Abstract
This chapter deals with the question that guides the entire book: What can we learn not about gay natives, but from them and their history? Our aim is to show that the fact that no one speaks about homosexuality among native peoples has to do with power relations − including those among the natives themselves. The chapter also presents a discussion about the implications of using certain expressions to understand homosexuality in intercultural contexts, questioning expressions used to refer to the phenomenon both within and outside these contexts. The word “homosexuality” is used as an umbrella expression to refer to all forms of sexuality that operate outside the hegemonic model. In this sense, “gay,” as an expression, gains analytical importance, since it can be understood only within the context of contact with non-Indians and the incorporation of settler/heteronormative language.
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Notes
- 1.
In the original quote, still named Judith, changed by the authors.
- 2.
At the end of nineteenth century, the General Allotment/Dawes Act (1887) signs the passage of a concentration and isolation in reserves policy to an assimilation policy (see footnote below about Removal Act). Its main goal was to end the policies that were allowing whole indigenous communities to have their territories demarcated and move to granting small parcels to individuals instead. That was a way to press indigenous people to become farmers, so they would be easily “assimilated” and their original territories would then be open to occupation by non-indigenous settlers. Such a policy lasted until 1934 (Reorganization Act).
- 3.
The Indian Removal Act (1830) authorized the U.S. government to negotiate indigenous people’s removal from their traditional lands and move them into a federal territory located west of the Mississippi River, now part of the state of Oklahoma. Such an attitude marked the move from miscegenation and conversion policies into removal ones. It would last until the first half of the nineteenth century. Thus, according to the Removal Act, indigenous people were not killed or displaced, but have been concentrated in small areas and pressed to sign treaties giving up their territories.
- 4.
The Relocation Act (1956) must be understood in the context of the increase in finishing and assimilation that mark the indigenous relations with the U.S. government in the aftermath of World War II, especially after 1953 (Public Law 280). It was a way to move indigenous people from their territories to look for professional training in urban areas where they could be relocated and “assimilated”.
- 5.
Signed in 1876 by the Canadian Parliament, it is about determining which instances and agencies can dictate laws concerning indigenous affairs.
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Fernandes, E.R., Arisi, B.M. (2017). Why It’s Important to Look at Gay Natives’ History. In: Gay Indians in Brazil. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-53225-7_1
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