June 9, 2024 • 33 mins
Can you imagine a world where the stories you heard in school about Native American communities are completely redefined? This episode features a poignant conversation with Kelly Tudor, an educator and proud member of the Lippon Apache tribe of Texas. Kelly is on a mission to correct misconceptions and provide a true representation of Indigenous culture. We explore her tireless work raising her children with traditional Lippon Apache values and the significance of maintaining cultural integrity. Discover how Debbie Irving's book "Waking Up White" has been instrumental in challenging the stereotypes that many of us unknowingly perpetuate.
For those interested in the profound issues within our education system, this episode is a must-listen. Kelly discusses the pervasive cultural insensitivity and miseducation that Native American students face daily, and how these issues have driven her to homeschool her children. Hear specific stories of cultural violations, including improper treatment of Native students' religious expressions, and learn about the federal protections that many educators overlook. This conversation is a call to action for better education and awareness to cultivate a more inclusive learning environment.
Lastly, we address the painful history of Indian boarding schools and their lasting emotional impact on Indigenous families. Kelly highlights the gaps in our current education system regarding Indigenous histories and underscores the importance of teaching these stories to foster empathy and understanding. We also examine the subtle yet powerful influence of media and educational materials on shaping societal perceptions from a young age. Don't miss out on these critical insights, and be sure to stay tuned for part two in episode seven. Check our show notes for invaluable resources mentioned throughout our discussion.
For links and the transcript, visit wokehomeschooling.com/podcast
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Delina (00:00):
There are harmful things that we think, do and say that
harm others.
There are things that we needto learn and unlearn.
Welcome to Homeschool Yourself.
I'm Delena Price-McFaul.
In this episode, I get to talkto one of the people that I've
learned from in the past fewyears.
Her name is Kelly Tudor andshe's dedicated her career to
undoing the harm that has beendone to indigenous people in
(00:23):
this country.
She does this through education.
She teaches children and sheteaches adults.
Also, she teaches teachers andshe does curriculum development.
There's so many untrue thingsthat we all learned in school
about Native American people.
We learned stereotypes as truth.
Most of the time, we didn'thave anyone to guide us, to even
(00:47):
be able to spot the stereotypesand think about the harm that
was done by certain messagesthat we learned.
Many times just by not learningtheir history, who they are and
them not being even in ourconsciousness, we learn to
ignore them in the present dayand ignore their contributions.
(01:08):
About 10 years ago, a book cameout called Waking Up White by
Debbie Irving.
I read it because I was leadinga group where we unpacked
issues of race.
I really think this is a reallypowerful book and one of the
things that I loved about it isthat after every essay or
chapter, there would bethought-provoking questions to
help you unpack your ownthoughts.
(01:29):
And one of the questions andyou can find this on page 91 of
the book and I'll link to thebook in the show notes One of
the questions asks you to makecolumns and label them and next
to each, quickly write fivestereotypes that come to mind
for each group of people.
So they have African-American,white, asian-american, native
(01:50):
American and so on.
I was honestly surprised aboutwhat I wrote down.
It got me thinking where did Ilearn this from?
Where did I get this?
Where did I get all of thismisinformation?
In this episode, kelly and Italk about exactly where these
harmful ideas come from.
Take a listen.
So this is exciting, kelly.
(02:13):
Will you give us your realrobust introduction about who
you are and what you do and tellus about Kelly?
Kelly (02:27):
Hello, my name is Kelly and I'm Lippon Apache.
I'm a citizen of the LipponApache tribe of Texas.
I am an educator and Ihomeschool my own children.
I am culturally intact andraising my children
traditionally Lippon.
What does?
Delina (02:42):
that even mean that you're culturally intact.
Kelly (02:46):
A lot of times when I meet people and you know people
are like oh, you're, you're,you're native american, you're
indian or whatever.
You know, yeah, I'm, you know,lepon apache and that kind of
thing, that's.
There's not a lot ofunderstanding of what that means
.
Um, people, I've tried toexplain.
You know, we are culturallydifferent than north american
people.
Like we, we have our owncultures.
(03:08):
And then people are like whatdo you mean?
Your own culture like what?
What foods and values andtraditions and and you know all
these different things andpeople, what do you mean?
It's different than the UnitedStates or what is you know?
And so I like to say that I'mculturally intact, because it
indicates that I'm not justsomebody that has some like
(03:28):
distant oh, my great greatgrandmother was, you know,
whatever which is really common.
A lot of people do have somedistant Native heritage or at
least families of that, orstories of that in their
families, which may or may notbe true, but that's not the same
story for another day.
Yeah, which?
But that's not the same thing.
Another story for another day?
Yeah, but that's not the samething as actually being an
(03:50):
Indigenous person and having aNative identity.
And so I like to say you knowI'm a Native person, I'm Lippon
Apache, but I'm also culturallyintact because I do have my
culture, my traditional culture.
I am Lippon all day, every day,and how I live and how I see
the world and how I experiencethe world and our cultural
traditions are a part of ourlife, and so it's not just
(04:11):
something that's distantheritage in my family, it's not
just something that I know alittle bit about, but it's, it's
my daily existence.
Delina (04:18):
Okay, this is not something that you came to know
later in life.
This is how you grew up.
Kelly (04:27):
Right, yeah, I was.
I was raised Lipan and my kidsare raised Lipan.
I didn't find out later that Ihad like a native ancestor and
then wanted to know more, moreabout it.
You know, people sometimes askme well, how can I find out
about my family?
You know, tree blah, blah, blah.
I don't know anything aboutgenealogy.
I've never had to do that, youknow I, I fortunately, have
(04:49):
always been connected to my, mynation, my culture, my people.
And I know, for a lot of Nativepeople that's not always the
case because of history, the wayit's happened, and a lot of
Native people find out later orthey know they're Native their
whole life but they don't havethat connection because of a
variety of reasons in history.
So I, you know, I understandthat that's a very fortunate
(05:09):
thing as a native person to beable to have that connection
that I've always had.
But you know it is.
It is a bit different than justhaving some distant ancestry or
heritage that I know a littlebit about.
Delina (05:20):
Right, great.
So how did you come to want toeducate others about Native
people?
Kelly (05:31):
So as an Indigenous person, I'm constantly having to
correct misconceptions about uspretty much everywhere I go,
everybody I talk to, there'salways something that comes up
in that, or people are curiousand want to know more.
So I just end up having to tellabout myself and teach and
educate.
So for a lot of Native peopleit's not really a choice just
(05:53):
because there's so muchunder-education and miseducation
about us out there that a lotof us don't really have an
option.
Like that's just kind of whatwe have to do in social
interactions.
So I grew up in publiceducation and I remember how
harmful it was.
And then when I startedhomeschooling my kids from the
beginning I started noticinglike how horrible the options
(06:14):
were for curriculum.
Like there was nothing outthere and everything was just
really whitewashed, racist, fullof stereotypes and
misinformation.
You know I wasn't surprisedbecause that's the kind of stuff
that I was taught and I didn'treally expect the you know, at
the time homeschool curriculumto be a whole lot different than
what's in the public schools,and but I was frustrated by it.
