Native American DNA

The following is another short post for an anthropology class. Native American DNA was one of my favorite assigned texts, and one I shall likely revisit.

Kim TallBear’s Native American DNA scrutinizes DNA and genetic science in the context of race and indigeneity. According to TallBear, many tribes are increasingly using DNA tests for membership in tribal rolls in addition to blood quantum. With that as a point of departure, the author borrows from feminist Donna Haraway, Aura Simpson’s ethnographic refusal, and Linda Tuwihai Smith’s decolonizing methodologies to unpack the ways in which genetic science perpetuates racialization and white domination. Indeed, TallBear’s study is more of an anthropology of white people, reversing the ethnographic gaze. She also adds nuance to the ways in which blood quantum became part of tribal membership, beginning with the 1887 Dawes act. Despite being impose from above, Indian input on who should be a member shaped how federal agents completed the allotment process. Furthermore, her nuanced discussion of blood as a sign of lineal descent, or genealogic tribalism, helps elucidate why blood quantum persists.

As someone less familiar with current trends in genetics, human migrations studies, and bioanthropology, TallBear’s dissection of those fields was often surprising. The use of knowledge of genetics as well as the ways in which indigenous communities’ views, permission, and epistemologies are not respected was not too much of a surprise, but the use of DNA studies to “prove” Native American ancestry is limited because of the faulty assumptions and racial thinking of scientists and genealogists. For instance, mtDNA or Y-DNA only tracks some of one’s paternal and maternal ancestry, meaning someone could be a member of, for example, the Sioux but a DNA test may not indicate any “Native American DNA.” As TallBear shared, many, including herself, have diverse Native ancestry and many of these groups have also formed close ties to whites and African-Americans over the centuries, thereby rendering genetic testing or gene fetishism problematic. Considering the discourse on indigeneity as the reserve of an untapped or “unmixed” gene pool closer to earlier stages of humanity, in danger of extinction or absorption, TallBear effectively argues for the resurgence of previous theories of race and racial domination. Her most powerful example, the documentary program with a white geneticist interviewing men from Tanzania, Mongolia, and a Native American, illustrate how theories of race and the dominance of European and Western ways of seeing the world permeate genetic science. 

However, one cannot help but wonder how inclusion of Native American communities or perhaps interviews with Natives dis-enrolled because of genetic testing could have shaped TallBear’s work. Without their voices, TallBear is leaving out part of the story while possibly blurring differences in the way Native American groups perceive the issue of genetics and research. And despite her criticism of the use of genetics to turn base indigeneity in biology, I am still a little confused by her treatment of blood quantum here. For TallBear, blood quantum is related to the lineal descent and genealogic tribalism, and many tribes assume the higher the blood degree, the more likely the odds of true affiliation. But does this not continue indigeneity through a biological basis? There is a tension here of essentialism that sounds like DNA and racialization. 

Rambling Thoughts on Earth Beings

The following is a short post for an anthropology course, centered on de la Cadena's use of Trouillot. I thought her book was one of the more interesting ones for the course, and my rambling thoughts on it appeared to have impressed my professor.

Marisol de la Cadena Earth Beings invokes Trouillot’s well-known Silencing of the Past multiple times throughout the book. Trouillot, who argued that the Haitian Revolution was unthinkable to European observers, is utilized by de la Cadena to argue why indigenous leaders such as Mariano Turpo were not recognized for their leadership. Like African-descended slaves in 18th century Saint Domingue, the runakuna of Peru were not seen as capable of rational political agency (61). Both liberalism and socialism perpetuate this refusal to recognize indigenous politics drawing on earth politics, which de la Cadena attributes to onto-epistemic practices of history which, beginning with Hegel and other Western thinkers, “canceled the world-making potential of practices that escaped the nature-humanity divide” (146). Similarly, the coloniality of politics and history, in which nature and humanity were divided, became the foundation of modern politics (92).

De la Cadena later connects epistemic disconcertment to Trouillot’s notion of the unthinkable, suggesting that instead of recognition, epistemic disconcertment has the potential to make one challenge what and how one knows (276). Building from her conclusions on the coloniality of modern politics and the importance of divergence or partial connections, de la Cadena seems to propose a politics underpinned by divergence (286). What this exactly looks like is not entirely clear, but she argues that the cosmo-politics of the runakuna, in which the in-ayllu includes earth-beings as well as humans, operates through divergence with modern politics and its possibility is not determined by contradiction (283). If my interpretation of de la Cadena’s argument is correct, she appears to be arguing for a coexistence of modern politics and earth politics in which neither one cancels the other. How would that work? Like Ari, she also noted the conflicts between Andean indigenous movements and their respective national governments regarding extractive mining or oil operations (284). The ontological disagreement on the rights of nature of Pachamama does not seem to be the grounds through which one can develop cosmovivir, either. 

