> Some of the people living on Big Mountain can trace their habitation of
> that land back for 25 generations, longer than the USA has been in
> existence.
For all who are not familiar with the area: Big Mountain is not really a
mountain, it has to be pointed out to you to be identified as a small area,
rising slightly above everything else. In fact when driving through the
area, one is not even aware of a higher altitude. There is no change in
vegetation - it's still juniper and pinon trees, not pine trees, which are
so characteristic for an elevation above 7000 feet in the Southwest.
Assuming that one generation counts for only 25 years - 25 times 25 is
525, which takes us back to 1472. That's pretty much the earliest date it
is generally accepted that the Dineh moved to the Southwest from what is
now Canada (compare other post on list). This group of Dineh all of a
sudden decided to change their nomadic lifestyle completely? Contrary to
all the other clans, they decided to settle in a rather small area in the
immediate neighborhood of the Hopi people, 25 miles away from Old Oraibi
(settled in 1050 A.D. according to tree ring dating) and raise corn just
like the Hopis? (They had to live off something, since they were not moving
around any more) Rather unlikely.. If one generation is counted as 40
years, we go back to 997. Noone ever claimed, that the Dine people were
there before the Hopis.
History and places are very much alive and very important in this area, and
it is this very knowledge of history, handed down through the generations,
retold at very important religious, traditional events, that kept the Hopi
people claiming the land, that used to be the joint use area. Go into any
Hopi house, visit any people on the mesas, and ask them personally if they
feel that this land rightfully belongs to them. They all will say yes
(that's the answer I always hear, no matter whom I ask), and none of them
will say that this is an issue of resource extraction. The people don't
particiularly even like or accept their tribal government, but in this case
they do support it.
From the beginning of the conflict, the voices of the Big Mountain defense
committee and other supporters have been the loudest. Already 15 years ago,
visitors from Switzerland, Sweden and other European countries arrived at
my doorstep, relating the injustices to me, 'that the Dineh were
suffering.' Some of them I drove out to the Big mountain support camp, so
they could make up their own mind.
I remember the Russel Tribunal in Belgium (or Holland).. I don't think
that the Hopi Tribe was informed, almost 20 years ago,that it was carried
out. Public opinion was already directed against them, before they caught
on. That's the reason why I spoke out here, yes, for the first time.
> The decision of the Tribunal was based on testimony from Black Mesa
> residents including Maxine Kescolli and Mabel Benally.
Were any of the residents of the Hopi villages asked? (not the so called
traditionals like Thomas Banyaca, please)
Arguments of the Big Mountain defense organizations are usually reinforced
with 'sacred land' or 'religious freedom' or 'genocide' terms, or as in
this post with '25 generations.' Whatever the terms are, they apply to both
sides, and again, this is a very complex situation, a situation of two
rights in conflict, and *not* good versus evil.
> Elsewhere on Black Mesa, members of the Benally clan sat in front of a
> bulldozer
There is no Benally clan - Benally is a very common Dineh name, like Begay
or Yazzie.
Bernhard
[ For more historical information about this dispute and to read some of
the claims made by supporters of the Big Mountain "resisters" [sic],
see "http://bioc09.uthscsa.edu/natnet/archive/nl/navajo-hopi.html"
--Gary (gst@gnosys.svle.ma.us) ]