(06:36):
So I started just making my ownstuff and using good materials
that I knew about, and thenpeople started asking me for
recommendations and then Istarted writing lessons and
curriculum and and lesson plansand things and people started
asking me for more and so itjust kind of grew kind of
organically out of being ahomeschooler.
(06:57):
And then my auntie Teresa shewas a storyteller and she was
hired at a historic site everyyear for a week-long educational
event and she told them to hireme and my kids to teach about
dance because they neededsomebody.
They had an empty spot and sothey did and I was like all
right, so we got on contractwith them and every year we
started teaching with them attheir event.
(07:18):
And then we started gettinghired at museums and schools and
libraries and the teachers werealways coming up and asking me
questions and complimenting us,and so then they started asking
me for resources.
So I started compilingresources for teachers and
making book lists and then Istarted making alternative lists
to popular curricula and I kindof got famous in the homeschool
(07:40):
world and just kind of branchedout from there.
So it was all really organicand kind of accidental.
But I now teach on out school,um but um.
I now teach on out school andthen I'm also hired to train
teachers in different schooldistricts and um educators.
And then I run seminars andworkshops for um teachers and
educators for identifying nativestereotypes in materials and
(08:01):
how to find better materials.
Um, I get hired at schools andmuseums and libraries still and
um.
And then I'm also a consultantfor multiple curriculum
companies like uh with you andseveral still.
And then I'm also a consultantfor multiple curriculum
companies like with you andseveral others.
And then I'm also right now ona committee to develop a high
school native studies curriculumfor the entire state of Texas
that we're hopefully going to belaunching this fall, that's wow
(08:23):
.
Delina (08:24):
So I was interested that you you said you were were you
grew up in the public schoolsystem.
So I mean, this is not in ourline of questioning here, but
what was that like?
Kelly (08:39):
It was rough, um, my sister and I were the only
native students in our school,um, and we got in trouble a lot
because we would challenge theteachers.
And you know, I I rememberthere was a time where my sister
had challenged one of theteachers and the teacher said,
(08:59):
well, where did you learn that?
And she said, well, my dad,cause we're Apache.
And she said, well, your dad isstupid.
And so we got I mean, that'show teachers treated us,
especially when we wouldchallenge them about the things
they were teaching, and thateventually led to some silencing
, of course, and we didn'treally get to deal with that on
(09:23):
a higher level at all, becausewe were just kids, kids.
And then you know, we dealt witha lot of, you know, racial
bullying and racial slurs inschools and just issues like
that from students and teachers.
It wasn't just a student'sthing, you know, it was all
around.
And then, of course, theeducational materials, the
things that are taught in publicschools, are just wrong,
(09:46):
stereotypes, sometimes racist,just not good, especially
growing up, you know, in the 80sand 90s right, so it was.
It was a bit different then too.
So it was.
It was rough and it definitelygave me a lot of resolve, by the
time I was an adolescent, tofight back against that and push
against those narratives.
I was an activist from an earlyage and I guess that gave me a
(10:08):
lot of a lot of reason to fight.
You know a lot of reasons.
Yeah, it's that.
And in the education world,specifically because I had those
experiences and I remember that, is that?
Delina (10:21):
did that inform your um reason for homeschooling part of
it?
Kelly (10:25):
yes, um, we had a lot of.
We have a lot of reasons forhomeschooling, um, but that's
one of them.
Yeah, I didn't want my kids inthat education system and
hearing those things beingtaught about us and them being
told all these wrong things andthere's only so many hours in a
day when they're at school allday.
How much you can correct athome?
And of course, they'd be raisedthey're being raised culturally
(10:46):
, so that still definitely shapehow they they process that
information from schools, butstill a lot of the the facts of
history and things can't becorrected as much, and so, um, I
just the environment.
Delina (11:00):
I mean I haven't thought this through, but I'm just
gonna say it anyway.
Um, I feel like I feel like weknow the things that you
shouldn't say about black peoplein school.
We don't know those things.
Well, like there's not yearsand years of of this.
(11:21):
I mean, I'm not saying itdoesn't get said, but I'm saying
do you see what I'm saying?
Like up until last year therewas still a football team named
a racial slur.
Kelly (11:33):
A national team.
Yeah, and there still are allover the country that the racial
slur is still used for teamsall over the country in schools,
so Right.
Delina (11:40):
Right, so yeah.
So there's like a differentconsciousness there is there,
really is.
Kelly (11:49):
We're still invisible, um .
We still don't exist in thepublic consciousness, um.
We're still some mythologicalthing of the past, um, and in
one thing not, not a notdifferent nations right, like
(12:09):
we're all lumped together intoone people group, either that,
or, if you know, people dorecognize our modern existence.
We're a bunch of um, you know,lazy drunks.
Or we're um doing nothing,right, you know we don't
contribute anything.
We do nothing, um, and so thethe public awareness of our not
only existence but just who weare, is non-existent.
(12:32):
And so, yeah, schools don'thave that like we know what to
say and what not to say, and youknow that kind of thing.
And then when you try to go upagainst these things at schools,
like the mascot issue or evenjust what they're teaching and
how they're teaching it, or evenyou know how native students
are treated, there's a currentissue a lot.
(12:54):
The um schools violate theamerican indian religious
freedom act all the time.
Uh, at graduations, when theytell students they can't have
their eagle feathers or theiryou know, the beaded caps or
their cultural expressions atgraduations, right, and they,
they'll come up and, um, there'sbeen teachers that'll throw
eagle feathers on the ground,which is like culturally, like
terrible.
It's a terrible thing, you know, you don't let those touch the
(13:15):
ground right, and so, and that'sa violation of the American
Indian Religious Freedom Act,which wasn't passed until 1978.
And so we've only had religiousfreedom since 78.
But schools all over thecountry won't let Native
students have those culturalexpressions which they're
legally allowed to have byfederal law and teachers and
administrators are completelyignorant of that federal law and
(13:36):
don't even know about it.
Or even here in Texas and inother places too.
But here in Texas it's happenedseveral times.
Where Native students will goto school, boys with long hair
will be told they have to cuttheir hair because the dress
code says boy's hair has to becut up here.
And well, you know, this iscultural, this is religious, you
know.
And here in Texas we had a kidfrom actually the Lippan Apache
(13:57):
tribe of Texas, from my nation,adriel Orocha, who was in
kindergarten, was put in inschool suspension for wearing
long hair and not cutting it andthey made his tuck, his braid
down, the back of his shirt,which you know was very
uncomfortable and wouldn't lethim be around other kids, and he
took them all the way to Ithink it was the Fifth Circuit
Court of Appeals and won.
(14:17):
And now there's actually caselaw in Texas that every time
Texas schools try to tell Nativestudents they have to cut their
hair, you can just pull outthat case law and they have to
stop.
And that still happens.
Like I know, a family wasposting about it just a few
months ago here in Texas, Ithink, the beginning of the
school year, and so those kindsof issues.
Most people just don't evenknow that there are cultural and
(14:41):
religious protections for thisand that these are actual
cultural and religiousexpressions, you know, let alone
it's not just like some kind offun decoration or whatever on a
bad right right, and so there'sjust.
There's all that completeignorance, um, and uneducation,
miseducation, about those thingsthat even school administrators
and teachers don't realize wow,yeah.
