Ep. 37 Dr. Paulette Steeves

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For full disclosure. The views and
opinions expressed in this podcast are those are

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the guests in the host. The
content here is for informational purposes only.

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I'm Tina and we have our guest, Hennessy's right here, who is the

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one who actually introduced your work and
you to us the podcast and really encouraged

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us to, you know, look
into your research and your work and showed

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us some of your story. And
I want to give her an opportunity to

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also introduce herself to Oh my God, my hands are setting, doctor Pillett

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Steves, because I'm a huge fan
Sam Shaw Get Malaya insta. Nice to

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meet you, Doctor Pellette Steves.
I will say that I will probably cry

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throughout this interview because I'm very excited
to meet you, and also because the

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work that you are doing is so
important and it has impacted me so deeply,

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both as a human being and as
someone who is in the archaeology world.

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And it's when I first met you
in your work, I was like,

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in this, in this place,
like it'd be so amazing to be

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able to be in the same space
with you. And so now we're here

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and I you know, I you
know, manifested that, and I know

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ancestors are here for a reason and
pushing me to reach out. And it

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was just a conversation that I had
with Tina and another member of a podcast

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and now we're he so I just
I don't even know what to say,

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but I'm just so excited to have
a conversation with you and go further.

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And I'm actually about to be done
with your book. I've been reading in

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and I'm about like a little bit
less than a chapter away from finishing it.

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So I'm just excited about our conversation
today. So thank you so much

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for coming here and sharing the space
with us today. We rich thank you

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for sharing all of that with me. It's really important for me to hear

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back from people, you know,
in our indigenous communities. I don't get

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a real strong reading back on how
my work is impacting people unless people reach

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out. And so I have had
students and classes and faculty and people like

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you reach out, and it's always
so so uplifting to hear from you and

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how it is positively impacting our community
these it is. I mean, I

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it's just I can't I don't know
if I have I'm able to articulate what

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it's done. You know. I
I'm actually being an organizer and land defender

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for over a decade now, and
it's just reading your book just like validates

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and confirms a lot of a lot
of things, like things that I that

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I knew, things that I read
and I intuitively just felt. And it's

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another thing to actually have numbers and
evidence, and not because I don't believe

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it, but it's it's it's just
the like a ceremony that you're creating by

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exposing all of this in a tangible
form that can be read upon wherever you're

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at, you know, and it's
accessible to not just indigenous people but also

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non indigenous people, which is like
super super important. And you know it

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might be controversial, but I will
say it. I truly believe the indigenous

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peoples of the Americas were in another
level when it comes to human human civilization

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and human history. And we do
not get the credit that is due to

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us. And I'm not here to
be like, oh, we I want

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you to see me like the systems
or whatever, like I don't I don't

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need that, but but it's still
important to uplift and to shed a light

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on the amazing contributions that we have
had and continuously have in our societies.

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And one thing that I always talk
to people about, especially like because I

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like, you know, specialize in
like Southwestern indigenous histories. It's like,

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whereas indigenous peoples in your head when
you think about history, you know,

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in like a time time frame we
think about people. There's like this TikTok

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trend about people being asked like how
often or like white men being as how

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often they think about the Roman Empire. I don't know if you guys have

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seen it. It's hilarious, but
reading like, it's just our people and

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our histories and this land is kind
of like an afterthought. It's kind of

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like, oh, you can't even
remember, you know, getting his Khan

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and you know Julius Caesar and all
of these people, but like nobody really

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has an idea of the people we're
here, like in Mexico, and you

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know, he was an emperor and
he was also a poet and all of

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this stuff. So this book really
does put a big, big like shed

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light to how we've this is not
a new world. It's always been part

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of the world. It's not new. So there's no such thing as an

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old world in a new world.
That's all the part of colonization to create

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our civilizations as not uncivilized and infantile. And you're right, you know,

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non indigenous people don't have an awareness
that's a part of colonization. That's been

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an intentional erasure of our intellectualism and
our humanity within education as a part of

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colonization. It's still ongoing, so
I'm really working to try to bring more

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attention to that as well. I
think that, you know, before we

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get into more further conversation, I
would just like for you, doctor Pollitt

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Steves, to do it just an
introduction of who you are and your homelands

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and your work, and then as
well as you Hennessys, and then we

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can definitely move forward from there.
Okay, well, Tansy, thank you

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for inviting me to your podcast today. I'm very honored to be here.

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My name is doctor Poullitt Steve's.
I'm an Indigenous archaeologist. I teach at

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Algoma University in Saint Marie, Ontario
in sociology, anthropology, geography, geology

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and land Stewardship. I am a
Canada Research Chair, which means that the

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federal government granting agency in Canada approved
my grant application. They believed my evidence

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for early peoples in the Americas,
and they've supported me for five years of

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research. So I only have to
teach two classes a year and the rest

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of my time is research and I'm
just working on renewing that grant for another

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five years. So I'm really I
was really excited. Was definitely a sign

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from creator that three grant reviewers believed
me, because it's been so denied that

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we've been here more than twelve thousand
years, but they believed me to the

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tune of a huge amount of grant
funds to do this research. So I

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think, you know, letting indigenous
students particularly know if you have an idea

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of research ever, never fear going
forward with it because your ancestors got your

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back. That's amazing. Absolutely,
thank you so much for sharing that.

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We also have Hennesis who is here
with us as archaeology in the fields individual

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who introduced herself as well. Yo, sim Chinela, everybody Insteak. First

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of all, Atome, I am
from predominantly northern Sonora. That's where I'm

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from, and first and am when
I acknowledge the land that I'm in right

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now, which is odam Quapa and
Quatan Land and here in the in the

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mighty birthplace of the Colorado River.
Yes. So I graduated from the University

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of Arizona in twenty seventeen with a
bachelor's in anthropology and another bachelor's in linguistics.

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I did a research on figurines on
my own culture down in Lower Door

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Belief. And after I graduated,
I mainly been working as a field tech.

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So I've been doing field work now
since twenty eighteen, so it's been

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a few years. I have diverted
from archaeology and academia in general, both

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for political and personal reasons. When
I was in college, I went through

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this whole you know, shift and
transformation. In twenty fourteen, there was

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a human like just a terrible,
just tragedy in Mexico where forty two students

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were disappeared and kidnapped by the Mexican
government. And when that happened, I

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was involved in organizing. But when
that happened and really seeing how students were

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being targeted by, you know,
by all of these systems because they were

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protesting for the rights to be sovereign
as indigenous peoples. There were indigenous people's

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students in Mexico who were trying to
do autonomous education in Guerrero, and that

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really shifted me the way that I
was thinking about how I was doing life

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in general, and the desire to
reconnect to my own ancestral roots and what

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that means in my life, both
politically and personally, and that has taken

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me to a beautiful but difficult path
to say the least. And soon I

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realized, when I was doing more
archaeology, is how political archaeology is.

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Even I don't care if people say
that it's not. It is because I

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could see from my own perspective beings
only some of the few brown people in

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classes, and I only had one
two professors who were I think they were

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both from China, and everybody else
I had white professors and in the anthropology

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department at Univa, like it's really
it was hard for me to feel that

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I could identify. And then the
way that allow a lot of those classes

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were portraying talking about indigenous peoples made
me feel very like disconnected from it.

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So academia in and of itself,
I noticed it wasn't a place for me

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that I was going to thrive in. I didn't feel like it was a

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space that was meant for me to
succeed and thrive in, and I was

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I was applying for a PhD.
I decided that it was no longer something

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I was aligned with because I don't
agree with the way academia is structured,

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and I was in a mental health
situation that I knew that graduate school was

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not going to help, like that's
not going to help me, And you

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know, I felt very isolated in
academia many, many, many times,

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so I decided not to but been
doing field tech work and I see archaeology

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for me personally, when I asked
myself, what do I see it as

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as my person? And I just
see it as my ceremony in many ways

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as I go on to the land
and really recognizing whose land I'm in and

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the stories that are there, and
I see the ceremony as you know,

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I'm paying tribute to them as I'm
working, And in many ways, I'm

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only the only Indigenous person in those
spaces who has that consciousness of being aware

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and intentional about where I'm stepping,
the thoughts that are going in my head

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as I'm step in in dis places, even though it can be a little

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controversions of the archaeology where you know, I do leave off offerings, you

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know, especially if I know that
we're close to a burial. I don't

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get myself involved in that. It's
really hard to kind of paint that line

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between like being what indigenous and an
archaeologist and mebeing I get pushed to do

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certain things that I'm like uncomfortable with. So yeah, that's where I'm at

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right now in the archaeology world.
I am an entrepreneur and I'm actually doing

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financial education primarily now, but I
do still go out into the into the

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field and because it's something I'm passionate
about. Yeah, I should have mentioned

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too. I'm Cremaiti. All four
of my grandparents had Indigenous parents and mixed

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blood parents, but I primarily associate
with being CREMATEI. I grew up in

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Canada and this is where most of
my relations are from, from Manitoba and

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Northern Quebec and Red River, so
that's a little bit of my cultural background.

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I did grow up with around the
Salish people in British Columbia and I'm

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still very connected to those communities.
Thank you so much, both of you

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for being here. With us to
our listeners. They get the privilege of

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hearing from two amazing women to talk
about their work, their perspectives, their

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ideas, their thoughts. And Doctor
poulad Steves, you know you've done You've

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done this for many, many years, and you've compiled so much data and

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information to share with us younger folks
who find interest in your work, to

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research to apply to teach others.
And I'm just curious when you were a

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young person, what were your first
thoughts, like, did you ever imagine

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you'd be where you're at today?
Oh, my gosh, no, so

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I didn't. I never even went
to high school. I never finished high

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school. I didn't get to have
that kind of life where you dream about

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becoming, you know, a pilot
and astronaut and archaeologist. I had to

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go out and work at a very
young age. But when I was in

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my early thirties, I was getting
divorced, you know, going through the

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messy stuff. And I went to
speak with a Sailish elder, Leonard Samson,

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in my home community in Litlow atte
British Columbia. He knew my family

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really well and he said, you
know what you're going through at the time

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is really hard, but it's a
lesson to learn to deal with difficult situations.