Babel-17

I haven't been reading much fiction these days. I devoured the recent English translation of a classic Haitian novel by Depestre recently, but besides that, Delany's science fiction class Babel-17 is the only other novel I've read in quite some time. Delany's prose is straightforward yet lyrical, combining provocative ideas about language, plot, character, and relationships in an accessible and addicting way. Prior to Babel-17, I was only familiar with a famous short story he wrote that shared some of the social conventions of Babel-17's world. The use of body modification, unconventional sexual relationships, and the overall context of a war with the 'Invader' species make for a great action story with a subtle but powerful message on language as a solution to conflict. Reading this, I could not help but think of Philip K. Dick's Now Wait For Last Year, which also features the human race in a galactic battle against an insect-like species, but fixates on time travel and hallucination and dysfunctional marriage in a way only PKD could accomplish. Nonetheless, it also shares with Delany's work a focus on the meaning of reality and perception, including some ideas of discorporation, subcultures, and class divisions. Indeed, perhaps reading more Delany will lead to him becoming my favorite science fiction writer...

Hannah Arendt Rant

So, lately I've been perusing Hannah Arendt again. Several months ago I was re-reading parts of Totalitarianism, but these days it's been Eichmann in Jerusalem and some of her essays on Jewish and African-American matters. I find it difficult to dismiss her as a 'self-hating Jew' or racist, although she certainly bought into the 'Heart of Darkness' narrative for Africa. And as noted by others, her approach to Zionism, European Jewish history, and the idea of the conscious pariah are provocative and, in some cases, prophetic (about the violence in the Middle East through a Jewish state instead of a binational federation). Even her problematic reading of European Jewish history and the role of Jewish leaders and Zionists during the 1930s and 1940s is interesting, even if she does come dangerously close to blaming the victims.

However, her "Reflections on Little Rock" seems to exemplify the limitations of Arendt's political theory and faith in the US. She claims to be sympathetic to African Americans but suggests that fighting bans on mixed marriages is more important and fundamental a right to battle for than desegregated schools. She even defends the right of social discrimination against Jews and African Americans by certain types of private businesses, like resorts or hotels because social discriminatory practices are, at least to her, inevitable, but as long as the state doesn't legally enforce those social discriminations, it's not a problem? However, she seems to think segregated schools just naturally came about, as if legal enforcement didn't make them so in the first place? Her argument is full of other contradictions about social, private, and political realms. Furthermore, if social discrimination was institutionalized through legal enforcement, why shouldn't political realm seek to end social discrimination?

Basically, if you read her piece, you'll get the feeling that socially discriminatory practices are inevitable, but the only role of the government is to make sure these social discriminatory practices don't become legally enforced, so fighting against bans on interracial marriage or discrimination in public services (private and public) is her priority for the state. She also seems to think children should be seen primarily as in the private realm of their parents (and thus the social realm of their parents), but if they're going to public school, aren't they by nature entering the realm of the political and social? There are many ideological assumptions in Arendt's essay, as well as a whitewashed reading of the US's contributions to imperialism and racism abroad. That said, I do not think it is necessarily fair to dismiss Arendt as a racist, particularly since her view of the law and intergroup discrimination is not rooted in a belief in the superiority of any group in the US.

Riding on a Blue Note

Riding on a Blue Note is comprised of a number of reviews and essays on several major or lesser known figures in the worlds of jazz and popular music. Giddins writes with wit and a sense of humor to discuss the merits and problems facing artists as diverse as Sinatra, Irving Berlin, Ellington and Ethel Waters to Bobby Blue Bland, Wes Montgomery, and Cecil Taylor. Giddins also approaches the question of race, culture, and identity in a more nuanced way than many other (white) critics of jazz, from what I've encountered so far. The essay on George Benson may come off as too dismissive of jazz fusion, but I cannot help but (mostly) concur with Giddins on the fusion question during 1970s jazz. This is an indispensable collection of essays from the 1970s that will add much needed nuance to the state of the music during those times. 