Delina (15:04):
So where do you start?
You start with the children oryou start with the school
administrators to teach?
That's a difficult question.
Kelly (15:13):
You know, I find that elementary kids tend to be the
most accepting and most willingto change how they think when
given new information.
The older the students get, theharder it is to challenge those
narratives that they've beentaught.
And then, you know, especiallyadults adults are a lot harder
(15:35):
to reach.
There's a lot of unlearning todo and a lot of adults don't
like to confront that inthemselves, and so there's a lot
of pushback and a lot ofrejection of it.
You know, when I train teachersthere's a lot of confusion, a
lot of um.
You know they don't want torecognize that they've
unintentionally been doing harmthrough the way they're
educating.
Um, you know, and it's, it'snot their fault, they were
(15:58):
taught that way and that theywere taught to teach that way,
um, but they don't want tousually face that.
And so I find it a lot easierto reach the younger kids,
either starting from thebeginning or, you know, in
elementary school, if they'vebeen taught some of those false
narratives, to be able toaddress it early on, and they're
like wait a minute, that's notwhat I was told.
And then they want more andthey want to know, and then they
want to tell others and a lotmore accepting of it and a lot
(16:20):
more willing to confront that.
So the older they get and themore those those false
narratives are ingrained in intheir minds and those
stereotypes that they'reconfronted with about us all the
time, the harder it is to reachthem.
Delina (16:35):
So, okay, I know this is probably not a fair question,
but what are the top threeterrible things that we've
learned about Native people orNative history?
Kelly (16:49):
So, I don't know.
I can't really choose three.
The racism and stereotypes areokay when it's Native people.
Oh, that's not just withmascots, but with the
educational materials too.
That's really ingrained ineducation from the very
beginning.
You know these ideas that wedon't exist anymore.
(17:13):
87% of textbooks don't mentionus past 1900.
And so this isn't explicitlytaught.
Like teachers don't stand upthere and say Native Americans
don't exist anymore, but it'simplied.
And then that means peopledon't learn all of the issues
that we deal with in the 20thand 21st century.
Delina (17:35):
Right.
Kelly (17:36):
All the things that were continuing.
You know, all 10 definitions of, or all 10 stages of, genocide
were still occurring to Nativepeoples through the 20th century
, and several of them are stilloccurring now.
Right and so.
But this, this isn't taughtbecause we don't exist anymore,
right, we're?
We're pre-1900.
And then I think a final majorissue is that, and I think a
(18:00):
final major issue is that wewere I say the S word savages,
it's a racial slur but we werejust as bad to each other as the
Europeans were to us.
So, whatever the Europeans did,it's not a big deal.
I see this all the time,especially online, on social
media, when native news storiescome up, there's going to be
commenters.
Well, they were just as bad toeach other as we were to them
and they were just killing eachother before we showed up.
(18:21):
And that's not true at all.
Um and but that's, that's thenarrative that's pushed.
So it's a really major issuewhen it comes to confronting
modern issues that native peopleare coming up against.
That's the, the pushback thatwe receive from the public.
Delina (18:37):
Yeah, I didn't know the S word was a racial slur.
Is it the word?
I'm not saying it.
I didn't know that.
You shouldn't say that aboutNative people.
I'm saying the word in general.
Kelly (19:03):
I mean when used, you know, not for people.
Okay, you know if you're goingto talk about like.
I mean, I don't like the wordin any context, but there's
contexts where it's not aboutpeople and it's not a slur, but
when it's referring to Nativepeople or people in general,
really it is and it's definitelybeen one that's been used
against us.
Delina (19:17):
um right, and indigenous people from all over the world.
That's been used.
Yes, yeah, yeah, I, I don'teven, I can't even think of what
other context we we know thatword.
That's, that's how we know thatword, you know it's.
Kelly (19:33):
I think a lot of youth are using it as slang these days
for like something being like,like what we used to call like
killer or sick.
You know they'll use it thatway.
Delina (19:48):
So I think I think that's kind of coming around as
a slang term now, but Okay.
So I think you answered thisquestion about resources for
homeschooling, but how do youteach your kids about hard
history and not history that'sabstract, or you know?
(20:08):
It's history about our people.
It's history about us.
This is directly related to ourpresent.
So how do you, how do younavigate that?
Kelly (20:19):
how do you navigate that?
It can be tough.
You know, my kids have grown upwith strong ties to our nation
and their culture.
They've been raised withcultural understandings and
worldviews that are quitedifferent than the United States
, and so they recognize a lot ofthings in the dominant culture
around them that are verydifferent than how we see things
(20:40):
and how we experience things,and they already see that on
their own because of the waythey've been raised.
Um, so when it comes to hardhistory, um, I mean they already
have that indigenous lens andperspective on things when they
see history.
They already have that in thefirst place.
So it's easier to um, it'seasier to recognize and easier
(21:05):
to confront, I think.
But at the same time, when it'sour own people in our own
histories, it's hard, um, likeyou know, when people learn
about, like the indian boardingschools, which is in the news
right now because of Canada, um,which, but that happened here
in the United.
Delina (21:22):
States too.
Oh, it's coming, that story'scoming.
Kelly (21:25):
Yeah, oh yeah, they're going to start uncovering the
same things here.
Um, because Deb Haaland just uhcalled for an inquiry into the
Indian boarding schools here.
So, um, but you know when, whenpeople learn about that,
because that's not taught inschools, that's 20th century and
we don't exist anymore, right,so that doesn't, that doesn't
get taught.
But when people learn aboutthat, they're shocked and you
(21:47):
know, wow, you know, and it'shard, and it is hard history to
confront.
But, like when my kids learnedabout that, they cry.
You know, when we, like, wewatched there's a scene in the
series Into the West about theboarding schools, about the kids
being taken away, and my kidsbawled and we had to turn it off
and talk, you know, becausethat's their own people.
(22:08):
You know, that's us, that'swhat our families experienced,
you know, and so we feel itdifferently.
And so, um, you feel itdifferently, it's it, yeah, we,
we, it's it's.
It can be really hard to facesometimes, especially for young
kids, seeing those kinds ofhistories, knowing, like, you
know, my kids watch that andlearn about that and know that
that could have been them.
Um, you know, I watch thoseinterviews from survivors and
(22:34):
and realize that that could havebeen me, um, um, because
compulsory attendance for Indianboarding schools was not ended
until 1978 and I was only born afew years after that, you know.
And so it's hard and then andthen looking at my own children
and thinking about like thatcould be, that could have been
(22:55):
me and them experiencing, youknow, and it and it's so.
It's the kids, they.
They experience it verydifferently when they learn
about those histories, and so wedo have to kind of come at
those a little bit differently,just because that's that's our
own history and our own people.
So I think it can be easier toconfront in in some ways because
they already have thatindigenous perspective, but can
(23:15):
be harder to confront in otherways because that's that's our
own people's experiences.
Delina (23:20):
Right.
How do you answer people whosay oh, my child is too
sensitive, people who not?
Speaker 3 (23:26):
are not indigenous.
Delina (23:28):
My child is too sensitive.
She can't learn this or hecan't learn that.
You know our children don'thave a choice about these things
.
