reclaim and heal their identities through rug weaving, she said.

鈥淭his is the type of healing that has led me to successfully reshare and remember this practice with other community members across the Navajo Nation.鈥

D颈苍茅 women from what is currently known as 笔颈帽辞苍, Arizona, practice the creative art of Da鈥檃t艂始贸h (rug weaving). Today, the T艂鈥櫭∶ch铆鈥櫭 (Red Bottom Clan) continue to weave despite having endured many colonial disruptions.

In the 1860s, D颈苍茅 were forcibly removed from their homelands and imprisoned at Bosque Redondo in Fort Sumner, New Mexico. This period ended with the signing of the Treaty of 1868, which has subsequently left an indelible mark on the transfer of cultural knowledge.

鈥淎s a community member, I have played a role in the ongoing survivance of rug weaving practices primarily through (re)learning the teachings and lessons from family and community members,鈥 said Yazzie.

Reawakening wellness

Yazzie stands and holds up a a black and grey handwoven rug with a lined pattern at both ends.
Yazzie displays one of her handwoven rugs. (Courtesy Shawna Yazzie)

Yazzie seeks to remember the history and protocols of D颈苍茅 creative arts by reawakening women鈥檚 rug weaving practices in 笔颈帽辞苍 and restoring the community鈥檚 health and wellness. Her research uplifts the significance of D颈苍茅 creative arts outside of settler capitalist frameworks and argues that weaving acts as an extension of D颈苍茅 philosophical and intellectual traditions that teaches humans one鈥檚 existence in the universe and how to live a life in peace and harmony. 

After completing her doctoral coursework and qualifying exams, Yazzie relocated to 笔颈帽辞苍 for the entirety of summer 2022. The primary goal for this phase was completing, submitting, and gaining approval for her research protocols from the Navajo Nation Human Research Review Board and the 新澳门六合彩内幕信息 Davis Institutional Review Board.

Yazzie鈥檚 summer project focused on learning from master weavers in her home community to document how their practices embody D颈苍茅 history. 鈥淚 began the process of engaging with community grandmothers through listening, talking, and remembering what it is that they are willing to do and share. By fall 2022, I will be ready to present and submit a final report that includes reflections and assurances with, by, and for the community.鈥 

Yazzie鈥檚 research during the summer also included herding sheep, yard cleaning and tending to other livestock, as well as rug weaving. She explained that relationship. 

鈥淪heep are a pivotal part of the research process that allow for storytelling to happen,鈥 she said. 鈥淪tories invoke relationships to be strongly grounded as it is an Indigenous feminist practice,鈥 she continued.

鈥淩ug weaving as shared with me is a breathing life form, it has a life of its own in which I (as a weaver) embark on creating healing for a vibrant future.鈥 Yazzie describes this collective healing as survivance, explaining that it creates an act of Native presence.

鈥淔or instance,鈥 she explained, 鈥渢he process of the sheep shearing actively involves one鈥檚 relation to our more than human relatives (sheep) in relation to the land (A Body of Water in a Sunken Area).鈥

Resurgence

鈥淢y scholarship is committed to working with, by and for my D颈苍茅 community to extend the act of K鈥檈 [D颈苍茅 Kinship Systems] to right the wrongs of previous research and increase the dialogue across the Navajo Nation,鈥 Yazzie said. 鈥淢y research seeks to uplift and support an emerging creative arts resurgence movement and the reintroduction of rug weaving across the Red Bottom Clan for present and future generations.鈥 

This is a story about how she came to understand herself as a D颈苍茅, she said.

鈥淢y intention is not to speak on behalf of the Navajo Nation, nor do I dismiss the other countless experiences of D颈苍茅 relatives who live across the Navajo Nation, but to reimagine or rethink and imagine possibilities grounded in the land, family, stories, and embodied knowledge rich with multisensorial archive.鈥

Yazzie has also been resharing the practice of rug weaving with other community members across the Navajo Nation.

鈥淭his initially started out as a place to learn the art of rug weaving. However, this is slowly becoming a part of me and who I am becoming as it is a lifelong journey.鈥 

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