It’s an interesting time to pursue an obsession with indigenous identity. One of my primary interests in Frontier Partisan studies these days is the “Men of the Middle Ground” — those whose racial and cultural identity was mixed in the great kettle of the borderlands.
The North American Fur Trade created thousands of racially mixed families, and rampant “cultural appropriation” meant that — regardless of “blood quantum” — native and European in the borderlands evolved into something that was both-and-neither “Indian” and “white” — a distinctive borderland culture. The fact that this culture was eventually swamped by the dominant Anglo-American culture does not take away from either the vibrancy or the fraught nature of this historical episode.
*
The question of identity has come to the forefront of cultural discourse a couple of times recently — for Americans most prominently in the political/reality TV farce of Elizabeth Warren’s DNA test “proving” that she has Native American ancestry.
In Canada, there is another more profound controversy, involving one of my favorite writers, Joseph Boyden.
Joseph Boyden (Photograph by Jacob C. Boynton)
Boyden broke big with his 2005 debut novel, Three Day Road, a novel that punches with a .303 bullet right through the Frontier Partisans X-ring, involving as it does a pair of Ojibway-Cree snipers on the Western Front in World War I. The novel is inspired in large part by the great warrior Francis Pegahmagabow.
Boyden went on to write several other indigenous-themed works, including the harrowing epic, The Orenda, centered around the Huron (Wendat)/Iroquois conflict of the 17th Century. He also became a media darling and a sort of mainstream media go-to spokesman on indigenous matters both in Canada and the United States.
In recent years, he’s come under increasingly intense scrutiny in regards to his somewhat vague and shifting claims of indigenous heritage. In some quarters, he’s been absolutely savaged as a fraud. In today’s climate, the controversy could be a career-ender, and since Boyden is one of Canada’s major literary figures, that’s a big damn deal.
The Boyden case throws a light on some of the thorniest issues surrounding indigenous identity: Is it a matter of blood or of nationhood? Could Boyden be justified in “feeling” at least in part native, while indigenous people are right to reject his claims? It’s important to point out that there’s no consensus anywhere on these questions. And, unlike Warren, Boyden has truly engaged with the indigenous peoples of Canada, particularly in the James Bay region, once a center of the Fur Trade, and has been accepted by some as family.*
All of this is explored assiduously in a remarkable 2017 piece of long–form journalism in The Globe and Mail, The Making of Joseph Boyden:
Does the celebrated author of Three Day Road and The Orenda have a right to call himself Indigenous? The answer to that question is tangled and fraught, writes Eric Andrew-Gee — much like the concept of Indigenous identity in a country still grappling with the painful legacy of colonization.
I printed the thing out at 22-pages and I’m still grappling with it. Here’s a passage that I’ve been mulling over for the past couple of days:
“My question to Joseph Boyden is, ‘What nation are you part of?’ Not whether you’re Indigenous,” said the Mohawk scholar Taiaiake Alfred. “If it’s all self-identification and something people feel and grasp onto based on their reading of history or stories, how the heck [are] you going to police that? And I’m not saying policing is what’s needed here, but the right to determine membership in their communities is a fundamental right of Indigenous nations.”
…Lying at the heart of Alfred’s contrast, and at the heart of so much discomfort with the way Boyden has presented himself over the years, is a deep, basic gulf between the broad European and Indigenous notions of identity formation. The “Western” paradigm of self-actualization, of creating one’s identity through a process of lonely soulful questing, is to a certain extent incongruous with the North American Indigenous tradition of forging identity through community sanction and reciprocity.
For many Indigenous thinkers, the idea that someone would claim to feel Anishinaabe or Métis, and that others would put stock in that feeling, is nonsense.
“A person can’t self-identify as Indigenous and claim to take that on,” said Alfred. “That simply doesn’t exist in [the] Indigenous worldview. It’s about relationships — relationships to land. To a people.”
*
I honestly don’t know what to make of all of this. The most damning take is that Boyden exploited a tenuous indigenous heritage to become a literary star, a famous cultural mediator (“a shining bridge”) and a rich man. That seems way too harsh, but if that’s the case, it’s much like a “stolen valor” scenario, and folks caught in that sort of thing get precious little mercy. Then again, maybe this is nothing more than mean-spirited character assassination coming out of the basest deadly sin, envy.
