Discuss When “Natives” Aren’t: The Epistemic & Communal Violence & Re-storying

A lot of Pretendians lay claim to this identity of being Native American, and the universities have no problem with it whatsoever. It's indigenous people who fight against that settler colonial initiative to make this about diversity, equity, and inclusion, and not about indigeneity or indigenous rights. And so when students mark down Indigenous, they're accepted as an Indigenous person, and the university pats itself on the back for admitting yet another Indigenous person. And they happily add up those numbers that go into all sorts of reports to say, "This is how many Indigenous students we have at the moment. The numbers are rising, etc." And many of those students never attend any Indigenous events, but some do. Some will come to the support center for Native students. And some will really take on ownership of this idea that they are Native, when in fact they're not. And they actually know they're not. But let's say we have a person who's gifted intellectually. And they can get their heads around these stories. And they can get their heads around epistemic violence. And they become friends with people in the Native community. That's the beginning of their story. And that's the way in which academia produces these people.