In ompa Tlamananalco inic oniquizaco inic onihuallihualoc ca mitl,
onimacoc in Inimiuh Tenamaztle, auh yehhuatl ihihyo ixpantzinco, tehhuan
tamechnahuatih totlahtol.
March
12, 2012
Superintendent John Huppenthal
Office of
Superintendent of Public Instruction
1535 W. Jefferson Street
Phoenix, AZ 85007
Dear Mr.
Huppenthal,
The
11th Session of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues will convene at UN
Headquarters in New York from May 7 -18, 2012. A special theme for discussion at this year’s session will
be the “Impact of the Doctrine of
Discovery on Indigenous Peoples”, which is the subject of the Preliminary Study on the Impact of the Doctrine of Discovery submitted to the UNPFII at the
9th Session in 2010.
The intent of this letter is to solicit a response from the Arizona
Department of Education addressing the impact of the Doctrine of Discovery in
terms of past and present educational policies and practices in the State of
Arizona.
Context
On
September 13, 2007 the UN General Assembly adopted the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. As a standard setting instrument of
International Law, the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) establishes for the first time
in five hundred years that Indigenous Peoples are “Equal to all other
peoples….” with corresponding rights as “PEOPLES” in the world community. Of the 46 Articles proclaimed in the
UNDRIP, the following are particularly pertinent to our present request:
Article
3
Indigenous peoples have the right to
self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their
political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural
development.
Article
5
Indigenous peoples have the right to
maintain and strengthen their distinct political, legal, economic, social and
cultural institutions, while retaining their right to participate fully, if
they so choose, in the political, economic, social and cultural life of the
State.
Article
8
1. Indigenous peoples and individuals
have the right not to be subjected to forced assimilation or destruction of
their culture.
2. States shall provide effective
mechanisms for prevention of, and redress for:
(a) Any action which has the aim
or effect of depriving them of their integrity as distinct peoples, or of their
cultural values or ethnic identities;
(b) Any action which has the aim or
effect of dispossessing them of their lands, territories or resources;
(c) Any
form of forced population transfer which has the aim or effect of violating or
undermining any of their rights;
(d) Any form of forced assimilation or
integration;
(e) Any form of propaganda designed to promote or incite racial or
ethnic discrimination directed against them.
Article
14
1. Indigenous peoples have the right to
establish and control their educational systems and institutions providing
education in their own languages, in a manner appropriate to their cultural
methods of teaching and learning.
2. Indigenous individuals, particularly
children, have the right to all levels and forms of education of the State
without discrimination.
3. States shall, in conjunction with
indigenous peoples, take effective measures, in order for indigenous
individuals, particularly children, including those living outside their
communities, to have access, when possible, to an education in their own
culture and provided in their own language.
Article
15
1. Indigenous peoples have the right to
the dignity and diversity of their cultures, traditions, histories and
aspirations which shall be appropriately reflected in education and public
information.
2. States shall take effective measures,
in consultation and cooperation with the indigenous peoples concerned, to
combat prejudice and eliminate discrimination and to promote tolerance,
understanding and good relations among indigenous peoples and all other
segments of society.
The
above clarifications become especially significant for the purposes of this
letter for the following reasons:
The
current Social Studies Standard for
American History extracted from the Arizona
Department of Education Website for High School level curriculum acknowledge the
precept that Indigenous Peoples are
recognized as “Peoples” by use of
the term in:
Strand 1: Concept 3: Exploration and Colonization
PO 1. Review the reciprocal impact resulting from early European
contact with indigenous peoples:
This
same strand of study from the social studies curriculum calls for:
PO 2. Describe the reasons for colonization of America (e.g.,
religious freedom, desire for land, economic opportunity, and a new life).
The
recognition of Indigenous Peoples as such in the standards of the Arizona
Department of Education is noteworthy, but of greater concern is the
perpetuation of policies of prejudice and “ethnic
solidarity” in that discriminate favor of “white” pupils in the evaluation systems of the Arizona State
Department of Education.
The
designation of “white” as a category
of evaluation and quantification of pupils in the Arizona State department of
Education is not a new phenomenon.
In fact, from it’s beginnings on September 9, 1850 with the establishment
by the 31st Congress of the Territorial Government for New Mexico, the
organic instrument from which the State of Arizona derives its jurisdiction as
a State (1912), the legal identity of “white person” has been given preferential “ethnic” treatment
with policies of prejudice and “white
supremacy” that are derivatives of the Doctrine of Manifest Destiny.
