Category: Haudenosaunee

Around 7:30 all of the students gathered up at the Benson Theater because we were going to watch a movie. The movie was called The Sprit Game and it was about the Iroquois tribes traditional game which is what we now know as lacrosse. This game has been a game the tribe has played for thousands of years and is a popular sport in the americas. A group of Iroquois natives started a team and they are from new York and they all come from indigenous communities and reservations where they grew up playing lacrosse. The main goal of the team was to reclaim their own sport and show the world that they represent the game and all their ancestors who played this game before they. One of the most Controversial parts of the film was when the pope came to the United Sates and he eventually came to new York where he and other cultural leaders were going to met up and the chief if the Iroquois nation was suppose to stand amongst the leaders of these world religions and represent the Iroquois nation. He was going to speak about a document the pope has called the Doctrine of Discovery where it talks about how the pilgrims came to this land seeking religious refuge and religious freedom, but it never mentions the atrocities committed against not just indigenous peoples of that region, but they speak for all natives who have had these atrocities committed against them for the sake of their religion. Catholicism and christianity have all had a negative impact on Existing native peoples, cultures and religion and the introduction of these foreign religions has lead to the near extermination of indigenous peoples, cultures and religions and that is why the chief of the Iroquois nation and the people are trying to convince him to destroy the document because of its historical inaccuracy and its wrong ideas. The chief wasn’t allowed to stand amongst the cultural and religious leaders for the stupid fact that he had antlers on his traditional hat and they say that as a threat so they confiscated his has and it was dehumanizing because of the fact that they are taking away one part of your identity and its wrong because you wouldn’t take the popes hat away so that was wrong.

On July 12, 2017, The youth of the Pitzer pipeline program had such an amazing experience today from learning more upon college and there requirements to ending our day with a new indigenous movie created and directed by Gayle Anne Kelley titled Spirit Game: Pride of a Nation. It was amazing to learn the true history and origin of the game lacrosse and how from a young age the iroquois players would play. I learned that the game lacrosse had more meaning which was for medicine to express themselves instead of a game to just play between each other.

The movie was such an informational movie especially for the youth to inspire them and show them some of there history. The movie was so touching just to see how all 6 nations came together to have this home game in there reservation and how even though they lost there final game they all were still so supportive of each other because at the end of the day the game is just a way to show there creator the respect they have for him and appreciation for the game he created. I hope to see more films like this one day and to just see more of our culture and history being shared to the world.

Peace and Love Christine

After watching Spirt Game: Pride of a Nation, I realized this documentary was nothing like any other sports documentary. This movie is inspirational to native youth who do not receive the chance to learn their history that is commonly left out of history books. The Federation of International Lacrosse holding its tournament on iroquois territory was huge for indigenous peoples everywhere. The movie covers the struggles of being native, always having to fight to protect their culture. It follows the endeavor of the path to dismantle the doctrine of discovery. After working years to organize a encounter with the pope, the secret service disrespected native elders and beliefs while destroying the work towards meeting the pope. The movie ended in a way that reflects historical context with the natives continuing to fight to amend and hold up their culture, traditions, and pride.

I thought the movie Spirit Game Pride of a Nation is an extremely necessary film for the indigenous community for a couple of different reasons. The first being that the Chief Oren Lyons is an executive producer for the film, this is extremely influential for the native community because it shows native youth that we can do phenomenal things with our stories and begin sharing our history through different media platforms. The movie also shows how indigenous people are continuing to be dehumanized by colonial oppression in very vital scenes of the film. When secret service agents took one of the onondaga chiefs head pieces that symbolized much more than what it seemed but just like in the past ignorant white people could not comprehend its significance and continued to disrespect native culture.

PS. indigenous people have always lived in harmony with our mother so i was wondering in construction of the lacrosse arena what did the Haudenosaunee people do to make the arena as sustainable as possible?

Yo what’s up it’s ya gurl Huitzilin! Today I got the amazing opportunity to participate in watching the film Spirit Games with my fellow peers. My favorite part of this whole experience was the beginning of the movie just because it already put such an excitement within me and made me more eager to continue to participate and be more open minded as well as a thinker through out watching the film. I also really enjoyed how the film made it very direct to share the background history and the background knowledge of the whole sport and where it originated from. The way the film played out was just so organized and so beautifully detailed and the directors definitely  knew how to balance out the sport and the culture of the sport. I want to say thank you to the organizers of the program to arrange for us native youth to be able to be introduced to this wonderful and elaborate film.