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Extract from dprogram Volume 1
"As Native Americans we survive
in all kinds of ways, as people who are full-bloods and people
who are mixed-blood, people who are traditional leaders and as
people who are musicians, like Robbie Robertson from The Band,
people who are actors or medical doctors who combine western medicine
with traditional healing practises. So we have this wonderful
opportunity now to share our knowledge and our history with other
people and that's certainly what so many of us want to do. But
we also want to be able to say, This is the limit of what we will
give you. Don't colonise our spiritual traditions."
Dr Sara Parker
Dr Sara Parker is one of a growing number of academics and scholars
whose personal cultural background as Native American allows them
to bring a different perspective to their studies of American
history. She attended the University of California at Berkeley
where she received a Bachelor's degree in the Humanities and went
on to receive a Masters degree in the field of Ethnic Studies.
Her specialisation is in Native American history and she now teaches
American Studies at U.C. both at Berkeley and Santa Cruz.
Pocahontas
Dr Sara Parker Recently I have been working with elementary
school children and I've found that many of them have more knowledge
of Native Americans than my college students at U.C. Santa Cruz,
for example, who have unfortunately learnt so much about Native
American culture from popular media that they're filled with stereotypes
and misconceptions - and those misconceptions are very hard to
deconstruct by the time someone is 20, 21 years old.
 What
can you do after you have an animated version of the story of
Pocahontas, for example? It filtered so deeply into popular consciousness.
Pocahontas, Lady Rebecca, Matoaka, this woman who was a real flesh
and blood person who's now been turned into a character and all
the licenses and franchises that go with that. The story of Pocahontas
is one that raises issues about problems that we have in the constructions
of narrative in history.
Pocahontas was indeed a real woman, not a cartoon figure, she
was a descendent of the Algonquin peoples, she was a mediator
and a diplomat in her own right as far as we know. Otherwise there's
no way that she would have been so powerful in being able to save
the life of this Englishman, John Smith.
What people don't understand, I think is the nature of leadership
amongst Native American peoples. Pocahontas is a good example
of how women had very important political roles among their people.
They were able to save lives by taking captives into their clans
and that was one of their roles and one of the ways that they
exercised political power at the time that the colonists were
first arriving in North America.
Pocahontas is a good example of how
the stories of these women have been reconstructed to fit a narrative
of Westward expansion.
General Custer
The constructions about the Westward movement, for example the
history of Custer and the Battle of Little Big Horn, that remains
one of the most contentious areas of history in the United States,
simply because when you try to debunk Custer, you're trying to
debunk someone who has been held up as a great hero. But when
you try to debunk Custer too much and turn him into a fool as
has been done, for instance in the film Little Big Man, then you
really do a disservice to the Native American warriors who fought
against Custer and returned victorious from the battle. By turning
Custer into such a buffoon that he wasn't a worthy adversary.
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© dprogram 1996>2008
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Originally broadcast on UK television's
Channel 4, dprogram is an award winning, mind expanding
trip featuring rare and exclusive interviews with leading edge
personalities from areas like cyber culture, consciousness research,
parapsychology, music and art.
Volume 1 includes:
• Dan
Mapes CEO of San Francisco's leading edge virtual
reality design company SynergyLabs on the metaphysics of VR.
• Jah
Wobble Musician and founder member of Public Image
Limited on Cockney mystics, creativity and the inspiration of
William Blake.
• Dr Sara Parker UC Berkeley scholar on the New Age
'colonisation' of Native American spirituality.
• Bishop
Joey Head of the First Church of the Last Laugh
- the worlds fastest growing snack relgion!
• Burning
Man A unique four day experience exploring creativity
and consciousness in Nevada's Black Rock Desert.
• Willis
Harman Former president of The Institute of Noetic
Sciences on their 'conventional research into unconventional areas'.
• Dr
Edgar Mitchell Founder of The Institute of Noetic
Sciences and Apollo 14 astronaut on parapsychology experiments
in space.
• Nick
Pope of the British Ministry of Defence on why
he had to change his mind about the UFO phenomenom.
• Peter
Russell Author, on the global brain, spirituality
on the net and our part in the evolution of the planet.
• Ann
& Alexander Shulgin Pioneer researchers into
psychedelics and the mind, on the politics of ecstacy.
And more...
Running time: 70 mins.
£19.99 plus Post & Packing.
Post & Packing rates:
For the UK add £3.00
For Europe add £4.00
For the United States and the Rest of the World add £6.00
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