The
concept of Manifest Destiny, a regime of ethnic solidarity if there ever was
one, prescribes to the Anglo-Saxon “race”
historical rights in the territory that supersede all others. Manifest Destiny is
itself a meme of caste that by its
nature as an ideology of “white supremacy” is a racist relic still embedded in
the underlying Doctrine of Discovery, a chapter of the “Masters’ Narrative” that has dictated the rules of dominion by American
societies since October 12, 1492. We are speaking of the context of cognition that provides
precept and dogma for the ongoing justification of colonization by
European-American constituencies in territories to which they have immigrated
or invaded as colonizers in this hemisphere.
Colonization
is a crime. It is a crime that
became so in 1960 with UN GA Resolution 1514 which proclaimed “All peoples have the right to self
determination.” With the adoption
in 2007 of the UNDRIP, and our recognition as “Peoples, equal to all other peoples….”, the Indigenous Peoples not
only of Arizona, not only of the US, not only of the Americas but the Nations and Pueblos of Indigenous
Peoples of Mother Earth – Nican Tlacah
Cemanahuac - are determined to achieve the equilibrium and harmony with the
Natural World that will allow Humanity as a whole to mature and realize planetary
sustainability.
The
perpetuation of doctrine is not education, it is indoctrination. And while the resistance and rebellion
against these regimes of “intellectual
apartheid” by the Indigenous Peoples
of Abya Yala [the Americas] to the centuries old regime of white supremacy
in the continent did not begin in Arizona, the time has come for us to here and
now, as Nican Tlacah, to move deliberately towards collective corrective
action in order to
address the violations of Civil Rights, Human Rights, and
Indigenous Rights that
have become exacerbated in terms of public educational services for our
community since the passage of AZ HB 2281.
 |
| Ancestral Corridors of Indigenous Culture and Trade |
Therefore,
we as Nican Tlacah, Indigenous Peoples of Anahuac who reside in the territories
of the O’otham Nations also known as the State of Arizona now present the
following demands and recommendations in pursuit of realizing the intent of
this letter:
In
light of the fact that there is absolutely NO
REFERENCE in the current Arizona State Curriculum Standards for a track of study on the relevance of
the Doctrine of Discovery in terms of Social Studies, History or Public Policy:
We demand that the
Preliminary Study on the Doctrine of Discovery, submitted to the UN Permanent
Forum on Indigenous Issues be integrated into the Social Studies Curriculum
standards immediately for implementation across the spectrum of services
delivered by the Arizona Department of Education at all levels across the state
with no exceptions.
We
recommend that the State of Arizona:
- Promote
and advocate for the continued development of appreciation, knowledge and
understanding of the Cultural Diversity
of all Arizona residents by supporting educational programs that contribute to
this goal;
- Reinforce
programs of Cultural Competency to
meet this goal, as a legal obligation
binding the State of Arizona in terms of Civil
Rights, Human Rights, and the Rights of Indigenous
Peoples;
- Promote
and advocate for the implementation of a state wide Indigenous Peoples Studies curriculum, that addresses the ignorance
and lack of historical perspective in the general public related to outdated
public policies that are grounded in the concepts of racial profiling and illegal preferences to constituencies
of European-American “white persons”
such as “Manifest Destiny”;
In closing, may we affirm the
notion that this communiqué is no way to be interpreted as a message of
resentment or hatred towards any other peoples, however they may classify
themselves. This is not a message
of antagonism against white people, but it is a challenge to the social constructs
of white
supremacy. And at a
deeper level, it is a call to our common humanity to strive to collectively
correct the injustices committed in the name of “Western Civilization”
that make victims of not only the colonized by the colonizer as well.
Where is the homeland of the
“White” ethnicity? What are its boundaries? Where are its borders? Who is their
leadership? Who benefits from this
ideology, and who suffers? Is it
not the “white people” themselves who have lost the most, by fomenting ethnic
and political identity at the family, community and national levels based on a
“melanin
deprived” physical characteristic that is unscientific and racist,
not to mention horribly dehumanizing?
These questions, demands, and
recommendations are signals from the ancient world of the Indigenous Peoples in
this year 2012 that call upon us as Human Beings not to
remain divided by dogma and doctrine but achieve integrity and sustainability with
the natural world based on principles of both individual and collective responsibility
and self determination. “Equal to
all other peoples” is not a phrase of ethnic solidarity; it is a call once
again from the tradition of the Indigenous Peoples that reminds us all why this
continent was called the “New World” by the immigrants from the “Old World”.
Not only are we the New World, we
are NOW the World in Renewal: We are the Nican Tlacah of Cemanahuac and our
proposals in terms of education are hereby respectfully submitted in the spirit
of the Prerogative
of the Peoples and for the purposes of advancing the Public Services
towards the Greater Good, the wela of
We the Peoples.
Sincerely,
Tupac Enrique Acosta, Yaotachcauh