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He said, this is training.
And then he said, you know,

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the elders and I have watched you
grow up, and we know you're

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going to have a really important job
to do that's really going to help Indian

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people, he said, not just
us, he said, Indians everywhere.

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He said, you know, we're
not sure what it is, but it's

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going to be a lot harder than
what you're going through at the time.

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And I couldn't imagine at the time
anything more difficult. I was just becoming

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a single parent. I had three
kids, one was terminally ill. I

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had a truck on twenty six cent. I'm like, what could be more

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difficult? I have to leave my
community. But I never forgot his words,

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and you know, I learned to
listen. I learned to listen to

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what the elders told me. I
learned to listen to the dreams and the

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thoughts that our ancestors bring. And
that's really important because we grew up in

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a white world, a lot of
us, and we're taught not to listen.

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If you listen to your thoughts while
you're crazy, But we need to

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learn how to reincorporate our cultural practices
into our lives. So for me,

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listening to those thoughts and dreams,
those intuitions became very important. And when

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I was an undergraduate student, I
did my undergrad at the University of Arkansas

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and Fayetteville, very close to Oklahoma. And while I was there, the

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Coopa tribe came and they asked me
could I help them. They were trying

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to reclaim five hundred sets of their
ancestors' remains from museums using nagpra, and

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the museums were withholding them, claiming
they couldn't prove they were their ancestors.

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Well, my goodness, these remains
were taken from well known Coopa villages.

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You know, what more evidence do
you want? So the Kapa asked me

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could I do some kind of genetic
work. And we didn't have a genetics

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lab and I was just an undergraduate
student, but I was listening, so

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I said, of course I can, and I applied for a grant,

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an undergraduate honors research grant. I
got in the honors program, I got

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the grant. I got one of
the top geneticists in the US at UC

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Davis in California to work with me. They extracted might und DNA for modern

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quop Pie elders here as soon as
we had those results. While the museums

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and institutions knew it would be a
match, they knew they would be really

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embarrassed for not returning those remains.
And two weeks later, the Quapi reburied

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five hundred ancestors. And that told
me, right there, I needed to

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be an archaeologist. I had been
planning to go to med school, but

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I realized that archaeology was a science
that we can use to support our communities,

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you know, And as Genesis was
saying, it's not easy to be

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an indigenous person in a white academia. It's very difficult. We will never

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feel totally welcome, we will never
feel like we fit. But it's up

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to us. We've been given the
job to go in there and make those

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changes. You do have to be
really strong, you do have to really

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listen to ancestors and have an understanding
of your path through life. So when

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I was grand graduating that my PhD
in twenty fifteen, I think I was

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in my fifties, and all day
thought the things that Elder Samson told me

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were going through my head and I'm
like, oh, I just have to

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rewrite world history to include the Americas. I got this right, And you

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know that work is a lot of
it has now been done. It's got

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a really good start. My first
book is out, and I'm absolutely amazed

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at how quick change in the archaeological
world is now happening. Like back in

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grad school, I swear my brain
almost melted. I almost gave up a

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number of times. I kept listening
to those ancestors and words and I could

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not leave. You know, he
told me I had a job to do.

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But this last week, the Smithsonian
Institution sent me their new, beautiful,

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great big book on the Atlas of
North American History. They are now

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stating we've been here at least fifty
thousand years and citing my research. So

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they've changed their I like forty thousand
years. Canadian Geographic just did a mapping

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special. They paid a photographer to
map my data of almost six hundred sites

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that date from eleven thousand, two
hundred to two hundred thousand years or three

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hundred thousand years in North America.
So they are supporting that we've been here

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two to three hundred thousand years before
present. Oh my god, the change

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is happening so fast that I'm just
amazed. And a lot of faculty have

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told me they're now using my book
as a textbook in their classes. Generation

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of students is learning the truth,
you know, and they're learning about racism

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and bias in archaeology and how it
has historically negatively impacted indigenous communities and colonized

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the minds of all the settler communities
to erase Indigenous presence on this land at

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an early date from their minds.
And so the changes happen so fast.

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I'm just absolutely amazed. But you
know, this is Creator's work, and

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when there's a door that needs to
be open, he'll just go right in

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there and knock it down. And
yeah, it's a blessing. I mean,

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I still face a lot of difficult
situations. I don't work in a

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big university with a big archaeology department
because none of them will hire me,

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because he's going to hire what I've
been called Keisha Super not called me writing

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in the vein of Vine Deloria Junior. So I'm being compared to the next

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Vine Deloria Junior. What archaeology department
would hire him. But you know,

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I wrote in Vineloria Junior for another
book this year, and I called it,

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I think I called it something like
stomp stomp dancing or around dancing in

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academic circles with Vine Doloria Junior.
So you're right, it's a ceremony and

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we're in there, and even though
they're all in our way, we're just

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in there stump dancing, and we're
just taking our presence. No, just

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get out of our and let us
do this work. So in grad school

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I had no mentors, nobody in
the world, not indigenous or non indigenous

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archaeologists. Tests of gathering this data
and showing this view of the indigenous paleolithics

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of the Western hemisphere. Why should
there only be one archaeologist in the world,

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me that did this Because it was
made to be a very dangerous,

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scary place for all archaeologists. This
was an area called an area of academic

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suicide. If you discussed they're published
on earlier than Clovid sites, your career

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was over. I didn't pay any
attention to any of that because Creators got

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my career, and he's just you
know, pushing all those other things out

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of the way. So It's really
important if you're going into academia for students

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to realize you will be in a
vacuum. You will be in a bubble,

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but your ancestors and relations are going
to be their stump dancing with you.

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And so you just take comfort in
that and you trust. You know.

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I came back to Canada in twenty
sixteen after being in the States for

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twenty years, and I took a
one year position for a faculty that was

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going away for a year. And
I thought, well, if I get

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a job, fine, if not, I'll just get you ice and I'll

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write my book. And did I
get a job. I got a job

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with a Canada research chair within one
year of coming back. Coldly smokes.

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That's like six hundred thousand dollars over
five years, teaching only two classes and

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doing whatever you need to do.
And that's Creator's message to me, I

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got you back, you know,
And we have to link this to understanding

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our life past. So my mom
used to always tell me this story every

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year on my birthday. She said, you know, I was born in

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Whitehorse, Yukon, in November in
the middle of a huge snowstorm and my

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mom came home on the hospital on
a dog sled with her neighbors. Her

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name was Steamboat Mary, and they
wrapped me in a big old fur coat

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and my mom got on the dog
sled and away they went in the storm.

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And all of a sudden, the
dogs stopped and Mary got off and

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she was checking the dogs. The
dogs were fine, the sled was fine.

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Didn't she notice my mom had passed
out cold and dropped me. She

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had hemorrhaged and passed out and I
wasn't there. And so Mary trudged back

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in the snow and found me face
down on a corner in the snow,

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brand new baby. And that's my
message from Creator. You know you're going

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to be challenged from day one,
but I got you back. And I

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don't know why. My mom told
me that same story every year on my

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birthday, but it lets me know
that I was given a path where I

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would need to be independent. I
grew up extremely independent, running around communities

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and cities by myself from the time
I was three years old. That's how

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Creator raised me. And you know, listening to Elder Samson and putting it

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all together. You know, when
I was getting my PhD, I was

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like, oh, this is what
they were telling me to do. And

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now I understand. And I didn't
need a big, strong committee for my

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dissertation. I needed my ancestors and
creator and they were there. And there

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were a lot of settler or white
archaeologists who had published on archaeology sites that

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were older than Clovis. Some of
them were fired, they were called crazy,

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they were called lunatics, they were
called bad archaeologists. They were none

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of those things. What they were
was truth tellers. They didn't want to

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lie to support the status quo of
American archaeology. They wanted to tell the

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truth. And if it wasn't for
them, I wouldn't have had anything to

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go on. So they stuck their
necks out and published what they knew was

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the truth. Right now, I'm
writing a book to honor sixty of those

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archaeologists that did that work, you
know, supporting our communities and who told

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the truth. So there's a lot
of there's a lot of ways to get

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through academia. And you know,
I never had a single Indigenous faculty or

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instructor. I had one faculty on
my committee who was from Caribbean and Native

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American studies, and she was Latino
and it was great to have her on

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my committee. But I wasn't given
one paper or book by an Indigenous or

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Aboriginal scholar to read. Now there
are a lot. So I only graduated

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what seven years ago, twenty fifteen, right, and when I was a

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graduate student, there were very few
papers by Indigenous scholars besides Vine Deloria Junior,

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Linda Twali Smith, Devin Mahutier.
I found them all on my own,

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thank god, because they really gave
me a strong foundation. Now there

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are literally thousands of papers by thousands
of Indigenous scholars in such a short time.

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It's absolutely amazing. So I want
to let students know, Oh,

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if you're in a program in academia
and you're not given papers or articles or

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books by Indigenous scholars, find them
on your own. Email me. You

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find one, you read it,
you find ten more, you read them,

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you find twenty more. So there
are ways to get through that academic

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arena, and we really need a
lot of Indigenous students to push through that

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because the more of us there are
in academia, the quicker that we make

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those changes for the future generations.
You know, we need people in field

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work, we need people in government
work, We need people in academic work

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and it's not easy. And you
may be in a bubble in the Southwest.

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You probably have a lot more Indigenous
scholars to reach out to in your

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local area, which is awesome.
I know there are a lot in California

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and a lot in New Mexico.
I was just in New Mexico this year

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giving the keynote lecture for the Native
American Bar Association. So this was awesome.