It’s hard to see Boyden as a phony and an exploiter, but I admit that I am deeply prejudiced by my love for his work. His case in self-defense, published in Maclean’s online magazine in 2017, is compelling — as you’d expect from such a powerful master of wordcraft:
…this leads me to questions I’ve been contemplating a lot as I navigate this recent rite of passage and try to answer to those who are asking who I am. If I am accepted by people in Indigenous communities, if I have been traditionally adopted by a number of people in Indigenous communities, if my DNA test shows I have Indigenous blood, if I have engaged my whole career in publicly defending Indigenous rights as well as using my public recognition as an author to shine light on Indigenous issues, am I not, in some way, Indigenous?
This probably won’t — probably can’t — get sorted out. Whatever “truth” is in a case like this almost certainly lies in soft, boggy, uncertain ground that could swallow those who venture into it without a trace. The borderlands have ALWAYS been like that, and the Men of the Middle Ground have always been chewed up by cultural arbiters and by their own self-destructive tendencies.
I’ll give Andrew-Gee (and through him, Boyden) the last word for now, as I continue to ponder on the pitfalls and snares that have, for three centuries and more, threatened the lives and fortunes of those who walk a twisting path along an ever-shifting frontier:
Since the controversy around his identity cropped up, Boyden has had a chance to establish “the real truth” about the background he has made so much of, and made so much from — the Indigenous background that made him a shining bridge between worlds. Months on, his confusion, and the confusion he has sown, about the proud and terrible and maybe redemptive history of Indigenous identity in this country has laid bare the size of the gulf that any shining bridge will have to ford.
“I’m a storyteller,” Boyden said at the panel talk in March (2017). He was discussing his novel The Orenda, but the words glowed with autobiography. “You would think writing a historical novel would be quite easy, because you’ve got A, B, C, D, and E — it’s laid out there for you. History’s obviously not that simple. And history is usually through the eyes of the conqueror.”
* James Bay is the locus of the action in the Netflix Fur Trade drama Frontier.
H.P. @ Hillbilly Highways says
Maybe this wouldn’t be so much of an issue if the literati judged writers based on their work rather than based on their identity. (And, to a lesser extent, if regular readers did.)
Other than that, I’m not sure why I should care. There are plenty of people who could provide authenticity from any given group. Most of them can’t write or tell a story worth a damn. It is also very, very hard to tell a story only about people just like you. If we can’t tell stories about people different than us–men writing about women, blacks about whites, the young about the old–then fiction cannot exist.
Which isn’t to say Boyden isn’t an asshole, just that it isn’t relevant. I don’t want to drink with the guy or give him a medal. I want to give him money in exchange for a story. I don’t ask the ethnicity of the guy selling me a sandwich, even if it is a gyro. Absent some very high standard (*cough* Samuel Delaney *cough*), I don’t care what a writer thinks or does.
JimC says
Well said, HP — as I would expect. We went around on this one with Forrest Carter a few years back. I do think that personal integrity and authenticity matter — even among tale spinners — but ultimately I think I come down where you stand — we have the work and if the work stands, it stands. And that is certainly true re: Carter and it is also true re: Boyden.
Paul McNamee says
H.P. took the words out of my mouth. As a cultural identity story, this is worth examining. As a “legitimacy of the writer” story? Don’t get me started. 😉
H.P. @ Hillbilly Highways says
The cultural identity side is much, much more complicated. I won’t touch that, except to say that it simply must be a matter of culture and not race. The modern effort to build racial identity where it did not previously exist, especially on college campuses, is one of the more pernicious trends in America today.
JimC says
Pernicious. From my Running Iron Report essay:
Mac Hay says
Check out “The Seven Daughters of Eve,The science that reveals our genetic ancestry “ by Bryan Sykes. Excellent editorial in the Nugget New this week Jim.
JimC says
Thanks Mac.
Black Tyrone says
I find it unusual that those that claim a fraction and sometimes miniscule Native American ancestry, seem to overwhelming sit that claim upon an “Indian woman” some where way back yet never or rarely on a man. Why? Seek out the Octobers True West Issue for some light comments. How much time did all those Cherokee princesses really have on their hands to procreate with European men? Not a final word but interesting non the less. We have had a caucasian woman identify as African American… Why is a President referred to as African American with a caucasian mother?, there is the politician from the Bay State claiming native American heritage for self gain and of course the community that denigrates a man who in 1492 reached beyond Europe little considering there own Spanish ancestry. Really who cares! The migrations of All people have and will continue to produce a very fluid melding of peoples.
