“We began this unit by discussing assumptions and differences that we carry into our class. In “First Contact as Spiritual Performance,” Lutz makes an assumption about his readers (Lutz, “First Contact” 32). He asks us to begin with the assumption that comprehending the performances of the Indigenous participants is “one of the most obvious difficulties.” He explains that this is so because “one must of necessity enter a world that is distant in time and alien in culture, attempting to perceive indigenous performance through their eyes as well as those of the Europeans.” Here, Lutz is assuming either that his readers belong to the European tradition, or he is assuming that it is more difficult for a European to understand Indigenous performances – than the other way around. What do you make of this reading? Am I being fair when I point to this assumption? If so, is Lutz being fair when he makes this assumption?”
One of the first things that stood out to me in John Lutz’s “First Contact as a Spiritual Performance: Encounters on the North American West Coast” was Lutz’s observation that “one must…enter a world that is distant in time and alien in culture, attempting to perceive indigenous performance through their eyes as well as those of the Europeans” (Lutz, 32) when understanding Indigenous performances. However, I do not think that the way in which Lutz frames his statement necessarily presumes that the reader is European in heritage. Lutz is implying that when trying to interpret any performance from any unfamiliar culture, one has to step outside their own cultural narrative to see the unfamiliar culture from a different context. This does not just apply to people of European heritage attempting to understand Indigenous performance, or Indigenous peoples attempting to understand European performance, but also applies to a more general population. This is evident by one particular part of Lutz’s statement: “attempting to perceive Indigenous performance through their eyes as well as those of the Europeans” (Lutz 32). He is not necessarily assuming that the reader themselves are European, but is suggesting a strategy of beginning to understand the performances of another culture (any other culture) by stepping outside one’s own world in order to see through the eyes of the people conducting the performance. He is also suggesting that any reader, no matter their background, would be required to step away from their cultural narratives while interpreting origin stories in order to more accurately understand the perspectives of both the Indigenous and European parties.
Hence, I do not think it is fair to make the outright assumption that Lutz is only speaking to those of European heritage in this context. However, I do believe that it is fair to point to Lutz’s assumption that it is more difficult for Europeans to understand Indigenous performances than the other way around. Assuming that Lutz is referring to present day readers attempting to understand the first contact dialogues of the past by the statement “distant in time” (Lutz 32), it would be easier for present day Indigenous peoples to understand the dialogues of the past Europeans due to the forced cultural assimilation that has occurred within the last century.
Indigenous children were forced for many years to attend schools which were mainly Eurocentric and generally disallowed indigenous cultures, preventing Indigenous children from becoming acquainted with the dialogues and histories of their people. Even though these schools did come to an end, the Eurocentrism did not. Indigenous children were and are still exposed to all sorts of different Eurocentric media and education that increases their exposure to “Western” culture, further contributing to an already existing distance between Indigenous peoples and the world view of their ancestors. However, Canada as a whole is only in the beginning stages of starting to understand and acknowledge the Indigenous cultures that have been silenced and ignored for so many years. There is still very little education in grade school about Indigenous issues (although it is improving) and very little exposure and understanding for today’s children. Therefore, today’s Indigenous children would have a much greater understanding of the European dialogue than children of European heritage in Canada might have of the different Indigenous dialogues. Furthermore, since throughout history, Indigenous peoples have been forced farther and farther from their cultures while European Canadians have remained close to their “ancestors’ world views”, Lutz suggests that European Canadians need to step outside their culture in order to move forward and actually begin to understand the Indigenous performances.
From the Daily Scandinavian
References:
“Indigenous Peoples Worldviews vs Western Worldviews”. Indigenous Corporate Training Inc. Blog. Indigenous Corporate Training Inc., 26 Jan 2016, https://www.ictinc.ca/blog/indigenous-peoples-worldviews-vs-western-worldviews. Accessed 7 Feb 2019.
Kjolberg, Tor. “First Black Woman Monument in Copenhagen.” Daily Scandinavian. 12 April 2018, https://www.dailyscandinavian.com/first-black-woman-monument-in-copenhagen/. Accessed 7 Feb 2019.