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There was a room full of over
two hundred Native American judges, lawyers,

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and politicians and they got what I
was saying. It was so awesome

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to speak to a group of people
who really understood, you know, what

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my research was doing. And so
there are big communities that you can reach

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out to whatever academic field you're in
and never be afraid to email even if

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you don't know them, and in
any Indigenous scholar and tell them who you

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are and ask them if you have
needs, if you have questions. That's

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what we're here for. That was
amazing, doctor, but Thieves, thank

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you for sharing all of that.
I really resonate with everything that you were

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saying. When it comes to like
one we don't know, like the certain

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00:27:47.720 --> 00:27:52.680
paths that we're taking and how we
find ourselves in certain places environments for a

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00:27:52.720 --> 00:27:59.640
reason. I've been in that situation
many, many times, and I've been

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very blessed to be close to a
lot of just amazing elders and mentors who

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are Indigenous and doing a lot of
political work, who have taught me to

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listen, because that's a really key
important thing, listening to our communities and

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00:28:15.240 --> 00:28:21.079
listening to mostly ourselves, because it's
through, like you said, through our

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dreams, through our thoughts, and
that we get communicated and through And I

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00:28:26.680 --> 00:28:30.839
didn't understand that until I was older. And I do remember when I was

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00:28:30.880 --> 00:28:33.759
younger, and I would have certain
dreams or certain thoughts or certain ways of

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00:28:33.799 --> 00:28:37.839
like inttally like wanting to do something, but I didn't know why I wanted

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to or why I wanted to give
myself that chance to move to a certain

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place. And I remember I thought
I was like a little crazy. I

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was like, maybe it's just like
my ADHD and I just like don't have

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00:28:49.799 --> 00:28:56.160
a sense of risk, and I
like to put myself in situations. Now

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I really going to reflect, I'm
like, no, it's just I've just

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been I've been very blessed to have
a spirit like I have. And I

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00:29:03.519 --> 00:29:07.799
think when you mentioned about how all
these changes are happening, I really do

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00:29:07.880 --> 00:29:11.680
think, doctor PELVSTI. It's also
like the generations that are coming, I

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00:29:11.720 --> 00:29:15.599
think we I'm twenty eight, so
I'm not like a full gen zer,

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00:29:15.759 --> 00:29:18.640
you know, but I'm a younger
millennial, I would say. And from

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what I see from my friends and
my communities, people around my age and

355
00:29:21.960 --> 00:29:25.319
younger. I hang out with a
lot of younger people because I have a

356
00:29:25.359 --> 00:29:29.319
lot of nephews who are like really
tiny, and I see them. I

357
00:29:29.319 --> 00:29:33.680
see them every day. And how
like our youth are really ready to be

358
00:29:33.720 --> 00:29:37.599
able to receive a lot more messages
than the other generations. I feel like

359
00:29:37.079 --> 00:29:42.240
we have a lot more tools.
Our hearts are more open. You know.

360
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My friends and I are talking about
intimacy and vulnerability, and I think

361
00:29:47.759 --> 00:29:52.359
that's such a key part when able
to be able to receive those messages,

362
00:29:52.160 --> 00:29:56.599
because it takes a really deep part
of us to be able to receive it,

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because it does trigger, it does
trigger a lot of us inside,

364
00:30:00.519 --> 00:30:03.359
like all this trauma that we have
to go through and then getting all this

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00:30:03.480 --> 00:30:07.960
new information, it takes emotional capacity
and emotional resilience to be able to hold

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00:30:08.000 --> 00:30:11.480
it. And I really do think
that the youth, I include myself in

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there, we're excited, We're enthusiastic. We're like, we want this,

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we want to be able to receive
this knowledge, and we want to take

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00:30:18.359 --> 00:30:22.759
it and transform it. We want
to make it in a way that it's

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gonna last. And we're ready to
shift the world. And there's a lot

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of stuff that's happening in the world
right now, but I think at the

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same time, younger generations are really
just are really pushing the world in a

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direction that I'm that makes me very
hopeful. And I really do believe that

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your research is part of that.
And I think that's why there's such a

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00:30:44.839 --> 00:30:48.200
shift, because I think people are
ready for this, Like we're past like

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00:30:48.839 --> 00:30:52.720
just talking about racism, Like it's
not that it's not important, but we're

377
00:30:52.759 --> 00:30:56.079
like we're ready, Like we understand
racism, Like what's the next step?

378
00:30:56.359 --> 00:31:03.000
How do we go from understanding racism
so now being practicing being anti racist?

379
00:31:03.519 --> 00:31:08.240
Right? And And archaeology for me
is such an it's a it's a tool

380
00:31:10.519 --> 00:31:14.359
that people can use art and this
is for me, for the archaeologists out

381
00:31:14.400 --> 00:31:18.119
there, it is a tool for
change that you can create. And we

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00:31:18.160 --> 00:31:22.799
see this with doctor Paula Steves,
change that wee's necessary from the field up

383
00:31:22.839 --> 00:31:27.079
to academia. So I really agree
with that. And you know, you

384
00:31:27.119 --> 00:31:32.359
were talking about school in academia.
I'm like, oh, doctor Pellet Steves

385
00:31:32.440 --> 00:31:37.039
is just academia. Oh my god. It's just I don't vibe with it.

386
00:31:37.279 --> 00:31:40.319
It's just like, yo, like
I'm here just like vibing and want

387
00:31:40.319 --> 00:31:44.599
to chill and just create communities and
like can we just like all work together.

388
00:31:44.640 --> 00:31:48.119
Why is it so hard? And
academia is like, nah, you

389
00:31:48.200 --> 00:31:52.880
gotta do it on your own.
It's just my spirit doesn't vibe with with

390
00:31:52.960 --> 00:32:00.240
academia many times. But I hear
what you're saying and I'm listening and I'm

391
00:32:00.240 --> 00:32:04.759
taking it in. I promise.
I don't know. Like when you talk

392
00:32:04.759 --> 00:32:07.160
about what it's creator trying to tell
me, I'm like, I don't know.

393
00:32:08.839 --> 00:32:13.640
Well, there's a lot of people
now that are working with communities.

394
00:32:13.640 --> 00:32:21.440
So this whole community centered archaeology thing, so some settler archaeologists have you know,

395
00:32:21.440 --> 00:32:23.720
they're trying to do the right thing, they're trying to be politically correct,

396
00:32:23.720 --> 00:32:28.519
they're trying to heal the field.
You know, there's a few,

397
00:32:28.599 --> 00:32:31.680
like in Washington State they've done really
good work with the Five Tribes of the

398
00:32:31.799 --> 00:32:37.400
Round, And in British Columbia there's
a program at University of Victoria where the

399
00:32:37.480 --> 00:32:43.720
elders teach the classes with the faculty. So there are some spaces where that's

400
00:32:43.799 --> 00:32:49.480
working really good for communities, and
communities have the resources and the knowledge holders

401
00:32:49.519 --> 00:32:54.240
to step up and become the leaders
in creating what it's taught about their history,

402
00:32:54.799 --> 00:33:00.279
so that's really really important. Those
are not that many spaces, but

403
00:33:00.319 --> 00:33:04.640
they're starting to open up, which
is really good. It is a lot,

404
00:33:04.960 --> 00:33:08.920
it's a lot of work to work
with elders and community and to make

405
00:33:08.960 --> 00:33:14.920
safe spaces for them in academia.
But one thing is for sure, to

406
00:33:15.079 --> 00:33:21.160
continue making these good changes, to
continue decolonizing all these minds, we have

407
00:33:21.240 --> 00:33:27.000
to lead the work. So I
do need. I need archaeologists students who

408
00:33:27.039 --> 00:33:29.559
are going to take over my work. I know I'm going to work till

409
00:33:29.559 --> 00:33:32.799
be one hundred and twenty six,
that's fine, but I need a group

410
00:33:32.839 --> 00:33:37.039
of archaeologists that are going to continue
this work. You know, I thought

411
00:33:37.400 --> 00:33:38.759
originally, well, I'll do this
piece of work and it'll be there.

412
00:33:38.960 --> 00:33:43.519
No creator says, you'll do this
piece of work, and you'll keep doing

413
00:33:43.519 --> 00:33:45.839
this piece of work, and you'll
train others, you know, a big

414
00:33:45.880 --> 00:33:51.559
group of others to continue this work
when you need to put down your pens

415
00:33:52.000 --> 00:33:57.960
and when you need to put down
your weapons. Right, But you know,

416
00:33:59.000 --> 00:34:01.920
going into academia. The book chapter
I was working on today talks about

417
00:34:01.920 --> 00:34:06.839
what's called an ulteriity or other ing, the history of other ing. Well,

418
00:34:06.880 --> 00:34:10.639
that's all about colonization and how we
were othered as being non intellectuals.

419
00:34:12.000 --> 00:34:15.000
But I had to write a story
that related to my own experience, but

420
00:34:15.119 --> 00:34:20.280
without naming people. So I wrote
a story about an ant in the department

421
00:34:20.320 --> 00:34:24.960
of elephants who was critiquing the elephant's
history, and the elephants kept stepping on

422
00:34:25.000 --> 00:34:29.599
them. But the one thing the
elephants forgot is that the ant has the

423
00:34:29.639 --> 00:34:34.719
biggest brain mass of any being on
the universe brain mass per body size,

424
00:34:35.440 --> 00:34:38.159
you know, And there's no stopping
that. And so the ants just kept

425
00:34:38.159 --> 00:34:43.639
going and going and going. And
so I need now all my archaeologists to

426
00:34:43.679 --> 00:34:47.960
come and take up my work.
In many areas, when you look at

427
00:34:49.000 --> 00:34:52.079
the Americas and you look at you
know, North America, you look at

428
00:34:52.119 --> 00:34:55.639
Mexico, you look at Central America. You need all the areas of South

429
00:34:55.679 --> 00:35:00.480
America. We need indigenous archaeologists in
all those areas. And let me tell

430
00:35:00.480 --> 00:35:06.400
you we have come together. Wow, that is one army. You are

431
00:35:06.480 --> 00:35:09.760
not going to stop. And so
we do need that army as scholars.

432
00:35:09.800 --> 00:35:15.280
It is a difficult place, but
you can make it your own place.

