...Stephanie Zackery Dr. Dreyer ENGL 1213 9 December 2014 Domestic Violence and Native American Women One in five, or nearly twenty-two million women, have been raped at some point in their lifetimes (The White House Council of Women and Girls 1). This alone is a surprisingly large statistics; however it does not seem quite as large when compared to the percentage of Native American women who experience rape. One in three Native American women experience rape in their lifetimes ("UNITED STATES: Crimes Against Native Women More Frequent, Less Often Prosecuted.") Rape is defined as forced intercourse, which can include vaginal, anal, or oral penetration. Rape is a purposed, measure form of control that ignores the feelings, fears, wishes, and sexual...
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...Chapter 1, Sexual Violence as a Tool of Genocide, discusses the history of and gives us an introduction to genocide. The author talks about the treatment of bodies, in particular Native bodies, and how colonial thought and theory regards Native people as inherently “rapable” and “violable,” a colonial conviction that stretches past the physical bodies of Natives, to Native independence and lands as well. She explains that patriarchy is the foundation by which power is established over Native women's bodies because hierarchal, patriarchal authority and control systems of society are seldom found within native societies. Europeans, on the other hand, have long depended on these methods to suppress and infuse fear into their people. Sexual violence, consequently, serves the colonizer as one way of assimilating Native women into Western society, which, therefore, increases Native vulnerability to gender violence. Sexual violence exists to such a degree, according to Smith, that the "phenomenon indicates the extent to which our communities have internalized self-hatred". Chapter 2, Boarding School Abuses and the Case for Reparations, give some examples for the above mentioned violence. Boarding school systems in the United States are described as a tool for genocide and rape/sexual dominance. This chapter focuses, as well, on the reparations for such wrongs, encompassed by her communication of "abuses from a reparations framework" that is essential for coalition-building...
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...Native women have been highly sexualized throughout pop culture and history. There are a number of examples that come to mind–the story of Pocahontas, or Tiger Lily in Peter Pan, or Gwen Stefani in her “Looking Hot” video, or even the Land ‘O’ Lakes Girl–the “Indian Princess” stereotype is far and wide. A current example of an American Indian stereotype happened in 2012. The Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show caused some controversy as their model, Karlie Kloss, strutted along the catwalk. She wore a tiny leopard print bikini, high heels with leather fringes around her ankles and hips, a large turquoise pendant, matching rings, bracelets and a belt. Her most alarming accessory, however, was a lofty Native American headdress. Kloss’s garb was designed...
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...Sexual Violence as a tool of genocide - Andrea Smith Here in this article, it is demonstrated that sexual violence as women creates genocides against their identities. It also a calling to the injustices of how women of color were targeted by white men. Native Americans were raped by white men who disguise themselves and themselves native men. Companies such as ivory soap was responsible to promote the Native Americans Indians as dirty and uncivilized. Yet sexual violence as racism is woven into our country, we can change it because it was socially constructed. Native Americans are being used as artifacts and put up into museums, yet we do not see white European figures in display. In order for anyone to teat anyone else differently, they must dehumanize their victims. Indians have begun hating them after all they have told many times and started believing other people words. Rape was used differently in different races. As for African Americans, they were rape to reproduce more slaves, but as for Indians women they were raped to take away their identities. Before Indians had contacted with Europeans, Indians did not practice war and if they did they did as a symbol to gain honor but their intentions were never to kill anyone. Women of color have been victimized everywhere, not only in the U.S. but also in South America and Mexico, they are viewed as a threat to the nation’s identity. Therefore, they are said to have earn that treatment because they were inherent. Before, Native...
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... “Conquest” mentions the painful and horrible situation that native women had faced during the history, mid-nineties, as well as in the present. She explains how women bodies were destructed and deteriorated through sexual violence and domestic abuse. Her book focuses on sexual violence as a tool of patriarchy and colonialism in native communities, both historically and today. She mentions how colonizers had historically used sexual violence as a primary tool of genocide, “Native people, in the eyes of the colonizers, are marked by their sexual perversity.” They had a mentality that the bodies of Native people are dirty, as their skins are black and has color, impure and shameful, so they were rape able and violable over the course of history. This shows these women’s bodies were only treated as an object for sex. Andrea talks about women’s bodies were used as an experimental tool for reproduction and medical testing. She mentions, when Indian Health Service initiated a fully federally funded sterilization campaign in 1970, these Native...
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...been featured consistently in the media as "the face" of this movement, regardless of the fact Caucasian individuals account for roughly 17% of all sexual assaults as compared to the following statistics. Albeit a smaller minority population, demographers have shown between 1 in 3 Indigenous female youths aged 25 and under have encountered sexual violence. This number also means Native American Girls are 2.5 times more likely to suffer sexual violence than any other ethnic group. 34.1% of sexual assaults upon Indigenous female youths reportedly occurred on campus. According to National Institute of Justice Native male youths 27.5 % have encountered rape. That which occurred on campus is currently unaccounted for. As reported by Human Rights Campaign 65% of Indigenous transgender have also suffered at the hands of sexual violence, such as the case in the documentation of the sexual assaults on Indigenous boys there is no said data. The reasoning...
