Atquetzali Quiroz (’24), far left, during the Feminist & Gender Studies Department Senior Capstone Project Presentations at Colorado College
Photo Credit: Heidi R. Lewis (2024)
“Truth, acceptance of the truth, is a shattering experience. It shatters the binding shroud of culture trance. It rips apart smugness, arrogance, superiority, and self-importance. It requires acknowledgment of responsibility for the nature and quality of each of our own lives, our own inner lives, as well as the life of the world. Truth, inwardly accepted, humbling truth, makes one vulnerable. You can't be right, self-righteous, and truthful at the same time.”
—Paula Gunn Allen (1929-2008), Off the Reservation: Reflections on Boundary-Busting Border-Crossing Loose Canons (1998)
Last Wednesday, I attended a walkout organized by the Colorado College Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), Jewish Voices for Peace (JVP), and other organizations. It was a beautiful, critical, powerful, collaborative, and transformative sight to behold. Near the end, faculty gathered in a sitting circle to discuss divestment and other resistive initiatives, and I heard a beautifully soft, yet powerful, voice singing in a language unfamiliar to me. As I listened more closely, I looked at my colleague and friend Dr. Santiago Guerra and asked, “Is that Indigenous?” He nodded, listened keenly, and said, “That’s Atquetzali.” We bolted from the circle back to the center of the walkout to listen1. Yesterday, Atquetzali told me she was singing in Nahuatl, one of many Indigenous Mexican languages. The song, “Ipalnemohua,” is about our creator, Ipalnemohuani, which loosely translates to “the one for whom we live.” In her family and Kalpulli, they sing this song during ceremonies and as a form of prayer. Her intention in singing “Ipalnemohua” during the walkout was “to call on the strength of Ipanemohuani and to pray for our Indigenous relatives in Palestine, the Congo, Sudan, and all communities facing genocide and displacement” and “to offer space for attendees to pray collectively but in their own ways.”
Atquetzali is an Indigenous Nahua and Filipinx student from Imnížiska (St. Paul), Mni Sóta (Minnesota) majoring in Feminist & Gender Studies (‘24). So, we’ve shared space quite a bit. She’s taken several courses with me, including my study abroad course in Berlin, and she’s even taken the time to build community with my children. She routinely asks how my son is doing in his first year of college, and as my daughter and I were leaving an event recently, she ran to us to say “hello” and give us hugs. That’s the kind of person she is—kind, generous, respectful, and thoughtful. I’ll be honest. I don’t tell her that enough. Atquetzali also has a relationship with Santiago, even closer than her relationship with me, because of his unwavering support and care for Indigenous students. I’m thankful I heard a voice. I’m thankful he heard her voice. In “NWSA Recommits to BDS and Feminist Accountability” (2024), the Governing Council and National Office acknowledge the ways we all “understandably grow weary from routinely studying and resisting […] oppression.” In the name of Grace Lee Boggs, we also promised to maintain our commitments to resistance “with as much joy and enthusiasm as we can muster.” In Atquetzali’s voice that day, I and so many others most certainly found joy.
Fast forward to the following day.
Atquetzali is currently taking the Feminist & Gender Studies Senior Seminar course, which I’m teaching for the first time. It has been a tremendous honor, joy, privilege, and relief to share this space with our brilliant, graduating seniors. On most days, they lead discussion. So, I get to be a student again, and I am learning so much about them and their work, as well as me and mine. Atquetzali led the first part of the discussion, focusing on her senior capstone project, “The Possibilities of Decolonial Theater: Fil-Minnesotan Community Intervention through Isla Tuliro,” which examines Marlina Gonzalez’s Isla Tuliro: Island of Confusion. I’ll be honest again. I haven’t engaged with her project that much beyond helping shape her theoretical framework during my Critical Race Feminism course last fall. So, I didn’t realize her place-based decolonial approach yielded a necessary focus on the Midwest, where I was also born and raised. I also didn’t realize Gonzalez, Atquetzali’s chosen tia, was more familiar to me than I’d previously recalled. I did a quick internet search and remembered she was at our 2022 conference in Minnesota participating in an Authors Meet Critics session on Gina Velasco’s Queering the Global Filipina Body: Contested Nationalisms in the Filipina/o Diaspora (2020). Gina, if you’re reading this—can you believe we’ve had this connection all this time and never knew? It is, as folks say, a small world2.
Fast forward to later that morning.
When I woke up that day, I had no idea another Indigenous woman near and dear to my heart would trust me enough to share her pain with me. I had no idea her tears would fall on my chest—sometimes gently, sometimes vivaciously. I had no idea her trembles would pulsate in my arms. I’m sure I didn’t say or do all the right things in that moment. Yet, I was and remain thankful to have been there—thankful she could find some home, some respite with and in me.