433
00:35:15.960 --> 00:35:21.360
But it's really great to see other
archaeologists, both indigenous and settler, who

434
00:35:21.360 --> 00:35:27.519
are actually working with communities and creating
spaces where elders and knowledge molders come in

435
00:35:27.880 --> 00:35:32.079
and co teach those classes on their
own history. Right. So those are

436
00:35:32.079 --> 00:35:37.519
the kinds of changes we see taking
place and the spaces we need to make.

437
00:35:37.599 --> 00:35:42.960
Yeah, there's really good non indigenous
archaeologists doing a lot of work.

438
00:35:43.679 --> 00:35:47.239
One of my mentors is Jill McCormick. I don't know if you remember her.

439
00:35:47.280 --> 00:35:51.000
I think she has reached out to
you several times. So I was

440
00:35:51.039 --> 00:35:55.880
working with her with the Quatan tribe
here in Uma County, and she was

441
00:35:55.920 --> 00:36:00.519
one of the people who introduced me
to your work. I just want to

442
00:36:00.559 --> 00:36:02.519
give her a shout out. I'm
gonna send her this episode and be like

443
00:36:02.800 --> 00:36:10.119
Jill because she really admires your work. But she has been an example of

444
00:36:10.320 --> 00:36:15.280
me as first and foremost just being
what a good archaeologist like is, you

445
00:36:15.280 --> 00:36:20.239
know, from being in the field
and what we're looking at in the field.

446
00:36:20.800 --> 00:36:24.599
And she has a powerful connection with
the with the tribes in the Yuma

447
00:36:24.719 --> 00:36:30.679
area, and so she's an example
of how she prioritizes the tribes needs as

448
00:36:30.719 --> 00:36:36.559
an archaeologist, even when she is
not you know, she's she's not an

449
00:36:36.559 --> 00:36:40.119
indigenous, but she's adopted by the
tribes over there. She is but an

450
00:36:40.199 --> 00:36:46.159
example how you you create a space
when using what you have and really looking

451
00:36:46.199 --> 00:36:51.159
out for the community and using archaeology
as a way to do that. So

452
00:36:51.280 --> 00:36:54.480
I've had really good examples. I've
been very fortunate to have really good mentors

453
00:36:54.480 --> 00:36:59.039
in that way. But definitely like
for me, when it comes to not

454
00:36:59.119 --> 00:37:00.840
just academia and our college, in
this world, it is just like it's

455
00:37:00.840 --> 00:37:06.559
so highly political, doctor politicis oh
my loud. I used to work for

456
00:37:06.639 --> 00:37:12.920
an environmental company and Uma Proving Grounds. So Yuma Proving Grounds is one of

457
00:37:12.960 --> 00:37:15.719
the largest military bases here in the
United States. So this is the area

458
00:37:15.880 --> 00:37:22.800
the Sonoran desert is the area where
the US military tests its weapons, so

459
00:37:23.079 --> 00:37:28.760
you'd imagine, but that land is
sacred land to the Quatsam people. That's

460
00:37:28.800 --> 00:37:32.920
where their birth is from. So
it's a very very sacred, sacred,

461
00:37:32.960 --> 00:37:37.280
sacred place. And now was very
blessed and privileged to be able to work

462
00:37:37.320 --> 00:37:44.840
there alongside the tribes. But it
was so difficult from working as a contractor

463
00:37:44.960 --> 00:37:50.719
working for the government and dealing with
all the bullshit and I'm not gonna say

464
00:37:50.760 --> 00:37:53.920
any other word because it is and
the discrimination I had to go through.

465
00:37:54.280 --> 00:37:58.840
And at that point, I was
like, where do I go? Do

466
00:37:58.920 --> 00:38:02.000
I go like private? Do I
go in the government? Do the academia?

467
00:38:02.039 --> 00:38:05.800
And and just feel like every space
that I had been because I've been

468
00:38:05.800 --> 00:38:08.760
in every in every of those spaces, even working in the tribes, it's

469
00:38:08.800 --> 00:38:16.039
like wow, Like the politics here
is so overbearing and overwhelming and trying to

470
00:38:16.280 --> 00:38:22.519
get people together, and it's just
how archaeology just really triggers something in people,

471
00:38:22.960 --> 00:38:28.800
right, because archaeology brings upon fourth
conversations about land, right, who

472
00:38:28.840 --> 00:38:32.480
gets who details first of all,
what's important to preserve or not right?

473
00:38:32.519 --> 00:38:36.840
Who has the right to say like
this is mine and that's yours, who

474
00:38:36.840 --> 00:38:40.880
has the right to decide what gets
developed or not get developed? And archaeologists

475
00:38:40.920 --> 00:38:45.280
just kind of find themselves kind of
in the middle of all those conversations and

476
00:38:45.360 --> 00:38:46.719
we're kind of like, wait,
you know, we're trying to do at

477
00:38:46.800 --> 00:38:52.119
work, but it's a difficult place
to be at. And when you add

478
00:38:52.119 --> 00:38:54.960
on top of that be an indigenous. Oh man, I've had I have

479
00:38:55.079 --> 00:39:00.599
stories. I have stories, and
it's like very it's just so overwhelming,

480
00:39:01.079 --> 00:39:06.320
you know. I still love the
work so much. It's really great.

481
00:39:06.480 --> 00:39:07.639
Like I said, like, I
see that as a ceremony to me,

482
00:39:08.119 --> 00:39:13.360
but it's so difficult, and I
admire you so much to be able to

483
00:39:13.400 --> 00:39:17.079
hold that space, doctor parlets do, because I just can't imagine what it

484
00:39:17.199 --> 00:39:22.280
felt like because now, like I
mean, you did graduate in twenty fifteen,

485
00:39:22.320 --> 00:39:28.360
and things have changed a lot since
then. And I have to give

486
00:39:28.400 --> 00:39:31.880
credit to the Black Lives Matter movement, you know, with really just putting

487
00:39:31.920 --> 00:39:36.840
forth that awareness and people united,
you know, for a cause, and

488
00:39:36.880 --> 00:39:39.719
the feminist movement in Latin America has
been a very big influence on me.

489
00:39:40.719 --> 00:39:45.440
But in general, it's like highly
political and overbearing and it sometimes just feels

490
00:39:45.519 --> 00:39:51.400
very powerless, like I feel very
powerless because it's like it's just me,

491
00:39:51.559 --> 00:39:54.719
one person out here trying to do
all this stuff. And I talk to

492
00:39:55.599 --> 00:40:00.800
my archaeologists coworkers especially too. I
always bring them forward this, and this

493
00:40:00.880 --> 00:40:04.599
is something you talk about in your
book too, where you know, like

494
00:40:04.679 --> 00:40:12.000
how many people doing archaeology in the
Americas actually even take one class, just

495
00:40:12.679 --> 00:40:17.440
even one class of indigenous histories?
And it's so true. I remember when

496
00:40:17.480 --> 00:40:22.000
I was in college. I had
to be I was so intentional about the

497
00:40:22.039 --> 00:40:27.760
classes that I was taking because I
wasn't a path of decolonizing and reindigenizing the

498
00:40:27.760 --> 00:40:31.000
way I was thinking of being.
But it had to be so intentional because

499
00:40:31.039 --> 00:40:36.119
it was not something that was given
to me. I had to like go

500
00:40:36.199 --> 00:40:42.639
and seek it and ask and do
all this stuff because it wasn't that it

501
00:40:42.679 --> 00:40:46.480
wasn't part of the curriculum. And
I even got questioned by my what's her

502
00:40:46.599 --> 00:40:51.480
name forgot but she was the person
who was getting me in my classes.

503
00:40:51.880 --> 00:40:54.199
And I would take certain classes and
she would question and it's like, why

504
00:40:54.239 --> 00:40:59.280
are you taking Like I wanted to
take like a political class around like political

505
00:40:59.360 --> 00:41:01.280
histories, and she was like,
but why are you taking that that has

506
00:41:01.320 --> 00:41:06.199
nothing to do with archaeology, and
I was like no, but for me

507
00:41:06.320 --> 00:41:08.800
it was important. I was like, no, I know it's not archaeology,

508
00:41:09.199 --> 00:41:15.119
but it's important for me to understand
the political side because this has influenced

509
00:41:15.159 --> 00:41:19.800
the way that I'm doing archaeology.
But I got questioned a lot about the

510
00:41:19.840 --> 00:41:22.760
reasons. I was like, I
was taking Mexican American classes, I was

511
00:41:22.800 --> 00:41:27.840
taking classes on aim and they were
like, what does that have to do

512
00:41:27.920 --> 00:41:31.159
with, like you doing archaeology,
And I'm like it is though it is

513
00:41:31.239 --> 00:41:35.599
important. But that was just me
like, again, I'm blessed to have

514
00:41:35.679 --> 00:41:38.639
this mind and the spirit who understood
them at such a young age, But

515
00:41:38.760 --> 00:41:44.719
I just can't, you know,
I think about my colleagues who don't necessarily

516
00:41:44.760 --> 00:41:47.880
think, you know, the way
that I do, or don't necessarily prioritize

517
00:41:47.880 --> 00:41:52.320
the same things that I do,
and then they're out into the field and

518
00:41:52.360 --> 00:41:59.760
how that does get reflected on the
type of research that gets grants for example,

519
00:42:00.199 --> 00:42:02.000
right the final all like, you
know, finance is also important,

520
00:42:02.000 --> 00:42:07.880
They're like, who what research matters
to be invested in? So it's just

521
00:42:07.920 --> 00:42:10.840
like a lot of layers, a
lot a lot of layers that we have

522
00:42:10.960 --> 00:42:16.159
to move through and and for me
personally, like it can be very isolating.

523
00:42:16.559 --> 00:42:20.559
It it can be very isolating.
Fortunately though, like recently I went

524
00:42:20.599 --> 00:42:22.679
into the field and I met a
friend. Now she's my friend, and

525
00:42:22.760 --> 00:42:28.039
she's from South Africa, and so
we also have conversations about it. And

526
00:42:28.079 --> 00:42:30.559
I told her, like, if
I want to go to South Africa,

527
00:42:30.599 --> 00:42:32.639
girl, I will take a class. So you better take a class too.

