Critical Response to Print Culture and Decolonizing the University: Indigenizing the Page – by Marie Battiste and L.M. Findlay
1. About the author;
Marie Battiste is an Indigenous scholar from the Potlotek First Nation of Nova Scotia. An unstoppable force in the field of indigenous education, she’s spent upwards of forty years working on the decolonization of educational institutions, and the revitalization of indigenous knowledge systems. Her list of professional degrees is rivalled only by her list of awards. Notably, Battiste completed her doctorate of education at Stanford University in 1984 with her dissertation titled: An Historical Investigation of the Social and Cultural Consequences of Micmac Literacy. In this text, Battiste deconstructs the myth of supremacy that has defined the European-indigenous relationship since first contact. She does this by looking at knowledge systems, literacy, and specifically the effects of the page and written culture on indigenous peoples and education.
2. Indicate 5 meaningful keywords;
The Myth of Supremacy: The myth of supremacy is the ethnocentric belief that (white) European culture is inherently better than other cultures. It is the foundational myth that is used as justification for atrocities and genocide committed by colonizers. Its influence runs deeply across all aspects of culture, and the dismantling of which is a key step towards reconciliation.
Oral Culture vs. Written Culture: Both oral and written cultures are essentially how a group decides to store their knowledge. In written culture, knowledge is produced by people and stored on the page. It is separated from people and so, in the euro-centric belief, more analytical and concrete. In an oral culture, knowledge is produced by people and stored within the people through a collective understanding.
As oral traditions and rituals are repeated knowledge is constantly being allowed to change and evolve where appropriate. By not depersonalizing knowledge it’s able to live within the community that holds it and grow and evolve with them. Written cultures update knowledge through discrete rewrites, revisions, and new editions while in oral cultures the same mechanism that stores the knowledge communicates and updates it.
Symbolic Literacy: Symbolic literacy refers to the understanding of symbols and iconography (and the knowledge behind them) within oral traditions. Battiste gives the example of Star Husband and Star Wife. The pictograph acts as a trigger to evoke the rest of the story, which is conveyed orally. Similarly, the images on a wampum belt detail the knowledge imbued within it given the “reader” has knowledge of the symbolic language.
Page as Stockade: The page as stockade is the subtitle in part two of Indigenizing the Page. It details how the page was a weapon used to assimilate or eliminate indigenous people. As land was stolen, and peoples assimilated, it was all recorded down on the page. Additionally, as the preferred method of recording and preserving European knowledge, oral traditions and other forms of literacy were forcibly replaced by the written word and the page.
3. Articulate a significant idea and 3-5 points that support the argument;
Euro-centric forms of education were used as a form of control, but in learning about aboriginal ways of knowing, colonizers were forced to question their own ethnocentrism. This led to the further eradication of indigenous cultures to preserve the myth of supremacy.
During his mission among the Mi’kmaq people in the 18th century, Father Pierre Maillard intentionally withheld teaching roman script. Becoming fluent in both the Mi’kmaq language and symbolic literacy made Maillard begin to doubt the myth of supremacy. Maillard was worried that teaching the phonetic alphabet based on the Roman script he had developed for the Mi’kmaq language would cause the Mi’kmaq to doubt French motives and see the ideological cracks in the new religion. One can imagine Maillard feeling conflicted as his line of thinking is both based on and doubting European supremacy.
Ledgers were another armature used in colonization. The one replicated in the book shows a list of property belonging to the Cheyenne Indians that was lost or destroyed by Colonel Chivington in Colorado. While they served as commodifier and quantifiers, ledgers were given to first nation men as a means to pass the time and became canvases for revolutionary literacy. The art created by indigenous people on these ledgers communicated the brutal genocide that was unfolding across the U.S. and Canada and was prized by soldiers of the time. The ledgers were so effective in their communication they began to erode the cultural confidence of the U.S. They were thus reduced and dismissed as mere doodles by the state in order to perpetuate the myth of supremacy.
Finally, the text gives us two different art pieces that serve as works of contrast, both produced on the page. The first is the before and after images of Tom Torlino, a Navajo from Arizona. The second is the ledger art piece Troops Amassed against a Cheyenne Village by Bear’s Heart. The works are eerily similar in motifs but directly opposite in theme. They both contrast the uniform and subdued with the unique and ornate. In the case of Tom Torlino’s portraits, this is to show an act of civilization. In Bear’s Heart’s work it shows an act of assimilation and extinction.
4. Include a piece of text taken directly from that week’s reading that you found most compelling;
What spoke to me most about this passage was how all these markers of seasons were things I’ve latently observed growing up and living in Canada. I couldn’t tell you what the “official” first day of spring is according to the Gregorian calendar, but I know when I start to see the robins appear I feel the weight of winter is lifting.
In my own research, I look at outdoor recreation and what it means to be outside. At the core of a lot of outdoor recreation, there is a rejection of the wilderness. It’s steeped in the colonial belief that nature and the natural world are seen as something to overcome or something to conquer.
Outdoor recreation is dependent on the seasons and time of year. The cycles of nature are what determines what the outdoor enthusiast is able to do and what is safe to do. This quote connects to that sensibility but it also forces a reminder. It forces the reader to look for specific plants, animals, and natural phenomena present in the outdoors. In doing so, it aids in eroding the colonial desires to conquer and overcome, and replaces them with an appreciation, and a grounding.
Works Consulted
- Battiste, M. (2004). Print Culture & Decolonizing the University: Indigenizing the Page: Part 1. In P. Stoicheff & A. Taylor (Eds.), The Future of the Page (pp. 111-122). University of Toronto Press
- Wikimedia Foundation. (2021, January 23). Marie Battiste. Wikipedia. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie_Battiste.
- Marie Battiste professor Emerita, Educational Foundations. Marie Battiste – College of Education – University of Saskatchewan. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://education.usask.ca/profiles/battiste.php#ProfessionalDegrees.