Kelly (23:38):
Right, you know, I tell people all the time.
You know, if you're, if my fiveyear old can experience racism,
your, your five year old, canlearn about it.
You know, and my kids have beenexperiencing racism their whole
lives.
I was starting at those youngages and we understood it.
I mean, we didn't understandwhy, but we understood what it
(23:58):
was.
You know, and so you know if,if our kids can experience those
things, they don't get a choicein having this idea of an
innocent childhood.
You know the other kids.
They can learn about thesethings too.
There are ways to do it thatmake it understandable at young
(24:20):
ages, that make it um digestibleat young ages.
Delina (24:25):
You know, and you don't have to tell them everything
right with with really youngkids.
Kelly (24:30):
I think it really leads to a lot of empathy and a lot of
um desire to change, you know,desire like I want to help fix
that with younger kids.
And so it's not harmful tonon-native kids to learn about
these things.
It's really not.
It's reality.
And in the same ways that wecan teach young kids other
(24:53):
realities like you know, there'sadults out there that want to,
that might want to harm you andhere's how to stay safe.
Right, you know we can teachthem those realities, so then we
can also teach them therealities of heart, history and
racism.
Delina (25:07):
Right, okay, so why do you think that it's important?
You alluded to it a little bitjust now in that answer.
But why do you think it'simportant what children are
taught?
Now you know it seems like anobvious question, right, but how
have?
How has that miseducation andthat under?
(25:31):
You said miseducation andundereducation, right?
How have those two thingscontributed to what we see?
Kelly (25:51):
no-transcript.
Eighty seven percent oftextbooks don't mention us past
1900 and 90 percent of thematerials taught about us are
over 90%, really.
Um of the materials taughtabout us are written by
non-natives.
Um, most of what is taught isshort and simplistic, um and
full of myths, inaccuracies andstereotypes.
The western um perspectives,eurocentric perspectives,
(26:12):
dominate, and most of this isnever corrected in college,
because those perspectives andissues exist in college too.
You can go kindergarten throughcollege in the United States
and receive a total scholarshipof two semesters of instruction
about native peoples, and mostof it's wrong, and unless you
specifically seek out nativestudies in college, that's not
going to get corrected.
Delina (26:33):
Um but that seems like a lot, a total of two.
That seems like fromkindergarten to college, though
no, no, I'm saying that seemslike you're being generous, I
mean I it might.
Kelly (26:47):
It might be, it might be generous in some places, um,
because really I mean you get afew paragraphs here and there in
textbooks over the years andput it all together Maybe it
adds up to about that much, butit's not much.
Yeah, it's not, um, but theeducation gap on this subject
leads to, you know, ignorance.
It leads to racism.
(27:08):
It leads to violence.
It directly impacts Nativepeople and how we're treated by
non-Natives.
It has a real world impact,from social interactions to
policies and laws that affect usand harm us.
Most judges in the United Statesdon't ever learn federal Indian
law at all.
Federal judges don't ever learnfederal Indian law.
Most politicians don't everlearn federal Indian law at all.
(27:28):
Federal judges don't ever learnfederal Indian law.
Most politicians don't everlearn federal Indian law or
treaties or sovereignty.
If you don't know treaties andsovereignty, you don't know US
history, right, and most peoplein the United States government
never learn that, and they'rethe ones that are in charge of
upholding those treaties right,and they don't even ever learn
about them.
Most people in Congress don'teven know what sovereignty means
when it comes to Native nations, and so most statistics don't
(27:53):
even include us right.
During the election there wasthat something else thing, the
CNN poll, something else.
So there's this whole Nativepop culture thing about being
something else, and it gotreally funny.
But you know that most don'teven include us, right?
Sometimes official paperworkand documentation doesn't even
have a category for us, and sothen when people are filling out
paperwork not us but like otherpeople about us we'll get
(28:15):
mischaracterized as,miscategorized, as like Latino,
black, white or Asian right,depending on.
You know how some people look,right, and that also impacts any
statistics as well.
But you know, in the UnitedStates today, native people were
the most likely race to bekilled by the police.
There's the missing andmurdered Indigenous women
(28:37):
epidemic that a lot of peopledon't know about.
We have some of the highestrates of sexual assault against
us.
There's major healthdisparities and racism in health
care.
Against us there's the suicideepidemics that are a direct
result of what's going on, ofhow we're treated, of
colonization, all those things.
Issues of poverty andunemployment again direct result
(28:58):
of colonization and ongoinggenocide, and how society treats
us and sees us.
Issues of religious rights andcivil rights, which I touched on
a few of those things already,but that all goes into the
issues that we face and I don'tknow, a lot of people don't even
realize that there's actually apipeline issue going on right
now in Minnesota line threeright People are trying to get
(29:22):
the attention that Standing Rockhad and it's not getting that
attention.
But that's going on right nowstill, you know.
And so this is all not becausewe're passive recipients of
history, but that's all you know, a direct result of how we are
treated by society, how we'reseen by society, and that all
(29:43):
comes from that uneducation andmiseducation, you know.
And so it also causes, you know, harmful social interactions
among children.
Other kids treat my kids badlybecause of what they've been
taught about Native people, whatthey see in the textbooks.
You know I had a friend when mykids were little, that her kids
(30:06):
were watching Peter Pan andthen she saw the, the whole, um,
the, what made the red man redthing came up and that I mean
that's horribly racist, thatmovie is horribly racist.
And her kids, um, saidsomething about like, are
Indians real?
And she said, yeah, well, wehave, we have native friends.
And she tried to tell, tellthem about my kids and us.
(30:27):
You know, you're, you'refriends with native kids.
And they said, well, are theygoing to kill us, and she had no
idea the impact that not onlypeter pan, but all these things
that our kids have could beenseen in society and exposed to
were having that kind of impacton her kids.
And so she came to me franticlike I don't know how to correct
this.
I didn't even know this washappening.
Um, and that's and that common.
(30:48):
Most people in the United Statesdon't even realize that they're
being confronted with negativeviews and stereotypes of Native
people on a daily basis that areleading to kids developing all
these internalized ideas aboutNative people.
That then impacts how theytreat us, and so it affects how
kids treat each other.
My kids have been raciallybullied by kids of their age as
(31:08):
early as five years old, youknow.
So one of the major ways tocombat this is through education
, right, and these narrativesneed to be corrected and our
voices need to be heard.
It's vital to not only how wesee history, but also to, you
know, culturally responsiveeducation that listens to Native
(31:28):
voices and promotesunderstanding and respect, and
that's really important,especially for kids to start
learning because, like I said,they're confronted with all
these stereotypes about Nativepeople on a regular basis and
most people don't even realizeit, and that does negatively
impact us, us and so, um youknow, correcting this and
addressing this througheducation is really vital to um
(31:57):
cultural understanding andrespect between people as well.
Delina (32:01):
Well, where do you think they get it?
Like kids as young as five, six, um.
Kelly (32:06):
You mentioned peter pan, but cartoons um books, books, uh
, chapter books and story bookskids love to read that are
really popular.
Um textbooks, school curriculum, um cartoons, of course, um
sports and the mascot shoe, umit's, it's all over the place,
it's, it's infused throughout USsociety without people
(32:30):
realizing it.
