I won’t pretend to be fluent in the Diné world, but I’ve dipped into the Navajo perspective in a book group offered through the Undergraduate STEM Development division at Brown. The book is Native Presence and Sovereignty in College by Amanda Tachine.

 Dr. Amanda Tachine is an Assistant Professor in Educational Leadership & Innovation at Arizona State University. She was born in Ganado Arizona. (I’ve visited there. It is a National Historic Site for the Hubble Trading Post.) There is some irony in that as you will see.

In the book, she weaves the Navajo creation myth into the reporting of data gathered from interviews with ten Navajo students about the challenges they faced in college. It is a wonderful example of how to present the themes uncovered in qualitative research, the kind of research I do. The rug she weaves is a beautiful native design that imparts both heart and understanding.

Last week she presented at a webinar and I was wowed by her grace, humor and wisdom, and the strength of the matrilineal culture. I experienced those same qualities often when I worked at the Tsaile health center on the Navajo reservation for several months more than 20 years ago.

The book talks about the financial challenges, Imposter syndrome, facing stereotypes, and lack of support and nurturing of spirit for Native students when negotiating college. She touched on those themes in her talk and presented on the empty promises Harvard and other Ivy league schools made to the Native Americans. Pocahontas was kidnapped and put on exhibition, along with a few other Indians, in England to raise money for colleges that educated Indians in the Northeast. The new Harvard charter of 1650 declared its mission to be "the Education of the English and Indian Youth of the Country". The first Native graduated in 1665, the next one nearly 300 years later. The Disney version of Pocahontas is pure romantic fantasy. Theses days, there is a lot of waking up and examining  the history my generation was taught. We need to honor the blood, sweat, and lives on which white folks in the United States built their success.

I asked Dr. Tachine if there was a person or people that influenced the work she was doing. When she answered my question, I realized what a product of my culture I am. I was humbled. She said, “I carry my ancestors with me into the present, I arrive with them. I honor the past, the good and the difficult. I am because of them” (my paraphrasing).

I have seen this same commitment to family and ancient family lands among my Palestinian colleagues. It is a perspective I have struggled to understand. Why are they so attached to the land? The relatives are difficult and demanding. However, it became clearer when I realized that I am from immigrants, Germans who followed a priest to a community in Ohio, hoping for a better life and work in the mid 1800s. The land where they settled was taken from the Indians at least a half a century before they arrived.

I have a relatively transient history, that of immigrants. My grandparents left their home in western Ohio to be educated, seeking work in a city two hours away, eventually buying a farm. While I have a strong sense of family and my grandparent’s farm occupied for two generations, I was anxious to leave all that behind in Ohio. I wanted to pursue my own dreams and goals. The connection to generations of family and land is not there for me.  The U.S. culture of autonomy and personal goals, minimizes the value of collective pursuits.

I have thought a lot about commitment to ancestors, about colonization and erasure of the history of those peoples who are overtaken. This is especially relevant to Palestine and the current war waged there. The history in that part of the world is long and complex. However, from the Palestinian perspective, their history was erased with the establishment of Israel in 1948, and continues to be with the settlements.

In an effort to support my West Bank colleagues and their students during this difficult time, we have conducted a qualitative research project. We interviewed fifteen physicians working in the West Bank, to understand their lives and work under Occupation by the Israeli military and how is has changed with the current war. We are now analyzing the data and writing a manuscript. Edited versions of some of the stories are posted on this website.

It is a difficult and dark story to tell, but I hear a tremendous commitment to ancestors and family, not unlike what I witnessed on the reservation. Dr. Tachine was clear – family is not always goodness, it can be marked by addictions, violence, and damaged by health issues. However, she talked about sporting events, dances, family gatherings around food, and humor as sources of joy despite the poverty and challenges of reservation life.

Recently, my Palestine colleagues gathered to celebrate the conclusion of Ramadan. When we meet virtually to edit our manuscript, I hear their joy and the pride they take in their lives in the midst of the war’s disruption. One colleague who lives in the desert, but visited me in Rhode Island last year Whatspped me this weekend: Good Morning. Today feels like a morning in Rhode Island, wet and it smells of fish.

I am humbled by the incredible resilience of the human spirit.