528
00:42:32.880 --> 00:42:37.639
You can't do archaeology if you're not
taking an indigenous class. But with

529
00:42:37.840 --> 00:42:40.719
her, you know that her being
a black woman and she understanding a lot

530
00:42:40.719 --> 00:42:44.480
of stuff that I don't have to
explain. She gets it. You know,

531
00:42:44.559 --> 00:42:49.400
I don't have to over explain myself
or like start certain commentaries from certain

532
00:42:49.480 --> 00:42:52.760
people and why I'm upset, I
don't have to explain it to her.

533
00:42:52.760 --> 00:42:55.480
So it's really cool to have someone
like that in the field. And her

534
00:42:55.480 --> 00:43:00.800
and I, you know, maybe
we're problematic, but we're always calling people

535
00:43:00.840 --> 00:43:02.320
out and we don't I mean,
I don't care, Like if you don't

536
00:43:02.360 --> 00:44:07.800
like me, I'm like, I'm
gonna call you out. Yeah. Truth

537
00:44:07.880 --> 00:44:14.840
telling is important, and that's how
you push back on colonization. And you

538
00:44:14.880 --> 00:44:17.719
know, when you go to do
this work, creator gives you this really

539
00:44:19.599 --> 00:44:22.679
nice, beautiful ball of energy to
do the work right, and you're going

540
00:44:22.760 --> 00:44:28.840
to have all kinds of politics and
negative people and racism and buying bias.

541
00:44:28.920 --> 00:44:31.840
They're flying at your ball of energy
like you know, space drivis trying to

542
00:44:31.920 --> 00:44:37.280
knock chunks off, and you got
to protect that ball of energy. You

543
00:44:37.320 --> 00:44:40.440
don't let those things take your energy. Your energy is given to you to

544
00:44:40.559 --> 00:44:45.400
focus on the work you've been given
to do. So Number one, listen

545
00:44:45.039 --> 00:44:49.719
about the work you've been given to
do. Number Two, protect your ball

546
00:44:49.760 --> 00:44:53.800
of energy and all that stuff outside
of it that doesn't reflect on your research

547
00:44:53.840 --> 00:44:59.119
and your work and the work you're
doing for the next seven generations. You

548
00:44:59.239 --> 00:45:01.800
just let it go. I passed
you. You just dodged that. I

549
00:45:01.920 --> 00:45:07.639
walked through academic dodging left and right, and I learned that if I was

550
00:45:07.679 --> 00:45:10.800
to respond to all of the politics
and racism and bias that was going on,

551
00:45:12.199 --> 00:45:15.039
I would never get my work done. So I learned to just let

552
00:45:15.119 --> 00:45:19.000
it go. Let it go,
Let it go. This work was so

553
00:45:19.159 --> 00:45:22.559
interesting when I figured out that.
You know, I emailed doctor Steve Land

554
00:45:22.559 --> 00:45:25.119
at the Denver Museum when I was
a graduate student. I said, you

555
00:45:25.199 --> 00:45:29.760
know, I'm wondering about sites that
are older than Clovis. I've heard you've

556
00:45:29.760 --> 00:45:31.639
worked on a few, and he
said. He emailed me back, he

557
00:45:31.679 --> 00:45:36.639
said, here's a list of ten
sites. Don't tell anyone what you're studying.

558
00:45:36.679 --> 00:45:39.119
They're just gonna call you crazy.
Well, if it's your dissertation,

559
00:45:39.239 --> 00:45:43.840
you've got to tell some a lot
of somebody's. But I took those ten

560
00:45:43.920 --> 00:45:45.559
sites and I read about them,
and every site I read about, I

561
00:45:45.599 --> 00:45:49.320
learned about other sites. And in
two weeks I had a list of over

562
00:45:49.400 --> 00:45:52.679
five hundred sites that were older than
Clovis. And I said, Okay,

563
00:45:52.719 --> 00:45:58.800
now I understand my life's path.
I got so interested in finding all of

564
00:45:58.840 --> 00:46:00.719
the data on all those and every
time I looked at a site, I

565
00:46:00.760 --> 00:46:05.599
found another site. Now I know
of over five thousand sites. Now I

566
00:46:05.639 --> 00:46:08.199
have a database of over six hundred
solid sites. And do you know that

567
00:46:08.559 --> 00:46:13.840
in what we call the grey literature. So I worked in cultural resource management

568
00:46:13.840 --> 00:46:16.039
field work for five years. I
got fired off my last three jobs because

569
00:46:16.039 --> 00:46:20.719
I wouldn't lie about there being an
archaeological site where they wanted to put a

570
00:46:20.800 --> 00:46:23.239
drilling pad. And I didn't care. Go ahead and fire me. I'm

571
00:46:23.320 --> 00:46:27.639
off to graduate school. But I
learned, you know, to study the

572
00:46:27.800 --> 00:46:30.760
artifacts, to study the collections,
to study the dates. I learned to

573
00:46:30.840 --> 00:46:36.639
focus that energy on what it was
I needed to do, and I created

574
00:46:36.760 --> 00:46:39.639
that database. And it took thirteen
years, but I wrote that book,

575
00:46:40.159 --> 00:46:46.119
and now that has completely changed how
the majority of archaeologists see our history.

576
00:46:46.199 --> 00:46:51.239
So I did a big survey earlier
this year. I haven't published it yet,

577
00:46:51.519 --> 00:46:53.559
and I asked ten basic questions.
How long do you think you know

578
00:46:53.679 --> 00:46:59.639
indigenous people have been in Americas?
Do you believe that rock art and oral

579
00:46:59.719 --> 00:47:04.440
t actually hold documented history? And
what about these sites? Do you think

580
00:47:04.480 --> 00:47:07.760
these sites are legitimate? Well,
let me tell you I was blown away.

581
00:47:07.360 --> 00:47:12.639
Over seventy percent of the archaeologist and
there was about one hundred and sixty

582
00:47:12.679 --> 00:47:19.079
of them or sixty eight agreed that
people have been here over twenty five thousand

583
00:47:19.199 --> 00:47:23.760
years, so before the last glacial
maximum started. Over seventy percent now stated

584
00:47:23.800 --> 00:47:30.199
they believe there is documented historical events
and histories in rock art and oral traditions.

585
00:47:30.480 --> 00:47:36.000
That is a huge change from just
a few years ago. So I

586
00:47:36.039 --> 00:47:40.280
can see now that you know,
I learned to focus my energy on that

587
00:47:40.400 --> 00:47:45.199
one specific thing and just deflect all
that other junk that I didn't need to

588
00:47:45.239 --> 00:47:49.800
waste my time on, you know, as an undergrad student and a graduate

589
00:47:49.840 --> 00:47:52.320
student. Yeah, I did some
protests, I did some work that I

590
00:47:52.360 --> 00:47:59.039
haven't written about that supported Indigenous communities. But my energy has been focused on

591
00:47:59.079 --> 00:48:02.320
this research since my book has come
out. I can see how it's going

592
00:48:02.400 --> 00:48:07.840
to change everything for the next seven
generations, how people see their history when

593
00:48:07.880 --> 00:48:15.320
you push back on racism and discrimination
and misunderstanding, when you inform that,

594
00:48:15.360 --> 00:48:19.000
you push back on it, and
you change it. And so I've had

595
00:48:19.039 --> 00:48:22.000
a number of settlers email me,
and one lady emailed me. She said,

596
00:48:22.519 --> 00:48:27.000
my dad's ninety seven years old and
he read your book and he just

597
00:48:27.159 --> 00:48:32.360
cried and cried and cried because he
knew that story about Clovis first wasn't right,

598
00:48:32.639 --> 00:48:37.360
but he didn't know what was right. And now he knows. And

599
00:48:37.440 --> 00:48:40.920
so there are a lot of people
in both indigenous and the settler worlds who

600
00:48:42.039 --> 00:48:46.400
never believed and who never thought that
that you know, Western archaeological story that

601
00:48:46.440 --> 00:48:51.000
we've only been here, you know, twelve thousand years or so, and

602
00:48:51.039 --> 00:48:53.599
you know, one small group walked
across a huge you know, hundreds of

603
00:48:53.599 --> 00:48:57.880
miles of ice to get here.
They knew that wasn't right, but they

604
00:48:57.880 --> 00:49:01.559
didn't know what was Now they do, and so to me, that's awesome

605
00:49:01.639 --> 00:49:07.079
because that whole generation of people that
is learning will pass it on to the

606
00:49:07.119 --> 00:49:12.280
next generation. And every generation that
learns and it comes in forms becomes a

607
00:49:12.360 --> 00:49:17.960
less racist, less discriminatory generation of
people, and that will change, you

608
00:49:19.000 --> 00:49:22.639
know, the future for the next
seven generations. So it's really only this

609
00:49:22.719 --> 00:49:29.320
year I can see how that work
will change the path for the next seven

610
00:49:29.400 --> 00:49:37.760
generations, will positively impact education,
politics, policies, everything, government,

611
00:49:37.159 --> 00:49:43.599
government policies. When people go to
work on new government policies for protecting the

612
00:49:43.719 --> 00:49:45.639
land, they're going to now have
it in their mind that, oh,

613
00:49:45.679 --> 00:49:50.360
wait, these people have been here
a few hundred thousand years, not just

614
00:49:50.440 --> 00:49:54.079
where Asians from Asia that came here
twelve thousand years ago. So some archaeologists

615
00:49:54.119 --> 00:49:58.079
still make that statement, and right
away I tell them, excuse me,

616
00:49:58.559 --> 00:50:01.519
Asia and Asians didn't ext twelve thousand
years ago. Could you correct this to

617
00:50:01.559 --> 00:50:07.360
be scientifically data that's correct, and
say indigenous people And so you know,

618
00:50:07.480 --> 00:50:15.039
you have to challenge these continued norms
of violence every time you see them and

619
00:50:15.719 --> 00:50:19.280
I can't keep up to all the
writing. And here's another thing, here's

620
00:50:19.320 --> 00:50:23.280
a signal that you know, Creator
has brought me that just blows me away.