Delina (32:31):
Yeah, let's leave it there for now.
I hope you enjoyed thatconversation with educator Kelly
Tudor.
We will continue with thisconversation in part two coming
up in episode seven.
In the meantime, check out theshow notes for links to things
mentioned in this interview.
Speaker 3 (32:48):
Homeschool Yourself is a production of Woke
Homeschooling Inc.
For show notes and links tothings mentioned in the episode,
visit wokehomeschoolingcomslash podcast.
Woke Homeschooling empowersparents to teach their kids an
inclusive, truthful history.
We invite you to visit ourwebsite and download a sample of
the history curriculum we offerfor kids.
(33:09):
Visit us atwokehomeschoolingcom.
There are harmful things that we think, do and say that
harm others.
There are things that we needto learn and unlearn.
Welcome to Homeschool Yourself.
I'm Delena Price-McFaul.
In this episode, I get to talkto one of the people that I've
learned from in the past fewyears.
Her name is Kelly Tudor andshe's dedicated her career to
undoing the harm that has beendone to indigenous people in
(00:23):
this country.
She does this through education.
She teaches children and sheteaches adults.
Also, she teaches teachers andshe does curriculum development.
There's so many untrue thingsthat we all learned in school
about Native American people.
We learned stereotypes as truth.
Most of the time, we didn'thave anyone to guide us, to even
(00:47):
be able to spot the stereotypesand think about the harm that
was done by certain messagesthat we learned.
Many times just by not learningtheir history, who they are and
them not being even in ourconsciousness, we learn to
ignore them in the present dayand ignore their contributions.
(01:08):
About 10 years ago, a book cameout called Waking Up White by
Debbie Irving.
I read it because I was leadinga group where we unpacked
issues of race.
I really think this is a reallypowerful book and one of the
things that I loved about it isthat after every essay or
chapter, there would bethought-provoking questions to
help you unpack your ownthoughts.
(01:29):
And one of the questions andyou can find this on page 91 of
the book and I'll link to thebook in the show notes One of
the questions asks you to makecolumns and label them and next
to each, quickly write fivestereotypes that come to mind
for each group of people.
So they have African-American,white, asian-american, native
(01:50):
American and so on.
I was honestly surprised aboutwhat I wrote down.
It got me thinking where did Ilearn this from?
Where did I get this?
Where did I get all of thismisinformation?
In this episode, kelly and Italk about exactly where these
harmful ideas come from.
Take a listen.
So this is exciting, kelly.
(02:13):
Will you give us your realrobust introduction about who
you are and what you do and tellus about Kelly?
Kelly (02:27):
Hello, my name is Kelly and I'm Lippon Apache.
I'm a citizen of the LipponApache tribe of Texas.
I am an educator and Ihomeschool my own children.
I am culturally intact andraising my children
traditionally Lippon.
What does?
Delina (02:42):
that even mean that you're culturally intact.
Kelly (02:46):
A lot of times when I meet people and you know people
are like oh, you're, you're,you're native american, you're
indian or whatever.
You know, yeah, I'm, you know,lepon apache and that kind of
thing, that's.
There's not a lot ofunderstanding of what that means
.
Um, people, I've tried toexplain.
You know, we are culturallydifferent than north american
people.
Like we, we have our owncultures.
(03:08):
And then people are like whatdo you mean?
Your own culture like what?
What foods and values andtraditions and and you know all
these different things andpeople, what do you mean?
It's different than the UnitedStates or what is you know?
And so I like to say that I'mculturally intact, because it
indicates that I'm not justsomebody that has some like
(03:28):
distant oh, my great greatgrandmother was, you know,
whatever which is really common.
A lot of people do have somedistant Native heritage or at
least families of that, orstories of that in their
families, which may or may notbe true, but that's not the same
story for another day.
Yeah, which?
But that's not the same thing.
Another story for another day?
Yeah, but that's not the samething as actually being an
(03:50):
Indigenous person and having aNative identity.
And so I like to say you knowI'm a Native person, I'm Lippon
Apache, but I'm also culturallyintact because I do have my
culture, my traditional culture.
I am Lippon all day, every day,and how I live and how I see
the world and how I experiencethe world and our cultural
traditions are a part of ourlife, and so it's not just
(04:11):
something that's distantheritage in my family, it's not
just something that I know alittle bit about, but it's, it's
my daily existence.
Delina (04:18):
Okay, this is not something that you came to know
later in life.
This is how you grew up.
Kelly (04:27):
Right, yeah, I was.
I was raised Lipan and my kidsare raised Lipan.
I didn't find out later that Ihad like a native ancestor and
then wanted to know more, moreabout it.
You know, people sometimes askme well, how can I find out
about my family?
You know, tree blah, blah, blah.
I don't know anything aboutgenealogy.
I've never had to do that, youknow I, I fortunately, have
(04:49):
always been connected to my, mynation, my culture, my people.
And I know, for a lot of Nativepeople that's not always the
case because of history, the wayit's happened, and a lot of
Native people find out later orthey know they're Native their
whole life but they don't havethat connection because of a
variety of reasons in history.
So I, you know, I understandthat that's a very fortunate
(05:09):
thing as a native person to beable to have that connection
that I've always had.
But you know it is.
It is a bit different than justhaving some distant ancestry or
heritage that I know a littlebit about.
Delina (05:20):
Right, great.
So how did you come to want toeducate others about Native
people?
Kelly (05:31):
So as an Indigenous person, I'm constantly having to
correct misconceptions about uspretty much everywhere I go,
everybody I talk to, there'salways something that comes up
in that, or people are curiousand want to know more.
So I just end up having to tellabout myself and teach and
educate.
So for a lot of Native peopleit's not really a choice just
(05:53):
because there's so muchunder-education and miseducation
about us out there that a lotof us don't really have an
option.
Like that's just kind of whatwe have to do in social
interactions.
So I grew up in publiceducation and I remember how
harmful it was.
And then when I startedhomeschooling my kids from the
beginning I started noticinglike how horrible the options
(06:14):
were for curriculum.
Like there was nothing outthere and everything was just
really whitewashed, racist, fullof stereotypes and
misinformation.
You know I wasn't surprisedbecause that's the kind of stuff
that I was taught and I didn'treally expect the you know, at
the time homeschool curriculumto be a whole lot different than
what's in the public schools,and but I was frustrated by it.
(06:36):
So I started just making my ownstuff and using good materials
that I knew about, and thenpeople started asking me for
recommendations and then Istarted writing lessons and
curriculum and and lesson plansand things and people started
asking me for more and so itjust kind of grew kind of
organically out of being ahomeschooler.
(06:57):
And then my auntie Teresa shewas a storyteller and she was
hired at a historic site everyyear for a week-long educational
event and she told them to hireme and my kids to teach about
dance because they neededsomebody.
They had an empty spot and sothey did and I was like all
right, so we got on contractwith them and every year we
started teaching with them attheir event.
(07:18):
And then we started gettinghired at museums and schools and
libraries and the teachers werealways coming up and asking me
questions and complimenting us,and so then they started asking
me for resources.
