[While Columbus Day affirms the story of a nation created by
Europeans for Europeans, Indigenous Peoples Day emphasizes Native
histories and Native people – an important addition to our
ever-evolving understanding of what it means to be American. ]
[[link removed]]

WHY MORE PLACES ARE ABANDONING COLUMBUS DAY IN FAVOR OF INDIGENOUS
PEOPLES DAY  
[[link removed]]


 

Malinda Maynor Lowery
October 10, 2022
The Conversation
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

_ While Columbus Day affirms the story of a nation created by
Europeans for Europeans, Indigenous Peoples Day emphasizes Native
histories and Native people – an important addition to our
ever-evolving understanding of what it means to be American. _

Indigenous People’s Day, by CSUF Photos, licensed under CC BY-NC-SA
2.0

 

Increasingly, Columbus Day is giving people pause
[[link removed]].

More and more towns and cities across the country are electing to
celebrate Indigenous Peoples Day as an alternative to
[[link removed]]
– or in addition to – the day intended to honor Columbus’
voyages.

Critics of the change
[[link removed]]
see it as just another example of political correctness run amok –
another flashpoint of the culture wars.

As a scholar of Native American history
[[link removed]] –
and a member of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina – I know the
story is more complex than that.

The growing recognition and celebration of Indigenous Peoples Day
actually represents the fruits of a concerted, decades-long effort to
recognize the role of indigenous people in the nation’s history.

Why Columbus?

Columbus Day is a relatively new federal holiday.

In 1892, a joint congressional resolution
[[link removed]]
prompted President Benjamin Harrison to mark the “discovery of
America by Columbus,” in part because of “the devout faith of the
discoverer and for the divine care and guidance which has directed our
history and so abundantly blessed our people.”

Europeans invoked God’s will
[[link removed]]
to impose their will on Indigenous people. So it seemed logical to
call on God when establishing a holiday celebrating that conquest,
too.

Of course, not all Americans considered themselves blessed in 1892.
That same year, a lynching forced black journalist Ida B. Wells to
flee her home town of Memphis
[[link removed]]. And while Ellis
Island had opened in January of that year, welcoming European
immigrants
[[link removed]],
Congress had already banned Chinese immigration a decade prior
[[link removed]], subjecting
Chinese people living in the U.S. to widespread persecution.

And then there was the government’s philosophy toward the
country’s Native Americans, which Army Colonel Richard Henry Pratt
so unforgettably articulated in 1892
[[link removed]]: “All the Indian there is in
the race should be dead. Kill the Indian in him, and save the man.”

It took another 42 years for Columbus Day to formally become a federal
holiday, thanks to a 1934 decree
[[link removed]] by President
Franklin D. Roosevelt.

He was responding, in part, to a campaign by the Knights of Columbus,
a national Catholic charity founded to provide services to Catholic
immigrants. Over time, its agenda expanded
[[link removed]] to include
advocacy for Catholic social values and education.

When Italians first arrived in the United States, they were targets of
marginalization and discrimination
[[link removed]].
Officially celebrating Christopher Columbus – an Italian Catholic
– became one way to affirm the new racial order that would emerge
[[link removed]]
in the U.S. in the 20th century, one in which the descendants of
diverse ethnic European immigrants became “white” Americans.

Indigenous people power

But some Americans started to question why Indigenous people –
who’d been in the country all along – didn’t have their own
holiday.

In the 1980s, Colorado’s American Indian Movement chapter began
protesting the celebration of Columbus Day
[[link removed]].
In 1989, activists in South Dakota persuaded the state to replace
[[link removed]]
Columbus Day with Native American Day. Both states have large Native
populations that played active roles in the Red Power Movement
[[link removed]] in
the 1960s and 1970s, which sought to make American Indian people more
politically visible.

Then, in 1992, at the 500th anniversary of Columbus’ first voyage,
American Indians in Berkeley, California, organized the first
“Indigenous Peoples Day
[[link removed]],”
a holiday the city council soon formally adopted. Berkeley has since
replaced its commemoration of Columbus with a celebration of
indigenous people.

The holiday can also trace its origins to the United Nations. In 1977,
indigenous leaders from around the world organized a United Nations
conference in Geneva to promote indigenous sovereignty and
self-determination. Their first recommendation
[[link removed]] was “to observe October 12,
the day of so-called ‘discovery’ of America, as an International
Day of Solidarity with the Indigenous Peoples of the Americas.” It
took another 30 years for their work to be formally recognized in the
United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
[[link removed]],
which was adopted in September 2007.

Unexpected allies

Today, cities with significant native populations, like Seattle,
Portland and Los Angeles, celebrate either Native American Day or
Indigenous Peoples Day. And states like Hawaii, Nevada, Minnesota,
Alaska and Maine have also formally recognized their Native
populations with similar holidays. Many Native governments, like the
Cherokee and Osage in Oklahoma, either don’t observe Columbus Day or
have replaced it with their own holiday.

But you’ll also find commemorations in less likely places. Alabama
celebrates Native American Day
[[link removed]]
alongside Columbus Day, as does North Carolina, which, with a
population of over 120,000 Native Americans
[[link removed]],
has the largest number of Native Americans of any state east of the
Mississippi River.

In 2018, the town of Carrboro, North Carolina, issued a resolution
[[link removed]] to
celebrate Indigenous Peoples Day. The resolution noted the fact that
the town of 21,000 had been built on Indigenous land and that it was
committed to “protect, respect and fulfill the full range of
inherent human rights,” including those of Indigenous people.

While Columbus Day affirms the story of a nation created by Europeans
for Europeans, Indigenous Peoples Day emphasizes Native histories and
Native people – an important addition to the country’s
ever-evolving understanding of what it means to be American.[The
Conversation]

_Malinda Maynor Lowery
[[link removed]] is Professor
of History and Director, Center for the Study of the American South,
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
[[link removed]]._

_She is a member of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina who writes on
topics including American Indian history, Southern history, religion,
music, and foodways. Her second book, The Lumbee Indians: An American
Struggle, will be published by UNC Press in September 2018. The
Lumbees' journey as a people sheds new light on America's defining
moments, from the first encounters with Europeans to the present day.
More about the book at [link removed]

_This article is republished from The Conversation
[[link removed]] under a Creative Commons license. Read
the original article
[[link removed]]._

* Indigenous People's Day
[[link removed]]
* Columbus Day
[[link removed]]
* Indigenous peoples
[[link removed]]
* History
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

 

 

 

INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

Submit via web
[[link removed]]

Submit via email
Frequently asked questions
[[link removed]]

Manage subscription
[[link removed]]

Visit xxxxxx.org
[[link removed]]

Twitter [[link removed]]

Facebook [[link removed]]

 




[link removed]

To unsubscribe, click the following link:
[link removed]