JimC says
Allan Barra commented on this in the context of Forrest Carter:
Black Tyrone says
Perhaps but I suspect there is a self imposed social/psychological taboo placed on having ones European women “ravished” by those perceived as lesser races. France accepted ie Metis and Spain accepted miscegenation. However while Hernando Cortes could sire offspring from his native mistress, I wonder the reaction if the flower of european/American womanhood was clipped by the native. Could we have had a situation reversing Thomas Jefferson’s sexual escapades. Cultural Mores in large part define these activities.. Oh well too much pschyo babble. Best left for others not I.
ps finishing Corbett’s Man Eaters of Kumaon
JimC says
More Corbett coming soon…
Ugly Hombre says
Strange world we live in in America, if you claim to be something that you are not- people are supposed to believe you. Even the government is in on the Alice in wonderland act.
Weird to me to claim to be something that you are not, WTH for.??
Better to culture steal cultural actions and mores internally if you identify with precepts.
“Kaka inis! that damn cano knows more about sabong manooks than my papang.”!
“Ussss that henna gaijin is more Japanese than a Japanese cleaned the dojo floor every day
for years with a rag before anybody came to keiko taihen des.”
Like that. Be it- But don’t claim to be something you are not, GD it- that’s moronic.
Outward trappings wearing a gold lame kimono or a bamboo sabongaro bolo hat don’t count are are equally daft. Its what you do- not, what you look like or say you are.
IMO anyway.
JimC says
Exactly. I have never understood the phenomenon.
Matthew says
I knew a girl in junior high who claimed to be from Germany when she wasn’t. Never figured out why. I think she was trying to impress us or something, but Germany?
JimC says
Exotic Dusseldorf.
Rick Schwertfeger says
I think about this frequently, and finally have put a few thoughts together:
1) I agree with a statement Jim made as a reply to a comment: “personal integrity and authenticity matter.” It is one thing to claim that aspects of ancestral culture, or an admired culture, have influenced one’s way of living. It is a totally different thing to claim to BE of that culture. My ancestry is 3/4 German, 3/16 Irish, and 1/16 English. And I am continuously exploring how those cultures when tranferred to America may have influenced who I am. BUT, I do not claim in any way to BE German, Irish, or English. I was born and raised by parents native to the United States in a Middle Atlantic state in the mid-twentieth century. And essentially I am at my core a mid-twentieth century working class American. Certainly one who has grown far from those roots in geography and to some extent in culture. And I have been influenced significantly by aspects of cultures outside of my own. But – while I am an admirer and appreciator of aspects of those cultures – I certainly am not OF those cultures. And it would be entirely bogus to claim otherwise.
I may have more to say. But this will suffice for now.
Rick Schwertfeger says
2) re: BLOOD MEMORY: In one sense this is a squishy, unscientific concept. But, as a counter when we discussed it, my science teacher friend Gary Loney gave it some validity, commenting that birds and fish, for example, migrate. How is the concept of blood memory different from such a “memory” that’s “in their blood”?
3) In a similar vein, I think about the fact that – as I have no indigenous American ancestry, nor any but European ancestry – 100% of my DNA crossed the Atlantic Ocean. That differentiates me from folks with ancestry from other areas of the Earth. And are we to say that DNA has no influence on who I am?
JimC says
Re: Blood memory: There are mysteries here. I have known too many people whom I respect who have had something approaching mystical experiences along these lines to dismiss it out of hand. And the power of the chords that can be struck in me by certain stories, images and sounds remains mysterious to me.
I think that the best way to approach this is with humility and honesty, acknowledging and embracing the mystery, accepting that much is simply unknowable. That’s hard for many people who want something definitive, and to say “I am THIS” and “This is why I am this.”
lane batot says
The “blood memory”(what I would simply call deeply rooted INSTINCTS) certainly IS a fascinating thing to ponder! And though it may seem ridiculous on the surface regarding humans, we have plenty of examples of it regarding other animals that people readily accept. I mentioned awhile back about a blatant example–all my dogs being interested in the exotic animal scents I bring home on my clothing, working as I do at a zoo. And how all of them got chances to smell both black and grizzly bear scent on me, and all showed equal interest. But when I came home one day from having helped lug a polar bear around, despite the usual interest from all the dogs, my Siberian Huskies WENT FRIKKIN” NUTS!!!! Their reactions were off the charts, bristling up, yapping and growling and looking around with great alarm, scratching vigorously(and painfully!) at my pants legs–FASCINATING! And these were huskies MANY generations from any that actually had to deal with polar bears!! If such instincts can be hard-wired or bred into dogs, why not humans? So I believe there may be more to some of these “blood memories” than the doubters may think…..