621
00:50:23.760 --> 00:50:29.119
I continually hear other academics and faculty
say, oh I put it out

622
00:50:29.159 --> 00:50:32.079
to four publications. Oh it was
turned down. Oh I can't get published.

623
00:50:32.760 --> 00:50:37.719
I've never sent one paper out to
any publication. I've never been turned

624
00:50:37.719 --> 00:50:43.440
down. Everything I've written has been
requested. So Creator went and poked people

625
00:50:43.480 --> 00:50:47.800
in Australia, indigenous and other settler
academics, and they asked me to write

626
00:50:47.800 --> 00:50:52.320
papers on Vine Deloria Junior, on
the Indigenous Paleolithic, on you know,

627
00:50:52.400 --> 00:50:55.920
indigenous method and theory. They could
have asked all kinds of other scholars,

628
00:50:55.920 --> 00:51:00.880
but they asked me. And so
I'm writing Borning Tonight almost every day and

629
00:51:00.960 --> 00:51:06.119
doing research and trying to catch up
on all these seven book chapters coming out

630
00:51:06.119 --> 00:51:09.559
this year. They were all requested. So I don't have any issue getting

631
00:51:09.559 --> 00:51:16.039
published because Creators got my back right. And I'll be going to a big

632
00:51:16.079 --> 00:51:22.559
convention in Hawaii in November, and
it's a group of Indigenous and settler scholars

633
00:51:22.599 --> 00:51:24.719
from Australia who asked me to be
in this session, you know, and

634
00:51:24.760 --> 00:51:29.199
they've asked me to write many papers. So I'm really looking forward to going

635
00:51:29.239 --> 00:51:32.679
there and thanking them, you know
for all the support they they've given me.

636
00:51:32.719 --> 00:51:37.559
But I was an unknown person in
twenty fifteen, and they were asking

637
00:51:37.599 --> 00:51:40.719
me to write book chapters, you
know, because they heard one or two

638
00:51:40.840 --> 00:51:45.559
lectures or something I gave. And
so that's a signal that you know,

639
00:51:45.679 --> 00:51:49.440
your ancestors and creator open all those
doors and they take care of things.

640
00:51:49.480 --> 00:51:52.760
So that's another thing that you don't
have to take that energy from your ball

641
00:51:52.840 --> 00:51:59.280
of energy to worry about publishing because
creators got your back on that. So

642
00:51:59.320 --> 00:52:02.719
I think this one thing I really
want students to remember is like, listen

643
00:52:04.239 --> 00:52:08.440
to your ancestors, Listen to your
dreams, listen to your communities and elders.

644
00:52:08.800 --> 00:52:15.679
Look at what other Indigenous people are
doing and how they're working to decolonize

645
00:52:15.280 --> 00:52:21.800
all of academia because and it has
changed so fast in the last five to

646
00:52:21.920 --> 00:52:27.400
ten years. It's just absolutely astonishing
how quick this change is taking place.

647
00:52:27.800 --> 00:52:30.679
And yes, groups like AIM and
Black Lives Matters had a big part in

648
00:52:30.719 --> 00:52:37.320
this, you know, for decades
making these changes. But just focus on

649
00:52:37.360 --> 00:52:39.960
the work you've been given to do
and the change you've been given to make

650
00:52:40.719 --> 00:52:45.360
and kind of rejoice in that.
So now that my book is out and

651
00:52:45.400 --> 00:52:49.239
I can I hear from students,
and I hear from communities, and I

652
00:52:49.280 --> 00:52:52.960
hear from archaeologists about how happy they
are they have this book, I'm like,

653
00:52:53.599 --> 00:52:58.320
Yay, it's going to actually make
change. And so now all of

654
00:52:58.360 --> 00:53:01.960
that really negative stuff I went through
in grad school I had. I had

655
00:53:02.000 --> 00:53:07.559
students in grad school and classes shake
their fists at me and jump up and

656
00:53:07.559 --> 00:53:09.800
shake their fists and tell me I
better watch what I'm saying. And the

657
00:53:09.880 --> 00:53:15.119
faculty said nothing to them. Right, they should have been charged and kicked

658
00:53:15.159 --> 00:53:17.719
out of school, but I let
that go and I just kept doing my

659
00:53:17.840 --> 00:53:22.280
work. And so that's what you
got to do. Just move forward with

660
00:53:22.320 --> 00:53:25.039
what it is you've been given to
do. I hear what you're saying,

661
00:53:25.039 --> 00:53:30.280
doctor Phillip Steeves. I yeah,
I And I'm glad that you're you're you're

662
00:53:30.320 --> 00:53:35.800
talking about this particular aspect, especially
like you know with this podcast. I

663
00:53:35.800 --> 00:53:37.920
actually used to work for for Tina
in this podcast for a little bit for

664
00:53:38.079 --> 00:53:43.800
a little bit over a year,
and we really wanted to we want to

665
00:53:43.880 --> 00:53:47.079
keep reaching out to the youth in
the communities, and especially with this one,

666
00:53:47.159 --> 00:53:51.559
you know, with the Too communities
in Tucson, but I think in

667
00:53:51.599 --> 00:53:55.599
general, Indigenous youth and I think
you bring upon you know, this light

668
00:53:55.679 --> 00:54:00.639
and hope when it comes to like
if youth want to continue academia and being

669
00:54:00.719 --> 00:54:05.159
like, it is possible for you, right, and that you don't have

670
00:54:05.239 --> 00:54:08.519
to separate who you are as an
Indigenous person to be able to adapt into

671
00:54:08.559 --> 00:54:12.880
this space. That, on the
contrary, and your voice matters, your

672
00:54:12.920 --> 00:54:17.239
story matters, and that that story
and that culture and that identity of who

673
00:54:17.239 --> 00:54:22.239
you are is actually the one that's
going to inform you and guide you when

674
00:54:22.239 --> 00:54:25.360
you are in those spaces. And
that's a big lesson I was learning because

675
00:54:25.360 --> 00:54:30.880
it's somehow academia kind of you know, the way that that you know,

676
00:54:30.960 --> 00:54:36.239
Western science kind of push it pushes
onto you is like, oh, well,

677
00:54:36.320 --> 00:54:40.320
no science is neutral. You know, science is just fat space.

678
00:54:40.559 --> 00:54:45.800
You know, it shouldn't be biased. And we know that that's not true,

679
00:54:45.920 --> 00:54:47.199
right, We know that that's not
true. But when it comes to

680
00:54:47.280 --> 00:54:52.519
like our identities, like Western science
and academia, like I think pushes this

681
00:54:52.519 --> 00:54:55.880
this narrative of like, well you
have to separate who you are as a

682
00:54:55.960 --> 00:55:00.519
person from the research that you're doing. Right, But it's just this list

683
00:55:00.599 --> 00:55:06.679
colonizer lens of like somehow being an
observer, like you're better than everything else,

684
00:55:06.719 --> 00:55:10.440
so you have the power to observe
instead of being in relationship with the

685
00:55:10.480 --> 00:55:15.599
research that you're doing and understanding that
it's energy that's flowing in and now and

686
00:55:15.639 --> 00:55:17.760
how like indigenous people's you, and
like it's a relationship, and that you

687
00:55:17.800 --> 00:55:24.360
don't have to separate who you are
to create factor based research. It's not

688
00:55:24.519 --> 00:55:29.320
a separate thing. On the contrary, right, Like your perspective is what

689
00:55:29.519 --> 00:55:31.920
brings upon fourth a new story when
it comes to the research. And that

690
00:55:32.000 --> 00:55:37.960
is a big lesson I learned to
because I really thought like I didn't have

691
00:55:37.000 --> 00:55:39.719
a place to do that, that
I had to separate who I was,

692
00:55:40.119 --> 00:55:44.880
and that never aligned well with me, you know. But when I was

693
00:55:44.920 --> 00:55:49.159
in academia, when I was doing
my grad my undergraduate, I don't think

694
00:55:49.239 --> 00:55:52.880
these conversations were as common. I
remember just thinking about this and being just

695
00:55:52.920 --> 00:55:58.360
like I don't want to do this, Like it's just like this is I

696
00:55:58.360 --> 00:56:00.199
don't feel like it aligns to me. But I don't really know how to

697
00:56:00.320 --> 00:56:04.840
align it. I don't have anybody
to tell me like if this is okay

698
00:56:04.960 --> 00:56:07.880
or not? You know, But
at that time, when I was younger,

699
00:56:07.199 --> 00:56:09.920
you know, I was looking for
validation. I was looking for someone

700
00:56:09.960 --> 00:56:14.639
to tell me, like what I'm
doing is okay and what I'm doing if

701
00:56:14.639 --> 00:56:19.880
I have to do something that's controversial, something that pushes the boundaries, you

702
00:56:19.880 --> 00:56:22.480
know, I'm gonna be protected.
And at that time, I never felt

703
00:56:22.480 --> 00:56:28.800
like I had that safetiness and that
protection because I didn't have that connection to

704
00:56:28.920 --> 00:56:32.519
my ancestors as strongly as I do
now. Because it definitely can feel very

705
00:56:32.559 --> 00:56:37.800
isolating. But I think what you're
saying is really important. So if anybody

706
00:56:37.880 --> 00:56:40.079
out there is like listening to her
episode, who you know has been thinking

707
00:56:40.079 --> 00:56:44.880
about academia, who's been thinking about
doing research, and who might be getting

708
00:56:44.920 --> 00:56:49.039
interested in archaeology, Like just like
doctor budzif we need more of y'all out

709
00:56:49.079 --> 00:56:55.480
there and actually speaking out as who
you are in this spaceis non You don't

710
00:56:55.519 --> 00:57:00.000
have to separate if you're too if
you're m if, if you're lucky,

711
00:57:00.039 --> 00:57:01.280
go that, like, you don't
have to separate who you are in this

712
00:57:01.400 --> 00:57:06.840
bas and the country. Like For
me, my work is centered around who

713
00:57:06.840 --> 00:57:10.000
I as, my um at work, as an indigenous person, like and

714
00:57:10.039 --> 00:57:15.000
everything around kind of circulation circulates with
my work, even my personal life,

715
00:57:15.000 --> 00:57:21.760
my political work, even my business
now that I'm growing, everything's around it.

