Every day more articles are posted on this controversial topic. Many contain an undercurrent of shaming toward those who are accused of lacking awareness or sensitivity. Most suggest that if you are a conscious, loving or aware individual, there is only one acceptable perspective on the issue.
Shree Paradkar writes: “Appropriation shows disregard for another culture. You borrow one aspect of a culture — say, wearing corn rows or bindis, or using recipes — all the while seeing the culture itself as backward and “the other.” from What Cultural Appropriation is and Why You Should Care.
In the midst of all the passionate responses on this subject, the very last part of this statement is key in this discussion. It is both the historic and present day experiences of oppression, control and denial that are seeking voice in this debate. Those who have suffered are crying out to be heard. Those who have watched their worlds be destroyed, their deepest expressions of self be consciously and intentionally maimed and crushed, this is the pain that is rising, and, like all pain, it must be acknowledged to allow healing. It is a long awaited voice of great power and beauty, a message whose time has come.
As the extent of the suffering becomes known, how could we not make way for the emotion, the anger, the profound loss. Once we bear witness to what has happened, how could it not be so? In Canada, for example, our history of incarcerating Native children in residential schools has only recently come into the public eye. “When the full extent of abuse is finally revealed, we’ll find the most extensive case of child sexual, physical, mental and spiritual abuse ever recorded in human history.” Spoken by Phil Lane, Director of the Four Worlds International Institute in Southern Alberta (Lethbridge Herald, November 24, 1997)
In this CBC interview, Jesse Wente speaks with profound emotion on the cultural appropriation controversy. He explains that to him, and many Indigenous people, appropriation is a word which references a legacy of intentional destruction of everything that references their culture. It’s not an issue of free speech for those who borrow Indigenous art, dress or spiritual practices, it’s a question of soul rape, the breaking of the spirit of an entire way of life. How could any feeling individual want to add to such pain?
One article speaking of the harsh conditions and discipline imposed upon these stolen children, taken mercilessly from their parents, some at gunpoint, states that this approach was modelled upon the practices of schools for delinquent youth. I also imagine these young men, although white-skinned, most were likely born into lives of poverty and abuse, locked up in another institution, more imposed control and blame. More towering walls and cold rooms, filled with children in pain.
Our species has a long history of unconscious violence, fear, hatred and blame. The one blessing in our Canadian story is that we now live in a day when such stories horrify. We have grown wiser. While we may fear the dissolution of our times, the truth is a brave consciousness is rising around the world. We are waking up, and awakening always involves a deconstruction, a falling apart, so the new may be born. Even unimaginable suffering may find its purpose.
But this is a story of the heart, and when we argue about paintings, or dress, or recipes, we are talking about something much more; the very spirit and bodies of the people. We humans are made manifest in our cultural ways, and up until very recently in human history, our cultures were distinct. The blurring of lines between nations and faiths is a direct result of the age of information and technology. The material world has become virtual, immigration is rising to a torrent, and our art travels around the globe in milliseconds. As much as we want to hang on to it, it has been set free like a stack of papers in a high wind. Everyone is an author, photographer, musician, celebrity. It is both a wonderful and an awful thing.
Speak to any musician over the age of 35 and they will tell you the world has ended. There is no way for them to make a living because everyone makes music now and anyone can access it without buying anything. Speak to any photographer who learned to process black and white prints in a closet darkroom, any author who went the old, slow route of agents and publishers and an actual hardcover volume you held in your hands, and we realize we can never go back, the cat is out of the bag, the genie is out of the bottle, and our collective expression is in the midst of its own kind of explosion. It is a force of nature, a stripping down of our collective ego, a trivializing and equalizing which forces us to detach from ownership. Not an easy task for those who may already feel they have nothing left to lose.
And we cannot rush the healing. Time must be given until every last story is heard. Every nightmare recounted. Not as perpetrators, but as brothers and sisters, we must accept the gift of the truth, and offer love in return. And, the more readily we face the pain, the sooner we will find a balance in our art. We can and must seek an ever maturing consciousness of love and respect. I believe the sharing of cultural expressions is the way of rediscovering union. We see this when two children of strong, differing cultures marry, and their children in turn are no longer attached to one culture or the other, but hold respect and a blended expression of both. The parents of the young lovers may struggle much more with a cross-cultural union,
I know what I am about to propose will upset some folks. But I believe that in the long run, we cannot control the evolution of art, language, cooking or fashion, and we would not want to. Any attempt to compartmentalize, devolve or freeze a culture in time goes against the grain of our expansive evolution as a species, and focuses upon separateness rather than inclusiveness.
In North America, there is a strong association in Indigenous dress with intricate and beautiful patterns of beading. When Conquistadors began trading with beads manufactured in Europe, the original quillwork of Indigenous tribes evolved to incorporate the new varieties of beads and designs.
From The History Of Beads by Ray McCallum, Saskatchewan Indian, June 1997, Special Pow Wow Issue:
“Although all First Nations have a concept of themselves as a people, tribal characteristics took on new meanings with the arrival of the trade bead. Glass beads replaced the quills and natural beads as the medium of choice owing to their availability, flexibility and variety of colour. Stylistic influences were reinterpreted from Euro-American expressions and designs.
The elements that make up a cultural society include continual growth and expansion borrowing a bit here and a bit there. To state that beads and Euro-American influences took away the national identity from First Nations is to deny their intelligent capacity to grow.
The ignominious bead that first insinuated itself through Columbus has become a cultural icon that continues to display the flamboyance of First Nations cultures to this day.”
This perspective takes nothing away from the profound need for the recognition of the horrific oppression experienced by the Indigenous. But it does allow us to remember that the Self that is expressed through art is constantly growing and at no time can we claim independent ownership of expression. There is nothing new under the sun.
I have to admit, I am a very white person. My heritage is primarily Cornish, Irish and English, those imperialist, heartless people who decided that land and people around the world could be conquered and owned, though I expect if I went deeply enough into my genetic background I would find people of colour. Almost all of us can.
There is an often debated suggestion that blonde hair and blue eyes are facing extinction, although scientists say that the blue eye gene cannot die out but only go dormant indefinitely. It certainly seems obvious that one day we will all be some shade of colour, brown, red or yellow.
My heart still warms when I remember my children as babies, with their clouds of white curls and angelic eyes. They were born of my body and I loved them more than life itself; they were the human expression of my soul’s presence upon this Earth. But if I think of a world where we literally become one family, I welcome this astonishing idea, because it will take us one step closer to the awareness of the illusion of the physical realm. When the day comes that we cease fighting over our differences and instead delight in our individuality, our world will be transformed.
Momondo – the DNA Journey
In the meantime, our attention must remain on the acknowledgement and transformation of all wounds, all suffering, however it is experienced. No soul is immune to suffering. All voices of pain ask to be heard, so that they may be set free to heal.