lane batot says
….and another thought on that–if such instincts can be bred into a breed, race, or type of critter(humans included)–and they CAN, as we can see readily and amazingly in our many dog types–how long exactly before such characteristics are part-and-parcel of the actual genetic make-up–in other words, “born in the blood”? Obviously with selection for certain behavioral and physical characteristics, it can be just a few generations for dogs–although they ARE considered more “plastic” genetically than other domestic animals. How long for selection in the wild? Or in human society? Maybe certain racial prejudices are not just socially taught, but INGRAINED in some human groups? But thinking like that leads to all manner of politically incorrect taboo subjects! Too bad that such understanding can get warped and used as a socio-political tool against others, as with the Nazis. If only humans would use such learning for good instead of evil, but maybe we are just genetically wired to be “bad”!
lane batot says
This is a subject I’ve had to deal with all of my life, being a mostly(well-mixed) Caucasian with what seems to have been an inborn interest in “injuns”–studying and emulating and adopting things from Native American cultures since early childhood. And often having to listen to reverse eugenics from holier-than-thou “real” indigenous individuals that bristle at any white-eyes that shows any interest in Indian ways. I find it sad, as originally, Native American cultures WERE far more about how one chose to live, rather than their bloodlines, and readily accepted peoples of other races incorporated in their tribes. But now it seems this racist eugenic view has tainted those old beliefs–and where did THAT “purist” view come from? Rather(sadly) ironic…….I have read, again and again, of people NOT of American Indian blood, who have made a life study of those ways(often preserving what would likely have been lost forever otherwise), having to deal with skepticism and disdain from actual genetic Native Americans, who usually knew LESS about their own cultures than the non-Indians they were deriding. I can understand, to a degree, WHY–so much has been stolen from indigenous peoples that they might be a bit peeved at perceiving their very identity as Natives being taken and/or exploited, but it should be viewed like anything else to be fair–is harm being done? False claims being made for selfish or mentally deranged reasons? Or perhaps is the interest beneficial and respectful? Lumping all us “Injun lovers” in one big, sweeping negative category is as prejudiced a view as any out there…..
JimC says
I think “regular folks” are generally inclined to take people as they are and can appreciate and abide someone who is, as you say, acting out of “beneficial and respectful” motives. Gatekeepers, especially the self-appointed ones, are the tendentious ones. There’s a way to be an “Injun lover” without being a phony — and without claiming the status that goes with actual tribal membership. Just calling yourself an “Injun lover” flat out probably goes a long ways.
And surely there is something significant in the fact that my autocorrect wants to call Injun lover “injunction lover.”
lane batot says
HA! I MUST not have that “autocorrect” thingy, as I continue to misspell purposefully with impunity!…..and I SHOULD add that I have ALSO met genotypic(as opposed to phenotypic or “emulotypic”) Native Americans who were VERY generous–yea, even THRILLED, to share aspects of their culture with ANYBODY! BEST TEACHER I ever had, kindergarten thru college, was my Cherokee Language teacher in college, Robert Bushyhead! He was punished for speaking his Native Cherokee in missionary school back in the 1930’s, so he got GREAT pleasure in later being able to teach Unegas(whites) his language at college level! That HAD to be satisfying! I always try to remember examples like that when confronted with the outraged indigenous individuals who want to label all us Injun lovers as from the “Wannabe” tribe…..
Rick Schwertfeger says
Very much agree, Lane. I have know four indigenous folks/Indians, who have allowed me wonderful exchanges. To me the key thing that “opened their doors” to me was recognition of my respect for them and the sincerity of my interest, my genuine desire to know and to understand their cultures and experiences. I had a love affair with a Lakota lady who 1) allowed me to read a book written by an ancestor that numerous members of her family had read and signed their names in. She even let me take it to a nearby pub to read over a couple of glasses. Her trust meant an enormous amount to me. She also painted for me a wall hanging on cloth of symbols meaningful to her that I still have. 2) A Navajo fellow working in a shop in Gallup, New Mexico, talked with me about a pretty stone that was an unusual shape. He could tell I was interested in what it was; and opened up to explain that it’s “a healing stone,” how they make them, etc. I handle that stone pretty much every day. 3) Another Navajo working at a historical site in Ganado, Arizona, likewise recognized the genuine interest behind my questions – and we had a wonderful half-hour conversation during which he shared much tribal plus personal things.