716
00:57:21.840 --> 00:57:25.159
Because I have understood that I don't
have to separate who I am to

717
00:57:25.239 --> 00:57:30.360
be able to thrive and create something
that's going to be for the seven generations.

718
00:57:30.360 --> 00:57:34.280
Like that's not true. I can
be who I am. Yeah,

719
00:57:34.320 --> 00:57:37.679
And it's it's important for students to
one of one of the first things you

720
00:57:37.679 --> 00:57:42.760
should learn about is indigenous method and
theory. So there's a lot of books

721
00:57:42.760 --> 00:57:45.559
and a lot of papers now,
and that will teach you how to center

722
00:57:46.000 --> 00:57:52.519
your research in your own communities and
in the communities that you work for,

723
00:57:52.840 --> 00:57:58.119
and to not worry about the so
called western method and theories because you can

724
00:57:58.159 --> 00:58:02.920
do indigenous method and theory. That's
a part of decolonizing all of the spaces

725
00:58:02.960 --> 00:58:08.559
in academia. And everyone has a
full right now, there's been enough done

726
00:58:09.239 --> 00:58:14.840
in indigenous method and theory. My
dissertation was written in indigenous method and theory.

727
00:58:15.199 --> 00:58:19.880
There's some scholars who have actually done
their dissertations in their own languages in

728
00:58:20.000 --> 00:58:24.519
Migma on Blackfoot, and so you
fully have every right to use your own

729
00:58:24.639 --> 00:58:30.400
language, use your own communities,
ways of understanding, and indigenous method and

730
00:58:30.480 --> 00:58:35.480
theory in all of the research and
all of the work you do to earn

731
00:58:35.519 --> 00:58:40.159
your degrees. Yeah, I mean, that's definitely something I wanted to get

732
00:58:40.199 --> 00:58:47.599
to was the book, you know, the Indigenous Paleolithic of the Western Hemisphere.

733
00:58:47.920 --> 00:58:52.199
And you know, I had never
thought I wasn't thinking about any of

734
00:58:52.239 --> 00:59:00.880
this topic until Hennessy's brought it up
in our conversations, and it was so

735
00:59:00.039 --> 00:59:02.920
interesting to me that I felt like, you know, what, how do

736
00:59:04.000 --> 00:59:08.679
you feel about talking about this on
the podcast? And you know, for

737
00:59:08.840 --> 00:59:13.480
me, with the work that I
do, not only am I in podcasting,

738
00:59:13.480 --> 00:59:17.719
but I'm also in radio. I've
been in radio for several years now,

739
00:59:17.760 --> 00:59:22.920
since twenty nineteen. I've worked for
the tribal radio stations on my res

740
00:59:22.400 --> 00:59:29.199
and now I'm currently working for the
community radio station here in Tucson, Arizona.

741
00:59:29.239 --> 00:59:31.480
But it's always about like, you
know, you just shoot your shot,

742
00:59:31.639 --> 00:59:36.280
you know, you never know,
you know, and just send an

743
00:59:36.360 --> 00:59:39.440
email, send a message and you
never know they might respond. That's just

744
00:59:39.519 --> 00:59:45.280
something that I was really happy that
you did respond, doctor Pollett, and

745
00:59:45.639 --> 00:59:50.960
to talk about your work and this
book, and just to hear more about

746
00:59:51.199 --> 00:59:57.079
your publications and things you're currently working
on is amazing. But when she brought

747
00:59:57.119 --> 01:00:01.480
up the book, I started to
read more and and research your work and

748
01:00:01.519 --> 01:00:07.800
your website and the book itself,
and certain terminologies that I wasn't familiar with,

749
01:00:08.039 --> 01:00:15.320
but you know, educating myself and
the terminology such as like when you

750
01:00:15.360 --> 01:00:20.559
talk about Clovis And for folks who
aren't too familiar with the terminology or the

751
01:00:20.639 --> 01:00:28.199
idea of decolonizing archaeology, let's go
ahead and get into that type of conversation

752
01:00:28.400 --> 01:00:32.280
right now with your book and what
does that all mean and the message behind

753
01:00:32.320 --> 01:00:38.840
it? Well, Western archaeologists,
I'll go back in time a little bit.

754
01:00:39.039 --> 01:00:44.159
So back in the early twenties,
Alex Chrlisko was the head archaeologist for

755
01:00:44.199 --> 01:00:49.599
the Smithsonian Museum. He argued indigenous
people had only been here three thousand years.

756
01:00:49.639 --> 01:00:52.400
That really wasn't based on any you
know, huge amount of scientific data.

757
01:00:52.440 --> 01:00:58.440
That was more or less conjecture.
Jesse Jennings then, who was from

758
01:00:58.519 --> 01:01:02.119
the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, excavated a site near Clovis, New

759
01:01:02.119 --> 01:01:07.760
Mexico, and he found this beautiful
stone tool in the rib of an extinct

760
01:01:07.800 --> 01:01:09.880
bison, so in the fossil of
an extinct bison, and he said,

761
01:01:09.920 --> 01:01:14.960
wow, people had to be here
since these bison went extinct. That's ten

762
01:01:15.000 --> 01:01:19.000
thousand years ago. So he had
to argue with Hrlishka and others for a

763
01:01:19.039 --> 01:01:22.440
couple of years, but he finally
got it accepted that, oh, indigenous

764
01:01:22.480 --> 01:01:24.840
people have been here ten thousand years. Well, it's kind of been stuck

765
01:01:24.920 --> 01:01:30.199
between ten and fourteen thousand years for
one hundred years of history. You'll notice

766
01:01:30.239 --> 01:01:36.960
that in the rest of the world
because of advancements in science and more excavations

767
01:01:37.039 --> 01:01:42.679
and our understanding that our whole understanding
of human evolution on a global scale has

768
01:01:42.840 --> 01:01:47.559
changed greatly, especially in the last
ten years, everywhere except the western hemisphere

769
01:01:47.559 --> 01:01:52.639
of the Americas. Right. So, now that I've pulled together all of

770
01:01:52.679 --> 01:01:57.199
this data that shows like Clovis is
a tool. It's a tool with a

771
01:01:57.239 --> 01:02:00.599
beautiful what we call a flute out
the middle of it. It's a beautiful

772
01:02:00.639 --> 01:02:05.599
stone tool. But archaeologists created the
Clovis culture and the Clovis people, which

773
01:02:05.760 --> 01:02:08.400
was false. There was no such
thing as the Clovis people. There was

774
01:02:08.440 --> 01:02:14.159
a stone tool called Clovis. They
were found all over North America. So

775
01:02:14.280 --> 01:02:17.599
when archaeologists say the Clovis people,
you know, North America, what they're

776
01:02:17.639 --> 01:02:22.639
doing is they're erasing the diversity of
you know, hundreds and hundreds of groups

777
01:02:22.639 --> 01:02:28.559
of indigenous people. So the Glovist
tool we know from doing archaeological work.

778
01:02:28.719 --> 01:02:31.800
The oldest Clovis tools are around eleven
thousand, two hundred years. So if

779
01:02:31.840 --> 01:02:37.559
you find an archaeological site and those
carbon dates come back older than eleven thousand,

780
01:02:37.559 --> 01:02:44.199
two hundred years, that's called older
than Clovis. So archaeologists have denied

781
01:02:44.360 --> 01:02:49.960
for one hundred years there was anything
older than Clovis, but other archaeologists have

782
01:02:50.159 --> 01:02:53.719
kept publishing on sites with dates older
than Clovis dates from eleven thousand, two

783
01:02:53.840 --> 01:02:59.679
hundred to two hundred thousand years before
present. So that's really important. So

784
01:02:59.719 --> 01:03:05.280
what I did was I gathered all
of the published articles with solid scientific data,

785
01:03:05.440 --> 01:03:08.920
with dates, with stratigraphy, with
artifacts, and I put it all

786
01:03:08.920 --> 01:03:13.519
together in a database and I mapped
it on a big map, and it

787
01:03:13.639 --> 01:03:20.320
showed that people were in the Americas
all the way from northern Alaska to southern

788
01:03:20.360 --> 01:03:23.360
Patagonia and from the east coast to
the west coast. You know, over

789
01:03:23.880 --> 01:03:28.159
twenty five to forty thousand years ago, people were all over the place,

790
01:03:28.519 --> 01:03:34.039
and in areas like central Mexico and
southern California, we have signs of people

791
01:03:34.079 --> 01:03:38.599
being there two hundred thousand years.
In the South East States we have signs

792
01:03:38.599 --> 01:03:43.599
of people being there three hundred thousand
years. So this shows that a lot

793
01:03:43.639 --> 01:03:46.280
more research needs to be done.
If it was a few sites, you

794
01:03:46.280 --> 01:03:51.480
could dismiss it twenty or thirty or
forty, but it's not. It's hundreds.

795
01:03:51.719 --> 01:03:57.039
I have almost six hundred published reports
of archaeological sites on my database.