So I started compilingresources for teachers and
making book lists and then Istarted making alternative lists
to popular curricula and I kindof got famous in the homeschool
(07:40):
world and just kind of branchedout from there.
So it was all really organicand kind of accidental.
But I now teach on out school,um but um.
I now teach on out school andthen I'm also hired to train
teachers in different schooldistricts and um educators.
And then I run seminars andworkshops for um teachers and
educators for identifying nativestereotypes in materials and
(08:01):
how to find better materials.
Um, I get hired at schools andmuseums and libraries still and
um.
And then I'm also a consultantfor multiple curriculum
companies like uh with you andseveral still.
And then I'm also a consultantfor multiple curriculum
companies like with you andseveral others.
And then I'm also right now ona committee to develop a high
school native studies curriculumfor the entire state of Texas
that we're hopefully going to belaunching this fall, that's wow
(08:23):
.
Delina (08:24):
So I was interested that you you said you were were you
grew up in the public schoolsystem.
So I mean, this is not in ourline of questioning here, but
what was that like?
Kelly (08:39):
It was rough, um, my sister and I were the only
native students in our school,um, and we got in trouble a lot
because we would challenge theteachers.
And you know, I I rememberthere was a time where my sister
had challenged one of theteachers and the teacher said,
(08:59):
well, where did you learn that?
And she said, well, my dad,cause we're Apache.
And she said, well, your dad isstupid.
And so we got I mean, that'show teachers treated us,
especially when we wouldchallenge them about the things
they were teaching, and thateventually led to some silencing
, of course, and we didn'treally get to deal with that on
(09:23):
a higher level at all, becausewe were just kids, kids.
And then you know, we dealt witha lot of, you know, racial
bullying and racial slurs inschools and just issues like
that from students and teachers.
It wasn't just a student'sthing, you know, it was all
around.
And then, of course, theeducational materials, the
things that are taught in publicschools, are just wrong,
(09:46):
stereotypes, sometimes racist,just not good, especially
growing up, you know, in the 80sand 90s right, so it was.
It was a bit different then too.
So it was.
It was rough and it definitelygave me a lot of resolve, by the
time I was an adolescent, tofight back against that and push
against those narratives.
I was an activist from an earlyage and I guess that gave me a
(10:08):
lot of a lot of reason to fight.
You know a lot of reasons.
Yeah, it's that.
And in the education world,specifically because I had those
experiences and I remember that, is that?
Delina (10:21):
did that inform your um reason for homeschooling part of
it?
Kelly (10:25):
yes, um, we had a lot of.
We have a lot of reasons forhomeschooling, um, but that's
one of them.
Yeah, I didn't want my kids inthat education system and
hearing those things beingtaught about us and them being
told all these wrong things andthere's only so many hours in a
day when they're at school allday.
How much you can correct athome?
And of course, they'd be raisedthey're being raised culturally
(10:46):
, so that still definitely shapehow they they process that
information from schools, butstill a lot of the the facts of
history and things can't becorrected as much, and so, um, I
just the environment.
Delina (11:00):
I mean I haven't thought this through, but I'm just
gonna say it anyway.
Um, I feel like I feel like weknow the things that you
shouldn't say about black peoplein school.
We don't know those things.
Well, like there's not yearsand years of of this.
(11:21):
I mean, I'm not saying itdoesn't get said, but I'm saying
do you see what I'm saying?
Like up until last year therewas still a football team named
a racial slur.
Kelly (11:33):
A national team.
Yeah, and there still are allover the country that the racial
slur is still used for teamsall over the country in schools,
so Right.
Delina (11:40):
Right, so yeah.
So there's like a differentconsciousness there is there,
really is.
Kelly (11:49):
We're still invisible, um .
We still don't exist in thepublic consciousness, um.
We're still some mythologicalthing of the past, um, and in
one thing not, not a notdifferent nations right, like
(12:09):
we're all lumped together intoone people group, either that,
or, if you know, people dorecognize our modern existence.
We're a bunch of um, you know,lazy drunks.
Or we're um doing nothing,right, you know we don't
contribute anything.
We do nothing, um, and so thethe public awareness of our not
only existence but just who weare, is non-existent.
(12:32):
And so, yeah, schools don'thave that like we know what to
say and what not to say, and youknow that kind of thing.
And then when you try to go upagainst these things at schools,
like the mascot issue or evenjust what they're teaching and
how they're teaching it, or evenyou know how native students
are treated, there's a currentissue a lot.
(12:54):
The um schools violate theamerican indian religious
freedom act all the time.
Uh, at graduations, when theytell students they can't have
their eagle feathers or theiryou know, the beaded caps or
their cultural expressions atgraduations, right, and they,
they'll come up and, um, there'sbeen teachers that'll throw
eagle feathers on the ground,which is like culturally, like
terrible.
It's a terrible thing, you know, you don't let those touch the
(13:15):
ground right, and so, and that'sa violation of the American
Indian Religious Freedom Act,which wasn't passed until 1978.
And so we've only had religiousfreedom since 78.
But schools all over thecountry won't let Native
students have those culturalexpressions which they're
legally allowed to have byfederal law and teachers and
administrators are completelyignorant of that federal law and
(13:36):
don't even know about it.
Or even here in Texas and inother places too.
But here in Texas it's happenedseveral times.
Where Native students will goto school, boys with long hair
will be told they have to cuttheir hair because the dress
code says boy's hair has to becut up here.
And well, you know, this iscultural, this is religious, you
know.
And here in Texas we had a kidfrom actually the Lippan Apache
(13:57):
tribe of Texas, from my nation,adriel Orocha, who was in
kindergarten, was put in inschool suspension for wearing
long hair and not cutting it andthey made his tuck, his braid
down, the back of his shirt,which you know was very
uncomfortable and wouldn't lethim be around other kids, and he
took them all the way to Ithink it was the Fifth Circuit
Court of Appeals and won.
(14:17):
And now there's actually caselaw in Texas that every time
Texas schools try to tell Nativestudents they have to cut their
hair, you can just pull outthat case law and they have to
stop.
And that still happens.
Like I know, a family wasposting about it just a few
months ago here in Texas, Ithink, the beginning of the
school year, and so those kindsof issues.
Most people just don't evenknow that there are cultural and
(14:41):
religious protections for thisand that these are actual
cultural and religiousexpressions, you know, let alone
it's not just like some kind offun decoration or whatever on a
bad right right, and so there'sjust.
There's all that completeignorance, um, and uneducation,
miseducation, about those thingsthat even school administrators
and teachers don't realize wow,yeah.
Delina (15:04):
So where do you start?
You start with the children oryou start with the school
administrators to teach?
That's a difficult question.
Kelly (15:13):
You know, I find that elementary kids tend to be the
most accepting and most willingto change how they think when
given new information.
The older the students get, theharder it is to challenge those
narratives that they've beentaught.
And then, you know, especiallyadults adults are a lot harder
(15:35):
to reach.
There's a lot of unlearning todo and a lot of adults don't
like to confront that inthemselves, and so there's a lot
of pushback and a lot ofrejection of it.
You know, when I train teachersthere's a lot of confusion, a
lot of um.
You know they don't want torecognize that they've
unintentionally been doing harmthrough the way they're
educating.