I have been honored by these exchanges. I think respect and genuine interest are paramount.
JimC says
Thanks for sharing that Rick.
lane batot says
…..and to get really quirky here, I find many similar parallels in comparing wolves with dogs–something that I’ve experienced firsthand having lived with wolf-X-dog crosses for many years. I see wolflike characteristics in ALL dogs, but being a WOLF has as much to do with how a canine lives and interacts with it’s ecosytem as it does its genetics. Nature itself doesn’t care squat about our narrow human ideals–Nature is only concerned with WHAT WORKS. Which is more wolflike in function and lifestyle–a wolf in a zoo, or a pack of completely feral dogs living completely wild? I have seen and observed both, and find it an intriguing thing to ponder. Then there is this silly(to me) eugenic battle going on now regarding that unique American “species”, the Red Wolf–whether or not it is a “pure” species, or resulted from Wolf-X-Coyote crosses. And whether or not it is worth preserving if it is a(gasp!) “hybrid” species. That’s kinda ironic, coming from modern humans, who are also mostly a hybrid species(ever since we discovered we have Neanderthal and Denisovian DNA!). Red Wolves WERE an existing species(HOWEVER they originated) before the European invasion of North America, fulfilling a particular niche in the Eastern ecosystems. A modern version of mixed coyote-wolf genetics is recolonizing the same area as we speak, that many people just want to deny even exist–the so-called FASCINATING “coywolves” that are viewed as vermin, but that ARE fulfilling a valuable role in the ecosystem again–despite every effort to exterminate them. Undoubtedly, we humans need to re-evaluate our notion of just WHAT a “species” is! Functional or genetic? Or BOTH? The “old bloodlines” of Red Wolves, in my opinion, are worth preserving no matter HOW they originated, just as I think the “New” Red Wolves are as well. This controversial “canine soup” is amazingly similar to the arguments that arise involving our own human American identities……
JimC says
It sure is.
lane batot says
….and a comment about Forrest Carter–his apparently false claims of Cherokee ancestry(but WERE they completely false? Cherokee/Scots/Irish intermixture is EXTREMELY common across the South–I’m partially a product of that combination myself–and I wouldn’t be surprised if Carter DID have at least a fraction of Cherokee genetics himself….) still gave him access to association with Native American cultures that he then utilized in his novels, introducing aspects of such to many who would never have otherwise learned anything on the subject. It was Carter’s Geronimo novel “Watch For Me On The Mountain” that instilled in me a desire to learn all about the Bronco Apaches of the Sierra Madres that continued living free DECADES after Geronimo’s surrender. This novel was the first notion I ever had of the phenomenon–it has been totally neglected and omitted from our history books and even ethnological studies of the Apaches(with a few, marvelous exceptions–like Grenville Goodwin!) Though Carter’s rendition of this in his fictional novel was unquestionably romanticized, it WAS based on FACT, and it was that fictional novel that inspired me to search for what truths regarding this subject are out there. So say what you will about Carter, he wrote good books that inspire people in positive ways, regardless of his actual ancestry, and sometimes less-than-admirable political agendas at certain periods of his life…..Again that view from NATURE–what WORKS as opposed to lofty(snobbish) human ideology!
JimC says
I find the Carter case fascinating. And there’s no better example of the principle HP enunciated at the top of this discussion: Whoever and whatever Carter was, his work stands on its own considerable merit, independent of its creator.
Ugly Hombre says
“Blood Memory” is interesting and may explain some things, General Patton for instance.
We all know he thought he lived before, and whats more interesting is he did some eerie things while visiting ancient battle sites etc. Strange things not explainable by ordinary methods.*
He believed in reincarnation but not in the traditional sense- he read the Hindu classics but seems he was not interested in Buddhist methods at all.
With family and his close friends he would discuss this.
He did not say however, “Read my 1913 Patton pattern saber manual I am a direct
descendant of Francois Vivonne and a long line of French swordsmen.”
That would have been unusual…
Patton thought he was a reincarnation of warriors and proved it soundly by his actions- imo
* “A Genius For War” Carlo D’este
JimC says
A friend’s girlfriend once said to my dad, “So, you taught Jim to shoot?”
My dad has no interest in firearms — he shot a rifle to qualify in the Navy and maybe twice since then. He laughed and said: “Hell no! He brought that with him.”
“Brought it with him?”
“From a past life.”
“Ah.”
It was an amusing moment.