Lutz, John. “First Contact as a Spiritual Performance: Aboriginal — Non-Aboriginal Encounters on the North American West Coast.” Myth and Memory: Rethinking Stories of Indigenous-European Contact. Ed. Lutz. Vancouver: U of British Columbia P, 2007. 30-45. Print.
Neeganagwedgin, Erica. “A critical review of Aboriginal eduction in Canada:Eurocentric dominance impact and everyday denial.” International Journal of Inclusive Education 17.1 (2013): 15 – 31, https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1004&context=aprci. Accessed 7 Feb 2019.
Hey Cassie. I enjoyed reading your response to Lutz, as your writing offered an alternative that ties strongly to many themes that we’ve focused on in the last unit. The erasure that took place through the Indian Act and residential schools definitely enabled indigenous populations a greater understanding of European culture rather than the reverse. And when Indigenous cultures were studied, it was done so through a very Eurocentric perspective, and written about with that narrative in mind. From reading your response, I wonder if whether the imperialist/religious backgrounds of European colonialism acts as a rigid framework itself, in regards to understanding the non-European “other.” What do you think?
Hi Lexis,
Thanks for your insight! Your question is definitely a tough one to answer, and I’m not sure I have a concrete answer to it, but I wonder myself if one’s understanding of the non-European “other” is based off one’s own background, or if European colonialism has had such a profound impact on the world that the Eurocentric view is always what is reverted to when attempting to understand the “other”?
Hi Cassie,
Thanks for this great post. I got a similar takeaway from reading Lutz’s article as you’ve ably expressed here, and actually found it refreshingly balanced in terms of its exploration and empathy towards the meeting of Indigenous people and European (soon-to-be) colonists. I think a big danger in studying history can be the propensity to transmogrify theoretical speculation (informed or not) into ‘putting words into the mouths’ of past participants and ascribing definitive mindsets to their actions. Lutz, I found, is actually fairly careful not to prescribe and overreach for both the historical communities his article theorizes or the reader’s particular background or perspective, instead largely bypassing the dichotomy to explore the scenario of contact as a cultural phenomenon unto itself, which I think is a wise tactic. It actually ties in very well to the point made in the Indigenous Peoples Worldview article you’ve hyperlinked here – namely, that a lot of Indigenous cultures are more predicated on a plethora of truths and experiences than the more stereotypically Western fixation on a singular, ‘infallible’ truth.
Branching off of this plurality of experiences and more personal, subjective ‘truths,’ my question is this: we’re so used to relying on peer-reviewed scholarship as means of learning history and substantiating arguments, but Wickwire’s introduction to Harry Robinson’s book illustrates (as you touch upon here) how skewed scholarship can be through ideological trends – meaning that the scaffolded studies and learning from seminal studies of the past can be built on a flimsy, and even downright wrong, foundation. How do you think we can best approach large-scale cultural and policy-based conversations such as those ensconced in the Truth and Reconciliation movement through this idea of a plurality of truths and experiences? So many of the predominant conversations of the movement, especially around land claims and treaties, have the propensity to – if not carefully moderated – devolve into a finger pointing game of ‘he said/she said,’ with both arguments anchored on conflicting, and arguably inconclusive, factual bases. Do you think there is a way to move forward towards a form of mass closure through acknowledging that no single truth or account will be able to encompass the entirety of what happened hundreds of years ago? And, if so, do you think it would be possible to sway the general populace (again, raised on a Western mentality of singular, fact-substantiated truth) towards this way of thinking?
(that’s a big, lofty question, and possibly a rhetorical one, I realize – but I’d love to hear your thoughts. Thanks!)
Hi Kevin,
Thanks for your insights! They really made me think hard about your questions and I honestly do not think I’m informed/currently knowledgable enough to answer them with the same amount of depth to which you asked them.