Um, you know, and it's, it'snot their fault, they were
(15:58):
taught that way and that theywere taught to teach that way,
um, but they don't want tousually face that.
And so I find it a lot easierto reach the younger kids,
either starting from thebeginning or, you know, in
elementary school, if they'vebeen taught some of those false
narratives, to be able toaddress it early on, and they're
like wait a minute, that's notwhat I was told.
And then they want more andthey want to know, and then they
want to tell others and a lotmore accepting of it and a lot
(16:20):
more willing to confront that.
So the older they get and themore those those false
narratives are ingrained in intheir minds and those
stereotypes that they'reconfronted with about us all the
time, the harder it is to reachthem.
Delina (16:35):
So, okay, I know this is probably not a fair question,
but what are the top threeterrible things that we've
learned about Native people orNative history?
Kelly (16:49):
So, I don't know.
I can't really choose three.
The racism and stereotypes areokay when it's Native people.
Oh, that's not just withmascots, but with the
educational materials too.
That's really ingrained ineducation from the very
beginning.
You know these ideas that wedon't exist anymore.
(17:13):
87% of textbooks don't mentionus past 1900.
And so this isn't explicitlytaught.
Like teachers don't stand upthere and say Native Americans
don't exist anymore, but it'simplied.
And then that means peopledon't learn all of the issues
that we deal with in the 20thand 21st century.
Delina (17:35):
Right.
Kelly (17:36):
All the things that were continuing.
You know, all 10 definitions of, or all 10 stages of, genocide
were still occurring to Nativepeoples through the 20th century
, and several of them are stilloccurring now.
Right and so.
But this, this isn't taughtbecause we don't exist anymore,
right, we're?
We're pre-1900.
And then I think a final majorissue is that, and I think a
(18:00):
final major issue is that wewere I say the S word savages,
it's a racial slur but we werejust as bad to each other as the
Europeans were to us.
So, whatever the Europeans did,it's not a big deal.
I see this all the time,especially online, on social
media, when native news storiescome up, there's going to be
commenters.
Well, they were just as bad toeach other as we were to them
and they were just killing eachother before we showed up.
(18:21):
And that's not true at all.
Um and but that's, that's thenarrative that's pushed.
So it's a really major issuewhen it comes to confronting
modern issues that native peopleare coming up against.
That's the, the pushback thatwe receive from the public.
Delina (18:37):
Yeah, I didn't know the S word was a racial slur.
Is it the word?
I'm not saying it.
I didn't know that.
You shouldn't say that aboutNative people.
I'm saying the word in general.
Kelly (19:03):
I mean when used, you know, not for people.
Okay, you know if you're goingto talk about like.
I mean, I don't like the wordin any context, but there's
contexts where it's not aboutpeople and it's not a slur, but
when it's referring to Nativepeople or people in general,
really it is and it's definitelybeen one that's been used
against us.
Delina (19:17):
um right, and indigenous people from all over the world.
That's been used.
Yes, yeah, yeah, I, I don'teven, I can't even think of what
other context we we know thatword.
That's, that's how we know thatword, you know it's.
Kelly (19:33):
I think a lot of youth are using it as slang these days
for like something being like,like what we used to call like
killer or sick.
You know they'll use it thatway.
Delina (19:48):
So I think I think that's kind of coming around as
a slang term now, but Okay.
So I think you answered thisquestion about resources for
homeschooling, but how do youteach your kids about hard
history and not history that'sabstract, or you know?
(20:08):
It's history about our people.
It's history about us.
This is directly related to ourpresent.
So how do you, how do younavigate that?
Kelly (20:19):
how do you navigate that?
It can be tough.
You know, my kids have grown upwith strong ties to our nation
and their culture.
They've been raised withcultural understandings and
worldviews that are quitedifferent than the United States
, and so they recognize a lot ofthings in the dominant culture
around them that are verydifferent than how we see things
(20:40):
and how we experience things,and they already see that on
their own because of the waythey've been raised.
Um, so when it comes to hardhistory, um, I mean they already
have that indigenous lens andperspective on things when they
see history.
They already have that in thefirst place.
So it's easier to um, it'seasier to recognize and easier
(21:05):
to confront, I think.
But at the same time, when it'sour own people in our own
histories, it's hard, um, likeyou know, when people learn
about, like the indian boardingschools, which is in the news
right now because of Canada, um,which, but that happened here
in the United.
Delina (21:22):
States too.
Oh, it's coming, that story'scoming.
Kelly (21:25):
Yeah, oh yeah, they're going to start uncovering the
same things here.
Um, because Deb Haaland just uhcalled for an inquiry into the
Indian boarding schools here.
So, um, but you know when, whenpeople learn about that,
because that's not taught inschools, that's 20th century and
we don't exist anymore, right,so that doesn't, that doesn't
get taught.
But when people learn aboutthat, they're shocked and you
(21:47):
know, wow, you know, and it'shard, and it is hard history to
confront.
But, like when my kids learnedabout that, they cry.
You know, when we, like, wewatched there's a scene in the
series Into the West about theboarding schools, about the kids
being taken away, and my kidsbawled and we had to turn it off
and talk, you know, becausethat's their own people.
(22:08):
You know, that's us, that'swhat our families experienced,
you know, and so we feel itdifferently.
And so, um, you feel itdifferently, it's it, yeah, we,
we, it's it's.
It can be really hard to facesometimes, especially for young
kids, seeing those kinds ofhistories, knowing, like, you
know, my kids watch that andlearn about that and know that
that could have been them.
Um, you know, I watch thoseinterviews from survivors and
(22:34):
and realize that that could havebeen me, um, um, because
compulsory attendance for Indianboarding schools was not ended
until 1978 and I was only born afew years after that, you know.
And so it's hard and then andthen looking at my own children
and thinking about like thatcould be, that could have been
(22:55):
me and them experiencing, youknow, and it and it's so.
It's the kids, they.
They experience it verydifferently when they learn
about those histories, and so wedo have to kind of come at
those a little bit differently,just because that's that's our
own history and our own people.
So I think it can be easier toconfront in in some ways because
they already have thatindigenous perspective, but can
(23:15):
be harder to confront in otherways because that's that's our
own people's experiences.
Delina (23:20):
Right.
How do you answer people whosay oh, my child is too
sensitive, people who not?
Speaker 3 (23:26):
are not indigenous.
Delina (23:28):
My child is too sensitive.
She can't learn this or hecan't learn that.
You know our children don'thave a choice about these things
.
Kelly (23:38):
Right, you know, I tell people all the time.
You know, if you're, if my fiveyear old can experience racism,
your, your five year old, canlearn about it.
You know, and my kids have beenexperiencing racism their whole
lives.
I was starting at those youngages and we understood it.
I mean, we didn't understandwhy, but we understood what it
(23:58):
was.
You know, and so you know if,if our kids can experience those
things, they don't get a choicein having this idea of an
innocent childhood.
You know the other kids.
They can learn about thesethings too.
There are ways to do it thatmake it understandable at young
(24:20):
ages, that make it um digestibleat young ages.
Delina (24:25):
You know, and you don't have to tell them everything
right with with really youngkids.