796
01:03:57.559 --> 01:04:00.599
When we look in what's called the
Great Literature, that's sites that have been

797
01:04:00.679 --> 01:04:05.960
done when they built a road or
a bridge and a cultural resource management firm

798
01:04:05.960 --> 01:04:10.280
has come in and documented that site. They've dated it, they've got the

799
01:04:10.320 --> 01:04:14.039
tools, they've got the artifacts,
they've written a report. They file that

800
01:04:14.119 --> 01:04:18.760
report with the state archaeological agency.
So I found out this year, just

801
01:04:18.840 --> 01:04:27.159
in Arizona alone, there are over
fourteen hundred sites in the state repository that

802
01:04:27.199 --> 01:04:31.960
predate Clovis. Fourteen hundred in one
state. So imagine now, if I

803
01:04:32.039 --> 01:04:39.440
do this, I think that research
and I get all of those documented sites

804
01:04:39.480 --> 01:04:45.760
from state offices and provincial offices,
I would have thousands and thousands of sites

805
01:04:45.840 --> 01:04:51.039
that predate Clovis. This is a
solid, strong body of evidence we need

806
01:04:51.039 --> 01:04:56.360
to gather and data and continue research
on. That's why we need a whole

807
01:04:56.480 --> 01:05:02.880
army of indigenous archaeologists and our archaeology
peers who are not indigenous, who but

808
01:05:02.960 --> 01:05:08.079
who are open minded and want to
understand and know the truth about the human

809
01:05:08.199 --> 01:05:13.400
history of the western hemisphere of the
Americas. And with like Watina was asking,

810
01:05:13.480 --> 01:05:16.119
like like decolonizing and all of that, like one thing that's important to

811
01:05:16.679 --> 01:05:21.719
notice, like how much still like
there's backlash on all this research I when

812
01:05:21.800 --> 01:05:25.599
I bring it forth your work,
like you know, we're in a campfire

813
01:05:25.639 --> 01:05:28.480
and I'm bringing up your work of
course, you know, And I see

814
01:05:28.519 --> 01:05:31.880
my colleagues and they're like, well, no, that's like too impossible.

815
01:05:32.079 --> 01:05:38.639
And I was like, but why
why is it so difficult for your brain

816
01:05:39.400 --> 01:05:44.159
to accept that other possibilities if because
in my head, like you know,

817
01:05:44.239 --> 01:05:47.599
like when when I think about being
in academia and doing research and understanding and

818
01:05:47.679 --> 01:05:53.159
understanding biases, I always tell people
like, do you do you see how

819
01:05:53.400 --> 01:05:57.639
biased Western science and all this research
has been, right, and they're like

820
01:05:57.719 --> 01:06:00.719
nope, yeah, yeah, so
why wouldn't not be Why would it be

821
01:06:01.800 --> 01:06:06.840
impossible for you for you to think
that there's more possibilities? And that for

822
01:06:06.960 --> 01:06:13.239
me is like that that those first
questions are like that process of decolonizing both

823
01:06:13.599 --> 01:06:18.440
being indigenous and non indigenous, because
we have been accepting some of this work

824
01:06:18.920 --> 01:06:24.960
in our education as truths, like
we accept them, and unfortunately, you

825
01:06:24.960 --> 01:06:29.360
know how just stuff goes on in
our education. We a lot of people

826
01:06:29.840 --> 01:06:33.400
haven't been taught like critical thinking,
right, that's not something that education focuses

827
01:06:33.440 --> 01:06:35.920
on, and a lot of people
just accept it as it is, not

828
01:06:36.000 --> 01:06:40.559
because that's that's the truth, right, And I tell them, like,

829
01:06:40.880 --> 01:06:45.639
as academics and people who are in
research, you always emphasize, right,

830
01:06:45.800 --> 01:06:49.360
like that we have to question things. We can take things as they are.

831
01:06:50.039 --> 01:06:58.079
But yet when I bring upon this
topic about indigenous peoples being here even

832
01:06:58.119 --> 01:07:02.840
I would say one hundred thousand,
it's like that's just too much. I

833
01:07:02.920 --> 01:07:06.599
accept maybe thirty, but one hundred
or more than that, that's just too

834
01:07:06.679 --> 01:07:12.440
much. You know. Yeah,
you have to constantly remind people of the

835
01:07:12.559 --> 01:07:16.960
data on human evolution on a global
scale that exists. So that people were

836
01:07:17.000 --> 01:07:21.719
in the area we call today in
northern Asia two million years ago. So

837
01:07:21.880 --> 01:07:27.920
early humans were very capable. They
walked fourteen thousand miles from Africa to northern

838
01:07:27.960 --> 01:07:30.519
Asia two million years ago. Now
you want to tell me that they didn't

839
01:07:30.559 --> 01:07:34.320
go a little bit further and cross
that fifty seven miles to get into the

840
01:07:34.320 --> 01:07:40.440
Americas until twelve thousand years ago.
We know that mammals were coming and going

841
01:07:40.519 --> 01:07:44.320
that whole time. We know there
was many times there was a land bridge.

842
01:07:44.360 --> 01:07:46.320
And by the way, that's not
the only way that people came and

843
01:07:46.360 --> 01:07:50.239
went from the eastern into the western
hemisphere, right, Yeah, And so

844
01:07:50.639 --> 01:07:56.480
people don't have this information because they
haven't been taught it. They've been intentionally

845
01:07:56.719 --> 01:08:00.079
not taught it. So yeah,
our education is based on agontology, that

846
01:08:00.239 --> 01:08:04.119
is meaning the teaching of ignorance,
not by what you teach, but what

847
01:08:04.159 --> 01:08:10.559
you intentionally do not teach. And
so students have not been taught the full

848
01:08:10.719 --> 01:08:15.719
history of human evolution. That early
horminids or humans were in Asia two million

849
01:08:15.800 --> 01:08:17.960
years ago, in the northern parts
of Asia, and that's not that far

850
01:08:18.039 --> 01:08:23.079
from North America, and you know
that early humans were very capable. They

851
01:08:23.079 --> 01:08:27.159
were using some form of water transport
over one hundred thousand years ago. There

852
01:08:27.199 --> 01:08:30.920
was many things to come and go. So students don't have that information because

853
01:08:30.960 --> 01:08:36.960
they're given an education, specifically in
archaeology that keeps them intentionally ignorant. And

854
01:08:38.119 --> 01:08:42.319
you're right, not thinking critically.
Yeah, and a lot of us are

855
01:08:42.720 --> 01:08:47.319
not aware fully about how we live
in this colonial imaginary, and like decolonizing

856
01:08:47.479 --> 01:08:51.319
is trying to question this colonial imaginary
that limits are even the way that we

857
01:08:51.399 --> 01:08:56.359
imagine our ancestors. I think there's
a lot of conversations when we talk about,

858
01:08:56.560 --> 01:09:00.680
you know, our pedolithic ancestors that
they were like just like cave people

859
01:09:00.760 --> 01:09:03.800
who didn't know anything, and they're
like, wait, no, Like our

860
01:09:03.840 --> 01:09:11.640
ancestors were traveling, they knew the
land so well. They were extremely intelligent

861
01:09:11.920 --> 01:09:16.279
beings. They even people that are
relatives who weren't Homo seepiens, they were

862
01:09:16.319 --> 01:09:24.279
extremely intelligent. And I think the
colonial imaginary really limits our ancestors' capacities.

863
01:09:24.319 --> 01:09:29.119
So why wouldn't it be impossible for
them to go to another place on vote?

864
01:09:29.439 --> 01:09:32.119
As if like they didn't have that
intelligence to find a way to move

865
01:09:32.159 --> 01:09:36.039
around the bodies of water when we
know that that's not true. But I

866
01:09:36.079 --> 01:09:43.079
think the colonial imaginary just like keeps
people very limited about how we view ourselves

867
01:09:43.159 --> 01:09:46.600
in the present and how we view
the past. And people in academia,

868
01:09:46.680 --> 01:09:51.439
especially in archaeology, I don't think
a lot of people have that self awareness

869
01:09:51.479 --> 01:09:59.079
to understand how their colonial imaginary is
influencing even the questions they're bringing up on

870
01:09:59.159 --> 01:10:02.840
forth in the resol. Yep,
they do. I have another meeting at

871
01:10:02.840 --> 01:10:08.840
too, Tina. Did did you
have any other questions? Yeah? Why

872
01:10:08.840 --> 01:10:14.119
don't we go ahead and wrap the
everything up here again? We just we

873
01:10:14.319 --> 01:10:18.279
just want to thank you doctor paul
It Staves for this conversation, for you

874
01:10:18.359 --> 01:10:23.239
being here with us. You know, if you had any last comments,

875
01:10:23.760 --> 01:10:27.800
anything you wanted to add, any
shout outs, definitely felt free to do

876
01:10:27.920 --> 01:10:32.680
that. Yeah, shout out to
all those archaeologists that got viciously bashed for

877
01:10:32.800 --> 01:10:40.520
publishing on earlier than Clovid sites.
Man, shout out to all the archaeologists

878
01:10:40.560 --> 01:10:46.640
working to decobnize academia and make safe
spaces for indigenous voices and which thank you

879
01:10:46.680 --> 01:10:51.359
all so much for inviting me here
to talk with you all today. And

880
01:10:51.520 --> 01:10:57.359
doctor Carlie Steves for having this conversation
and oh my god, I'm just being

881
01:10:57.399 --> 01:11:03.680
fan girly. It's so great to
meet you. And I want to shout

882
01:11:03.680 --> 01:11:09.239
out to my elders Manny and Ernie, who I have been working with them

883
01:11:09.319 --> 01:11:13.760
for a long time at the Qatan
tribe here in Yuma, and these elders

884
01:11:13.880 --> 01:11:17.439
have really taught be the ones who
taught me how I can create ceremony as

885
01:11:17.479 --> 01:11:21.439
I do archaeology as an indigenous persons, and how I can look out for

886
01:11:23.279 --> 01:11:28.960
our ancestors in the land, and
the type of a way I can approach

887
01:11:29.039 --> 01:11:33.920
this differently than just how I've been
trained in academia and archaeology, and how

888
01:11:33.920 --> 01:11:39.239
I can create a ceremony, a
daily ceremony with them and in the land

889
01:11:39.359 --> 01:11:43.119
as I'm doing this work. So
I shout out to them for teaching me

890
01:11:43.199 --> 01:11:47.039
this and for opening their hearts so
that they know that I could proceed with

891
01:11:47.199 --> 01:11:51.640
archaeology without having to separate who I
am as a person as a um a

892
01:11:51.720 --> 01:12:12.880
person in this work. Thank you
listeners for tuning in to today's episode on

893
01:12:13.079 --> 01:12:17.560
then Autum Young Voices. Make sure
to go check out the other episodes you

894
01:12:17.600 --> 01:12:24.520
can find us on Spotify, iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen

895
01:12:24.600 --> 01:12:25.600
to your podcast.