However, what I can say is that I liked your comment about how our scholarship can be easily (and very often is) skewed through ideological trends. I’m a big believer in education being one of the many foundations for creating change, and if we were to create change in the way we approach conversations around Indigenous issues and the Truth and Reconciliation movement, then there needs to be a cultural shift in our current ideological trend, whatever that may be. I don’t know exactly how this could be accomplished and I feel as though it might create a chicken and the egg scenario: did the change in ideology change how we educate or did a change in education change ideology?
And like you’ve mentioned, that change in ideology would very well have to include stepping outside of our Eurocentric view of infallible facts, which is a difficult thing to accomplish when all of your education has only ever been from a Eurocentric perspective. I touch on this below in my reply to Tamara and honestly, it would take a lot of time and a lot of change before we’ll ever be able to have the general public accepting of a plural truth.
Hi Cassie,
Thank you for your post – I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. I chose to answer the same question for my blog post, and it is great to see that we have similar thoughts on this topic!
I definitely agree with you, in that Indigenous children and youth have been pushed towards the dominant Western culture, while simultaneously being pushed away from their own respective cultures. It is a very saddening reality.
You mention that there is a lack of adequate education regarding Indigenous issues in school, which as a recent high school graduate and an aspiring secondary teacher, I am aware of. What would you possibly recommend for this to progress? Would you choose to make an institutional change with the ministry of education, or perhaps create awareness on a more individual level with specific schools?
Hi Simran,
Both of my parents are actually high school teachers, so I’m generally kept up to date on the going-ons in the school districts and the province in terms of education. Over the past couple of years, the Ministry of Education (I think at least it’s Ministry of Education) has actually been developing a new curriculum for the past few years that included a lot more curriculum on indigenous perspectives that it used to. I don’t exactly know the extent of this inclusion as my mom (who teaches English and Social Studies) has been including Indigenous issues and perspectives in her teaching for many, many years now.
It’s great that they are finally including Indigenous perspectives in the formal curriculum, I think the main problem that has to be dealt with now is that teachers don’t know exactly how they should be teaching it. It’s always difficult to teach a subject you aren’t familiar with, and so many of the teachers currently in our schools didn’t grow up with Indigenous issues being mentioned and talked about. So many teachers are uncomfortable with the topic because they are afraid they will mess it up in some form.
I have no clue what’s available to teachers from the Ministry to help them teach Indigenous issues and perspectives in their classrooms, and for all I know, they have already implemented my suggestion, but I think teachers should have access to some kind of guidelines or training to help them feel more comfortable teaching these topics. I know they have a bit of training available during Professional development sessions, but I think that it needs to be more widespread to be more effective.
Hi Cassie! I loved reading your post. My question would be how could we change this Eurocentric education on Indigenous history, culture and issues in todays world. Everything that I have learned whether it would be in an academic situation or outside always seems to be through this lens since it has been the dominate culture for so long. How would Indigenous peoples reclaim the heritage and culture that was nearly destroyed through residential schools? Then be able to educate the rest of the world on Indigenous culture and history with their own voices?
Hi Tamara,
I think a lot of the answer to your question comes down to time and education.
I remember, in my grade 8 Social Studies class, we had this relatively old textbook from 1998. It had two central themes: a Eurocentric view and a Middle eastern view. Both sections covered the same topics (ie. The Crusades, the development of religion, etc.), but each topic was covered from both perspectives. I thought this was pretty cool because I hadn’t ever learned much about what the Middle East was like in the Middle Ages. However, my class only discussed the first half of the text, the Eurocentric half.
We do this same thing with Indigenous perspectives and issues. They are there and they are teachable, but it just isn’t happening to the degree it needs to be in elementary and high schools. If you look at my reply to Simran’s comment, I explain how this has gotten better in recent years (at least in BC) and some of the problems that are still present.
I really think the best way to stop seeing solely from a Eurocentric perspective is through education. If we can educate present and future children how to switch views when examining an event or a problem, then that may help stop us from educating solely from a Eurocentric lens. I don’t exactly know how this could be implemented, that’s really up for teaching professionals to figure out, but I certainly think this strategy could help with how Canada thinks about Indigenous issues and perspectives.