Kelly (24:30):
I think it really leads to a lot of empathy and a lot of
um desire to change, you know,desire like I want to help fix
that with younger kids.
And so it's not harmful tonon-native kids to learn about
these things.
It's really not.
It's reality.
And in the same ways that wecan teach young kids other
(24:53):
realities like you know, there'sadults out there that want to,
that might want to harm you andhere's how to stay safe.
Right, you know we can teachthem those realities, so then we
can also teach them therealities of heart, history and
racism.
Delina (25:07):
Right, okay, so why do you think that it's important?
You alluded to it a little bitjust now in that answer.
But why do you think it'simportant what children are
taught?
Now you know it seems like anobvious question, right, but how
have?
How has that miseducation andthat under?
(25:31):
You said miseducation andundereducation, right?
How have those two thingscontributed to what we see?
Kelly (25:51):
no-transcript.
Eighty seven percent oftextbooks don't mention us past
1900 and 90 percent of thematerials taught about us are
over 90%, really.
Um of the materials taughtabout us are written by
non-natives.
Um, most of what is taught isshort and simplistic, um and
full of myths, inaccuracies andstereotypes.
The western um perspectives,eurocentric perspectives,
(26:12):
dominate, and most of this isnever corrected in college,
because those perspectives andissues exist in college too.
You can go kindergarten throughcollege in the United States
and receive a total scholarshipof two semesters of instruction
about native peoples, and mostof it's wrong, and unless you
specifically seek out nativestudies in college, that's not
going to get corrected.
Delina (26:33):
Um but that seems like a lot, a total of two.
That seems like fromkindergarten to college, though
no, no, I'm saying that seemslike you're being generous, I
mean I it might.
Kelly (26:47):
It might be, it might be generous in some places, um,
because really I mean you get afew paragraphs here and there in
textbooks over the years andput it all together Maybe it
adds up to about that much, butit's not much.
Yeah, it's not, um, but theeducation gap on this subject
leads to, you know, ignorance.
It leads to racism.
(27:08):
It leads to violence.
It directly impacts Nativepeople and how we're treated by
non-Natives.
It has a real world impact,from social interactions to
policies and laws that affect usand harm us.
Most judges in the United Statesdon't ever learn federal Indian
law at all.
Federal judges don't ever learnfederal Indian law.
Most politicians don't everlearn federal Indian law at all.
(27:28):
Federal judges don't ever learnfederal Indian law.
Most politicians don't everlearn federal Indian law or
treaties or sovereignty.
If you don't know treaties andsovereignty, you don't know US
history, right, and most peoplein the United States government
never learn that, and they'rethe ones that are in charge of
upholding those treaties right,and they don't even ever learn
about them.
Most people in Congress don'teven know what sovereignty means
when it comes to Native nations, and so most statistics don't
(27:53):
even include us right.
During the election there wasthat something else thing, the
CNN poll, something else.
So there's this whole Nativepop culture thing about being
something else, and it gotreally funny.
But you know that most don'teven include us, right?
Sometimes official paperworkand documentation doesn't even
have a category for us, and sothen when people are filling out
paperwork not us but like otherpeople about us we'll get
(28:15):
mischaracterized as,miscategorized, as like Latino,
black, white or Asian right,depending on.
You know how some people look,right, and that also impacts any
statistics as well.
But you know, in the UnitedStates today, native people were
the most likely race to bekilled by the police.
There's the missing andmurdered Indigenous women
(28:37):
epidemic that a lot of peopledon't know about.
We have some of the highestrates of sexual assault against
us.
There's major healthdisparities and racism in health
care.
Against us there's the suicideepidemics that are a direct
result of what's going on, ofhow we're treated, of
colonization, all those things.
Issues of poverty andunemployment again direct result
(28:58):
of colonization and ongoinggenocide, and how society treats
us and sees us.
Issues of religious rights andcivil rights, which I touched on
a few of those things already,but that all goes into the
issues that we face and I don'tknow, a lot of people don't even
realize that there's actually apipeline issue going on right
now in Minnesota line threeright People are trying to get
(29:22):
the attention that Standing Rockhad and it's not getting that
attention.
But that's going on right nowstill, you know.
And so this is all not becausewe're passive recipients of
history, but that's all you know, a direct result of how we are
treated by society, how we'reseen by society, and that all
(29:43):
comes from that uneducation andmiseducation, you know.
And so it also causes, you know, harmful social interactions
among children.
Other kids treat my kids badlybecause of what they've been
taught about Native people, whatthey see in the textbooks.
You know I had a friend when mykids were little, that her kids
(30:06):
were watching Peter Pan andthen she saw the, the whole, um,
the, what made the red man redthing came up and that I mean
that's horribly racist, thatmovie is horribly racist.
And her kids, um, saidsomething about like, are
Indians real?
And she said, yeah, well, wehave, we have native friends.
And she tried to tell, tellthem about my kids and us.
(30:27):
You know, you're, you'refriends with native kids.
And they said, well, are theygoing to kill us, and she had no
idea the impact that not onlypeter pan, but all these things
that our kids have could beenseen in society and exposed to
were having that kind of impacton her kids.
And so she came to me franticlike I don't know how to correct
this.
I didn't even know this washappening.
Um, and that's and that common.
(30:48):
Most people in the United Statesdon't even realize that they're
being confronted with negativeviews and stereotypes of Native
people on a daily basis that areleading to kids developing all
these internalized ideas aboutNative people.
That then impacts how theytreat us, and so it affects how
kids treat each other.
My kids have been raciallybullied by kids of their age as
(31:08):
early as five years old, youknow.
So one of the major ways tocombat this is through education
, right, and these narrativesneed to be corrected and our
voices need to be heard.
It's vital to not only how wesee history, but also to, you
know, culturally responsiveeducation that listens to Native
(31:28):
voices and promotesunderstanding and respect, and
that's really important,especially for kids to start
learning because, like I said,they're confronted with all
these stereotypes about Nativepeople on a regular basis and
most people don't even realizeit, and that does negatively
impact us, us and so, um youknow, correcting this and
addressing this througheducation is really vital to um
(31:57):
cultural understanding andrespect between people as well.
Delina (32:01):
Well, where do you think they get it?
Like kids as young as five, six, um.
Kelly (32:06):
You mentioned peter pan, but cartoons um books, books, uh
, chapter books and story bookskids love to read that are
really popular.
Um textbooks, school curriculum, um cartoons, of course, um
sports and the mascot shoe, umit's, it's all over the place,
it's, it's infused throughout USsociety without people
(32:30):
realizing it.
Delina (32:31):
Yeah, let's leave it there for now.
I hope you enjoyed thatconversation with educator Kelly
Tudor.
We will continue with thisconversation in part two coming
up in episode seven.
In the meantime, check out theshow notes for links to things
mentioned in this interview.
Speaker 3 (32:48):
Homeschool Yourself is a production of Woke
Homeschooling Inc.
For show notes and links tothings mentioned in the episode,
visit wokehomeschoolingcomslash podcast.
Woke Homeschooling empowersparents to teach their kids an
inclusive, truthful history.
We invite you to visit ourwebsite and download a sample of
the history curriculum we offerfor kids.
(33:09):
Visit us atwokehomeschoolingcom.
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