Blutopia

Graham Lock's Blutopia: Visions of the Future and Revisions of the Past in the Work of Sun Ra, Duke Ellington, and Anthony Braxton is a thought-provoking and serious work in Jazz Studies. Anytime one can encounter a serious work on jazz that takes the musicians themselves seriously and endeavors to engage with their ideas should be applauded. Lock also manages to impressively integrate an analysis of Sun Ra and Anthony Braxton with Duke Ellington, despite vast differences in style, thought, and age among these titans of jazz. However, Lock raises more questions than he answers in much of the text. 

First, Sun Ra. It's been a number of years since I've read Szwed's Sun Ra book, but much of Lock's analysis felt 'new' or 'fresh' to me. In a literature class over the last several months, Sun Ra came up more than once and we discussed the parallels of his work with Negro spirituals, but because I know very little about spirituals, Lock connecting spirituals and Sun Ra's chants (in addition to the ring shout and the way the Arkestra moved counterclockwise around the audience) was informative. However, I was at times struck by how Lock seems to take Ra's mythology too much at face value, as if there are not several troubling implications from Sun Ra's Astro Black Mythology. I think Lock came closest to grappling with this issue by identifying Ra as someone who chose to identify with Pharaoh over Moses. 

Wilson J. Moses has written about the Pharaoh-Moses dialectic with regards to African American black nationalists and intellectuals, but it seems as if the despotic aspects of Pharaoh are left out of the discussion while the 'authoritarian collectivism' of Moses (and, by extension, Christianity) are rightfully included by Lock's discussion of Ra's opposition to Christianity. As a result, Sun Ra's ideas of the past and future, not to mention the present, are not fully considered since the Moses-Pharaoh conflict is never resolved or rejected (are African Americans stuck with only Moses or Pharaoh? What of Legba?). 

As for Duke Ellington, a composer I have not listened to seriously in probably 5 or 6 years, these two chapters were a breath of fresh air. Ellington's fight for jazz to be taken seriously and the complexity and nuance of African American music to escape essentialist and condescending treatment in the eyes of white America are still relevant, as are his attempts to fight minstrelsy, blackface, and 'Uncle Tom' depictions of black life in popular culture. I think Lock also hit the nail on the head about Duke Ellington's view of black America's history as (mostly) based in the US, and his race pride was inseparable from his patriotism. Such a sentiment is lacking in Sun Ra's revisions of the black past and black present, and Duke Ellington's views are probably the most 'mainstream' when it comes to African American perceptions of their nation. 

Nonetheless, I was a little surprised that Duke Ellington's middle-class background and support for respectability politics was not integrated into the two chapters (Duke believed African Americans must behave in ways that command respect, according to Lock, plus he opposed the confrontational aspects of the Civil Rights Movement). Given the climate around respectability politics among those in African American Studies today, what are the limitations of Duke Ellington's revisions of the past and future? How does his Blutopia fall short? In what ways are Duke Ellington's US-centered black history and future limited by exclusion of Africa? What do we make of the 'world music' aspirations of his later LPs?

Last but certainly the most confusing and perhaps less relevant to Blutopia, Anthony Braxton. I do not entirely buy the argument of Mackey about Legba's limp and jazz swing or syncopation. It seems too fanciful and impossible to 'prove,' plus it may neglect the ways in which Legba's limp may be more a product of dances and music rather than the other way around. I have no evidence for my own assertion either, but I remain skeptical of a Legba interpretation of Braxton's multiformity. Lock is right about Braxton's synesthesia and the heterogeneity of black creativity (not to mention the critiques of jazz critics), but the Legba interpretation and the chapter on Trillium operas was somewhat less successful or convincing. Braxton's 'vibrationism' and spirituality were fascinating, but one must visit his esoteric writings directly to get a more detailed 'feel' for his views. Lock, to his credit, admits this and acknowledges that the chapters on Braxton did not go in depth. 

Overall, however, this is a provocative and insightful reading of three significant jazz artists. Jazz musicians as intellectuals is a growing interest of mine, and Lock has increased my appreciation for artists like Ra, Braxton, and Ellington. Some recent readings of mine on AACM and Art Ensemble of Chicago have tangentially included Braxton, but I think an interesting project would be to focus solely on the differences between Braxton and Art Ensemble of Chicago's approach to "Great Black Music" and revisions of the past and future. Perhaps that will be my next rambling post?

Ragtime Dance

I love it when avant-garde artists look to the roots, in this case, Scott Joplin and ragtime. Although I admire Henry Threadgill, there is still much of his music I am unforgivably unfamiliar with. So, enjoy this "Ragtime Dance" for the weekend.