Thursday, May 15, 2008

Video: I'M NOT THE INDIAN YOU HAD IN MIND

Got the review (below) yesterday... Sounds terrific, and with its length of five minutes, would work well in a classroom, leaving time for meaty discussion! The image shown here is from the website of the American Indian Film Institute. (Note: This review may not be published elsewhere without permission of its author, Beverly Slapin.)

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I’m Not the Indian You Had in Mind. 2007, 5 minutes, color, grades 7-up.

I’m not the Indian you had in mind. I’ve seen him, I’ve seen him ride, a rush of wind, a darkening tide, with wolf and eagle by his side…” In this brilliant, fast-paced visual and spoken-word performance, Tom King and actors Tara Beagan and Lorne Cardinal juxtapose themselves and other contemporary Indians with cringe-inducing media images of Indians—“the clichés that we can’t rewind.” But there is more than stock footage of tomahawk-wielding Indians, a cigar-store Indian and a haute cuisine Indian-themed restaurant whose waiter wears war paint. I’m Not the Indian You Had in Mind is razor-sharp social commentary with visuals of pollution-spewing smokestacks and gas pumps and freeways and drained lakes and war rooms and a world gone “Monsanto-mad,” and this, muses King: “Sometimes late at night when all the world is warm and dead, wonder how things might have been had you followed and we led.”

(Note from Debbie: The DVD is $15.00, available from Oyate.)

2 comments:

  1. very nice blog... keep up the good work.. God Bless!!!

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  2. Thanks to Beverly Slapin I had a copy of this compelling piece and have used it in workshops with teachers, teaching artists and librarians as part of the Multicultural Voices Initiative, which is one component of the professional development work I do for a state agency, the Perpich Center for Arts Education. I work with artists and educators to facilitate reflective protocols to "unpack" articles, a text, art work and pieces such as this one, to surface hidden assumptions, bias, etc. Thanks to the Oyate catalog and this wonderful blog by Debbie Reese, I can continue to work through my own hidden assumptions and bias and bring meaningful learning experiences to those who have direct contact with k-12 students. Thank you!

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