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...Monkey Beach's Role in Highlighting Native Canadian Issues European dominance over Aboriginals has ended however the negative effects of colonization continue to impact Natives to this day. Although many efforts have been made to reverse the damage done, Native Canadians still face many drawbacks and issues to this day as a result of colonization. Eden Robinson's Monkey Beach is the story of Lisamarie Hill and her search for her brother, Jimmy, who is missing at sea in northern British Columbia. During Lisa's search for Jimmy, she reflects upon her childhood and the different hardships she faced growing up. Monkey Beach depicts the real life struggles of indigenous people in a modern, euro-centric society through taking a close look at the story of Lisa and her family. Lisa and other Aboriginal characters in the novel act as an example of the issues faced by Aboriginals by showing society's treatment of Aboriginals, Lisa's difficulty in connecting with her spirituality, and the many instances of sexual abuse towards Aboriginals. Monkey Beach highlights issues faced by Native Canadians by showing numerous instances of society's mistreatment to this particular group. The first example is the government's treatment of Lisa's grandfather after he loses a leg in World War II. Lisa explains the disorganization of the government when it comes to her grandfather's compensation, “when he came home, he couldn't get a job or get the money he thought he should get from Veteran Affairs because...
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...response has to deal with their friends, and their family. Everyone has some relationship with their family, good, or bad. The real question is, what about those who never experience what it’s like to have a family present throughout their lives, helping them grow and learn to become a working part of society? I should make it very clear that my Mother, Father, and little Sister are the three most important people in my life right now, but I always tend to think about other families. Not just minority families, or the families less fortunate than I, but in particular, Native American families and children who lose their mothers. Last semester, I was in a class with a Native American student who reported to the class that around...
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...Glady Rose C. Bunao IV-23 BSE- Values Prof. Arabit DISCRIMINATING PROSTITUTION IS IMPOSSIBLE ABSTRACT: Prostitution was considered as the “oldest profession” in the world because of its commonality. This is one of the most abundant societal issue recognize all over the country that can’t be avoided nor discriminate at all. This term paper aims : 1.) To define prostitution 2.) To understand the history of prostitution in the Philippines; 3.) To classify the type of prostitution; 4.) To identify the cause and effect of prostitution; 5.) To specify the cause of men in buying prostitutes 6.) To give facts about prostitution all over the world. The researcher used to have interview with the buyer of prostitute specifically in Bulacan. This methodology will strengthen the 3 major theories namely: a.) Symbolic Interactionism, b.) Functionalism c.) Conflict Theory. Charles Darwin stated that there’s a need for survival. Prostitution was a product of never ending poverty in the world and in order to survive, even though they don’t want to engage to this kind of work, they don’t have choice but to follow where the money is or else, they will die in hunger. The scarcity of primary needs pushed people to desperately make some money even if they became “immoral” .It is considered as immoral because until now, it is not accepted in the society and there’s still debate if the world must accept this profession since it can’t be stop as the powerful group protects and control the illegality...
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...of a Native American woman. Although I did not grow up on the Navajo Reservation like she did, she made sure my sisters and I understood what our ethnicity entitled us. As a Native woman, I was expected to learn our language, because our language defined our tribe. I was expected to respectfully follow our beliefs and traditions, because our beliefs and traditions made us distinct and allowed us, as woman, to keep the tribe in order. It was the woman’s job to make sure our tribe or family represented well. And lastly, I was expected to always fight for what I believed in. I was always afraid about the responsibility of fighting back and standing up for my beliefs. Nevertheless, when it comes to my people, I believe it is my place and my right to inform American citizens of the effects caused by the United States Government. Native Americans aren’t as prosperous as they used to be and being contained on reservations has only deteriorated our people, our land and our entitlement to justice and protection. There has been a rise of many destroying factors on reservations, such as abuse of alcohol and the rise of brutal crimes, but the most important and overlooked is the crimes against Native women. Justice on Native American reservations requires a fight. The backbones of most tribal communities are continually and increasingly being taken advantage of. With tribal authority ranging from little to none, Native women on reservations have become targets of attack by non-Natives. To...
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...David Casani November 17, 2014 Indigenous Peoples’ Rights in the US and Contemporary Issues The United States is the melting pot of many different ethnicities and indigenous tribes attempting to harmoniously coexist. One of the major ethnic groups is the Indigenous Peoples of America. Who are they? Jose R. Martinez Cobo was a diplomat and politician who elaborated a definition for Indigenous Peoples, although the UN officially never adopted his definition, which is the commonly accepted understanding of the concept of Indigenous Peoples, stating: “Indigenous communities, peoples and nations are those which, having a historical continuity with pre-invasion and pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories, consider themselves distinct from other sectors of the societies now prevailing on those territories, or parts of them. They form at present non-dominant sectors of society and are determined to preserve, develop and transmit to future generations their ancestral territories, and their ethnic identity, as the basis of their continued existence as peoples, in accordance with their own cultural patterns, social institutions and legal system” (NCIV). Currently, there are 4.1 million indigenous peoples living in the US, which contributes to 1.5 of the US population (Nelson 1-19). The majority of these individuals are members of one of the five greatest tribes that forms the Confederacy of the Five Nations: Navajo, Hopi, Apache, Iroquois, and Lakota. The main...
