Balancing Power and Building Agency: Creating Educational Pathways within an Indigenous Community

Abstract

This is an original work co-created in reciprocity and in relational accountability by Cheebo Hou-E-Now-E Frazier and Mildred Rose McCloud, daughter and mother, weaving generational knowledges gifted by their ancestors. This study reflects a heuristic journey of intergenerational knowledge sharing within one family and how this traditional learning process is vital for community health, well-being, vitality, and futurity. What I hear from the community is the cry for change. Time and time again we hear, as Tribal leaders, how hard it has been for our membership to receive services, support and to access resources for their children, especially in the realm of the public-school systems. They come to leadership seeking solutions and answers to complex systemic issues. What I see lacking, and what I believe is the most critical need for the Nisqually Tribe and its citizenship, is adequate ties to the past and connections to the present. We also need membership to see their capacity and ability to hear the calling for community leaders to engage and drive positive change as a Tribe and community. Our Tribe has stories and examples where activism has led to astonishing feats of self-reliance and fortitude, including the signing of the Medicine Creek Treaty and the Fish Wars. We need to remember those stories now.

As I co-researched and co-wrote with my Mom, we used Indigenous research protocols by consulting with students, parents, Elders, and community members within the Nisqually Indian Tribe. This research links the past, the present, and the future of our Tribally self-determined educational sovereignty as the most powerful tool in Native education for the Nisqually Tribe. As researchers/writers, we are situated inside the community of research. One of us is an elected Tribal leader and the other is an honored Tribal Elder, both with the capacity to utilize intergenerational knowledges as a guide in our roles and responsibilities to our Tribe. Community-driven research evolved, flourished, and became actioned throughout this theoretical and applied project. This study exhibits the need and the value of collaborative community planning and the incorporation of Elders’ knowledges into the design and construction of the futuristic imagined state of being that we hope to see operationalized. Storywork as data is reflected through storytalk with my Mom and in community cafés with students, leadership, parents, and Elders. This work will continue to archive and digitize information. As a result, my mom’s life’s work will live on in her honor.