Last Updated on March 18, 2025
I dreamed about her before she was born. While living in Virginia, I was going through some rough times, and at one of my lowest points, when I didn’t think I could handle the stress anymore, I dreamt of a beautiful little girl playing in a field. I was flying overhead, hovering over the field. The girl had long, light brown hair and I knew she was my daughter. The geography of the place in my dream was different from Virginia, so I figured we must have moved to a different place – one where everything was really lush and green. That dream came to me about five years before she was born and lifted my spirits at a time when I felt beaten down…it was a moment of renewal. Atsehisodiyi.
Settler society tends to think of renewal in terms of consumerist ideals – escaping life’s challenges with spa days, shopping, vacations, entertainment, all of that. For me, the most powerful aspects of renewal come from daily spiritual obligations and actions promoting community consciousness. The dream reminds me of our accountability to future generations…to those generations yet unborn. How will future generations recognize me as Cherokee? Or any of us as being from a particular Indigenous nation? More importantly, what are my responsibilities to future generations? These are challenges that we take up in the everyday – those often unseen, unacknowledged actions that renew our peoplehood and generate community resurgence. And how did I recognize her as being my daughter? I just knew. You sense it in your gut as that feeling of belonging and recognition washes over you. It’s that sense of belonging, or community camaraderie that sparks renewal. This extends beyond fatherhood, motherhood, and well beyond those artificial boundaries that we construct around relations, such as 1st, 2nd or 3rd cousins. Such artificial distinctions can distance us from each other and obscure the depth of our familial sense of belonging. At the end of the day as Indigenous nations, we all belong to each other. Digadatseli’i.
My daughter is older now and she still likes to hear about how I dreamed about her before she was born. To draw on a word used extensively by our Kanaka Maoli brothers and sisters, she is my piko, my center or umbilical cord; she is the convergence of the people, place and practices that piko represents. After she was born the nurses saved the birth cord and placenta for me in the refrigerator. I froze it for several months while thinking of a plan for how to return it to Cherokee territory and bury it in our family territory near Westville, Oklahoma. I wanted to motivate her to go home and feel what it’s like to walk among our ancestors…to breathe in and connect with the land so deeply that you can’t imagine your life without it. When my daughter was older, I showed her where it was buried in Oklahoma, and she remembers. Through a process of renewal (retelling and regenerating this story and actions that go with it), she embodies her relational responsibilities. This is where people, place and practices converge. Piko.
When speaking of everydayness, we should be careful to not romanticize these actions. They are often thankless. Anyone who raises children knows that the daily realities of parenting can be exhausting and frustrating at times. To a single parent struggling to put food on the table, everyday life might seem overwhelming. But everyday acts of resurgence persist amidst these hardships and occur despite ongoing colonial and neo-liberal impositions on our lives. They can be very simple practices that appear mundane. Ever since she was two or so, I’ve asked Leila three questions pretty much everyday: Osiyo Tohi’tsu (hello, how are you)?; Gado usdi gawonihisdi hewoni (what language are you speaking)?; and, Tsalagi hiyosgitsu (are you a Tsalagi warrior)?
Embedded in the word Osiyo (the first question), which is often translated as “hello”, is the word “osi”, which means being upright, forward-facing, and existing on a single point of balance.[1] When I speak to my daughter in Cherokee, I’m really asking her if she’s aligned and balanced with the unhurried pace of nature. Just one part of one word in the Cherokee language carries so much with it. I’m also ensuring that Cherokee is spoken on a daily basis. These deeper understandings of language are symptomatic of everyday acts of resurgence that might be overlooked by a casual observer. These questions attempt to breathe life into the language, even in a small, seemingly insignificant way. They covertly function as unseen acts of renewal. After all, resurgence is about renewing, nurturing and re-awakening those relationships that promote individual and community health and well-being. In this sense, how she responds to these questions signifies her commitment to them. We start with these basic questions and continue to build on them. In doing so, we’re also giving breath to the unhurried pace of nature and ultimately challenging western notions of time and place. Osi.
How we convey Indigenous values and practices to future generations is sometimes just as important as what we’re teaching. When a child asks why something is done a certain way, how do you respond? Do you say “because it’s traditional”, “it’s how we do things” or just “because”? Those are unsatisfying answers for anyone to hear, whether as a child or adult. After all, community ‘traditions’ are constantly changing and evolving. Future generations demand better answers to their questions as they weigh their obligations to re-interpret Cherokee teachings alongside a renewal of their commitments to them. It’s not enough to claim something is traditional – it should be embodied in your everyday actions and follow an inherent Indigenous logic. Renewal is strengthened through reinterpretation and reconnection.
When I was visiting the ahupuaʻa of Kahana (O’ahu, Hawai’i) in March 2015, I saw a sign urging Kanaka Maoli people to “Educate to perpetuate”. It is through our everyday actions that we seek to restore and perpetuate Indigenous peoples, places, and practices. This can be tricky, even when learning Indigenous languages in our own communities. We have to be careful what we’re perpetuating. I recently spoke with a parent who was pulling her child out of an Indigenous language immersion kindergarten class. When I asked why, the parent said that the Indigenous teacher was just merely reinforcing a western way of learning and her child no longer enjoyed learning the language. This is a heartbreaking story but not that uncommon. Education that reproduces the alienating and competitive processes of colonial classrooms can be incredibly harmful, even within an Indigenous context. Humor, patience, and Indigenous pedagogies are crucial to inspiring future generations to educate to perpetuate. As Nishnaabekwe scholar Leanne Betasamosake Simpson states so powerfully, “Resurgence is our original instruction.”[2]
The Cherokee notion of leadership starts with a person having a vision or dream. That person begins to embody that vision by putting it into everyday practice. While implementing it, the person also has a responsibility to makes that vision understandable to other people through her/his words and actions. After gaining this experience, the person offers some direction for people to mobilize around that vision. In short this is leadership by example that is common to most Indigenous nations. When speaking of what decolonization entailed during the 2011 UHIP/IGOV exchange, Kanaka Maoli Ph.D. student Kahikina de Silva pointed out that decolonizing praxis entails moving beyond performance and/or symbolic gestures to everyday practices of decolonization.[3] These everyday actions give life to our dreams and visions. My daughter embodies renewal and resurgence for me. The practice of speaking the Cherokee language at home is how I mobilize the responsibilities that came with my initial dream. It is through these reconnections to people, place, and practices that spiritual revolutions are born and the rebellious dignity of Indigenous nations is proudly renewed.
[1] Altman, Heidi and Tom Belt. 2011. “Moving Around in the Room: Cherokee Language, Worldview and Memory” in Margaret Williamson Huber, ed. Museums and Memory. Knoxville: Newfound Press, p. 227. Available at: http://newfoundpress.utk.edu//pubs/museums/chp11.pdf
[2] Simpson, Leanne. 2011. Dancing On Our Turtle’s Back: Stories of Nishnaabeg Re-Creation, Resurgence and a New Emergence. Winnipeg: Arbeiter Ring, p. 66.
[3] de Silva, Kahikina. July 19, 2011. “Pathways to Decolonization” class session, University of Hawai’i Indigenous Politics/Indigenous Governance Program exchange course, IGOV 595: Reclaiming Ćelánen: Land, Water, Governance, University of Victoria, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.
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