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...Violence Against Women Act: Essential and Expired Kamille Hall Hamline University February 2013 GPA 8000: Foundations of Public Administration Violence Against Women Act: Essential and Expired The following is a composite story of what happens to a woman somewhere each day in the United States to women and shows why the Violence Against Women Act must be renewed in 2013. A 30-year-old woman screams in her apartment. She knew he was coming home. Her husband has been on a drinking binge for days. When she receives an angry text message from him, she places the children in another room: they fear for their lives. They have seen this behavior all too often. The kids cower in the closet, a place that gives them some sort of refuge during the storm. In this case the storm is their dad’s misdirected anger toward their mom. They fear for themselves, but not as much as for their mother, their sole support in this chaos. They hear their father come home, yelling for several minutes. The mother tries to calm him down and pleads: “Please don’t hurt me, I’ll give you whatever you want…” Then they hear piercing screams. The front door slams. The children, ages 8 and 6, come rushing out of the closet, only to see their mother lying in a pool of blood – stabbed multiple times. Their father murdered her (what is known as femicide). The Violence Against Women Act works to reduce and prevent domestic violence. Every six minutes in the United States a woman is raped, and most often it is not...
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...Fiction and Justice: The Round House 11/3/14 By: Shannon Long For decades, when a Native American woman has been assaulted or raped by a man who is non-Indian, she has had little or no recourse. Under long-standing law in Indian country, reservations are sovereign nations with their own police departments and courts in charge of prosecuting crimes on tribal land. But Indian police have lacked the legal authority to arrest non-Indian men who commit acts of domestic violence against native women on reservations, and tribal courts have lacked the authority to prosecute the men. In Louise Erdrich’s novel, The Round House the main character’s father explains his understanding of “ideal justice as opposed to the best-we-can-do kinds of justice, which is what we end up with in making so many of our decisions”(306). Those who avenge killings, when the legal system can’t or won’t act, bear the consequences of having taken a human life. In the end, Joe’s parents “know everything. The sentence was to endure . . . I don’t remember that they even looked at me or I at them after the shock of that first moment when we all realized we were old” (317). When Joe hears that the judge handling his mother’s case is uncertain whether the accused man can be charged at all, the 13-year-old boy whose mother was raped pursues his own quest for justice. Narrating this gripping story years later, having himself become a public prosecutor, Joe shows how a seemingly isolated crime has many roots. The Round...
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...Facts on Domestic, Dating and Sexual Violence Domestic, dating and sexual violence are costly and pervasive problems in this country, causing victims, as well as witnesses and bystanders, in every community to suffer incalculable pain and loss. In addition to the lives taken and injuries suffered, partner violence shatters the sense of well-being that allows people to thrive. It also can cause health problems that last a lifetime, and diminish children’s prospects in school and in life. The United States has made progress in the last few decades in addressing this violence, resulting in welcome declines1 – but there is more work to do to implement the strategies that hold the most promise. These include teaching the next generation that violence is wrong, training more health care providers to assess patients for abuse, implementing workplace prevention and victim support programs, and making services available to all victims including immigrants and children who witness violence. Prevalence of Violence in the United States On average more than three women a day are murdered by their husbands or boyfriends in the United States. In 2005, 1,181 women were murdered by an intimate partner.2 In 2008, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published data collected in 2005 that finds that women experience two million injuries from intimate partner violence each year.3 Nearly one in four women in the United States reports experiencing violence by a current or former spouse...
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...conducted on Native American reservations, specifically their relationship with the criminal justice system. The topics that will be discussed include rape, structural disadvantages and Native American violence, and finally how society views these issues through the context of difference, inequality, and division. Native Americans have been the victims of oppression since Europeans came to North America. Europeans considered themselves to be an advanced civilization, who created social constructions of young America. Europeans introduced the term race to already existing societies in America, by differentiating Native Americans by the color of their skin. Through time, these Native American societies accepted the constructs of race and were referred to as “us” versus “them” to distinguish which race they represented. As Europeans settlers began to expand their civilization over Native American territories, their hierarchical power grew as well. The way Europeans inherited this hierarchical power was due to their technology (e.g. guns, education, medicine, etc.) leaving many Native Americans powerless. The textbook, “Investigation Difference” by Vernon Anthony states, "…use difference as a resource as we have done so ably in the past, or we can use power, coercion, and hate to try to eradicate diversity from our country as many fundamentalist, militant, and radically conservation groups and individuals advocate" ( Anthony, pg. 5). After the European settlers dominated Native American...
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