As we resume the Challenging Colonialism podcast after a break, we will be diving into a series of book talks with Indigenous Californian scholars and allies. We are fortunate to be in a time where there are many excellent and important studies being published. We wanted to share these works with our listeners.

The first in this series is the new book Indigenizing California Mission Art and Architectur,e, by Dr. Yve Chavez. You can find her work at the following links:

Indigenizing California Mission Art and Architecture

Visualizing Genocide: Indigenous Interventions in Art, Archives, and Museums

“Remembering Our Ancestors: Photographing Mission San Gabriel’s Cemetery," inVisualizing Genocide: Indigenous Interventions in Art, Archives, and Museums, edited by Yve Chavez and Nancy Marie Mithlo, 21-37. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2022.https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv3006zsc.7

“Eighteenth-Century Loom and Basket Weaving at the California Missions,” Journal18, Issue 18 Craft (Fall 2024), https://www.journal18.org/7537.

“Decolonizing California Mission Art and Architecture Studies.” In The Routledge Companion to Decolonizing Art History, edited by Tatiana E. Flores, Charlene Villaseñor Black, and Florencia San Martin, 286-296. New York: Routledge, 2023. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003152262

Audio editing: Daniel Stonebloom

Interviews: Martin Rizzo-Martinez

Music: G. Gonzales

Our 10th and final episode of Season 2 extends our critique on the history of colonial acquisitions and collections with a focus on the colonial legacies of the institutions of Museums. We focus on the California Indian Museum and Cultural Center, recent movements to 'decolonize' museums as with the Museum of Us in San Diego, and discuss whether it is possible to ultimately decolonize these institutions.

Speakers:

Dr. Amy Lonetree (enrolled citizen of the Ho-Chunk Nation), Dr. Alírio Karina, Dr. Samuel Redman, Gregg Castro (t'rowt'raahl Salinan / Rumsien & Ramaytush Ohlone), Dr. Cutcha Risling-Baldy (Hupa, Yurok, Karuk), Nicole Lim (Pomo), Dr. Micah Parzen, Dr. Chris Green

Audio editing: Daniel Stonebloom

Interviews: Martin Rizzo-Martinez

Music: G. Gonzales

Special advisor on this episode: Kathleen Aston.

Links & Further Reading:

California Indian Museum & Cultural Center

Acorn Bites

Decolonizing Museums: Representing Native America in National and Tribal Museums, Amy Lonetree

The National Museum of the American Indian: Critical Conversations, Edited by Amy Lonetree and Amanda J. Cobb

“Decolonizing Museums, Memorials, and Monuments,” The Public Historian, Vol. 43, No. 4, pp. 21–27 (November 2021), Amy Lonetree

Museum of Us

“Race: Are we so different?” Exhibit

Museum of Us: Colonial Pathways Policy

Against and Beyond the Museum, Alírio Karina

Episode 9 explores the ways in which colonialism and colonial collections have impacted the development of archives, and the restrictions of these spaces. We follow the stories of Indigenous scholars who have worked to reclaim Indigenous knowledge, songs, and documents from archival collections. We also explore questions of data sovereignty, digital sovereignty, and intellectual property rights.

As discussed throughout Season 2, colonial extraction and collections have resulted in the theft of Indigenous knowledge, Indigenous bodies, and so much more. Previous episodes have explored issues of 'salvage anthropology' and repatriation. This episode shifts the focus to efforts to reclaim Indigenous knowledge, whether that be in the form of songs, wax cylinders, documents, letters, or other forms stored in colonial archives.

The speakers in this episode include:

Dr. Robin R. R. Gray (Ts’msyen/Cree)

Weshoyot Alvitre (Tongva)

Carolyn Rodriguez (Amah Mutsun)

Sedonna Goeman-Shulsky (Tonawanda Band of Seneca)

Links for further reading:

"Cahuilla Basket Returns Home," by Emily Clarke, August 12, 2022, in News from Native California.

CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance

GIDA, Global Indigenous Data Alliance: Promoting Indigenous Control of Indigenous Data

Collaboratory for Indigenous Data Governance: Research, Policy, and Practice for Indigenous Data Sovereignty

"Indigenous Digital Sovereignty: From the Digital Divide to Digital Equity," by Davida Delmar, Jul 19, 2023

"Ts'msyen Revolution: The Poetics and Politics of Reclaiming," Robin R.R. Gray Dissertation.

Dr. Robin Gray: “Embodied Heritage: Enactments of Indigenous Sovereignty” (video)

"Toypurina: Our Lady of Sorrows," Weshoyot Alvitre, Kickstarter

Theft Is Property! Dispossession and Critical Theory, Robert Nichols

Challenging Colonialism is produced by Daniel Stonebloom & Martin Rizzo-Martinez. All interviews by Martin, all audio engineering and editing by Daniel. All music by G. Gonzales. The title of this episode comes from Dr. Robin Gray.