Shortly after, I journeyed to an event honoring the National Day of Awareness for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, and Two-Spirit Peoples (#MMIWG2S) co-organized by Colorado College Elder-in-Residence Debbie Howell, the Native American Student Union, and the Chaplain’s Office3. I’ll be honest again. I had no idea the event was happening until the previous day when I saw it posted on the college’s event digest. Still, I was moved to confront and navigate my guilt and shame by showing up rather than going about business as usual. After welcoming and feeding us, Atquetzali and Elder Howell graciously educated us about the significance of the day, which is formally celebrated on May 5. They reminded us that Indigenous women are 10 times more likely to be killed than the average national murder rate. They reminded us that more than half of Indigenous women have experienced sexual violence. They reminded us that racist and sexist discourse about Indigenous women, girls, and Two-Spirit peoples contributes to sexual, domestic, and other forms of violence. They also facilitated a screening and discussion of Jordan Dresser, Sophie Barksdale, and Jonathan Thunder’s Who Is She? in order to “humanize the people behind the statics.” My heart felt even more broken, but it also felt deeply filled with the love and strength I shared with Atquetzali, Elder Howell, and others in the room.
Fast forward to moments later.
When I woke up last Thursday morning, I had no idea another Indigenous woman near and dear to my heart would trust me enough to share her pain with me that afternoon. I had no idea her tears would fall on my chest—sometimes gently, sometimes vivaciously. I had no idea her trembles would pulsate in my arms. I’m sure I didn’t say or do all the right things in that moment. Yet, I was and remain thankful to have been there—thankful she could find some home, some respite with and in me.
Shortly after, I journeyed to the Feminist & Gender Studies senior capstone project presentations. That group, of course, includes Atquetzali, whose project builds on “feminist and decolonization practices of collaboration, self-reflexivity, and solidarity” in order to examine the ways “marginalized groups actively shape community formation, resist assimilation, and move beyond cultural preservation through theater.” As I spoke during the final Q&A session, I refused to hold back tears while honoring the ways each and every one of our students has worked so long and hard to do critical, beautiful, powerful, and carefully vulnerable, transformative work. I’ll be honest again. I’m sure some of those tears were catalyzed by Palestine, Congo, Sudan, West Papua, Tigray, Haiti, Burma/Myanmar, Uyghurs, Syria, Kashmir, Cameroon, Armenia, Kurdistan, and the list unfortunately, as you know, goes on. I’m sure some of those tears were catalyzed by the Colorado College encampment that I saw for the first time earlier that day. I’m sure some of those tears were catalyzed by the institutional and state-sanctioned surveillance, harassment, and brutality other encampments are facing throughout the nation. I’m sure some of those tears were catalyzed by Florida’s six-week abortion ban taking effect just the day before. I’m sure some of those tears were catalyzed by the pain my two Indigenous sisters entrusted with me earlier that day. I’m sure some of those tears were catalyzed by pain beyond the scope of this blog and/or pain about which I’m not yet clear or willing to share.
I’ll be honest again. Some of those tears were catalyzed by joy—the joy of allowing myself to be guided to Atquetzali’s voice; the joy of bearing witness to and being a part of what seems like unprecedented solidarity with Palestine; the joy of being trusted by students to provide feedback on their encampment plans; the joy of my son finishing his first year of college at Morgan State University; the joy of my daughter turning 18, graduating high school, and joining Hampton University; the joy of my students proudly telling me about their post-graduation plans; and, of course, the joy of watching our seniors “do the damn thang.” I’m sure some of those tears were catalyzed by joy beyond the scope of this blog and/or joy about which I’m not yet clear or willing to share. In any case, I let my tears flow for the sake of truth, my truth. I let them flow for the sake of shattering “the binding shroud of cultural trance.” I let them flow for the sake of ripping “apart smugness, arrogance, superiority, and self-importance.” I let them flow for the sake of vulnerability.
During the aforementioned #MMIWG2S event, Atquetzali and I were doing some lighthearted teasing in the tradition of laughing to keep from crying, and I said something about showing up to get “ally cookies.”4 She joked, “You even wore red!” I asked what she meant, and she told me people wear red to honor #MMIWG2S. I’ll be honest one last time…for now. I had no idea. That morning, I simply woke up, grabbed a long, red sweater vest I haven’t worn in over a year, got dressed, and went to work. I had and have as much guilt and shame about not knowing to wear red as I had and have about not knowing about the #MMIWG2S event until the previous day. I had and have as much guilt and shame about not knowing about the #MMIWG2S event as I had and have about not knowing Atquetzali would be singing “Ipalnemohua” during the walkout. I have guilt and shame about knowing, but I have unequivocal joy about allowing myself to be led. When my mind failed me, my heart didn’t.
Perhaps the ancestors have been talking to and guiding me, and I’m only just now learning how to listen. Perhaps I let my tears flow during the presentations, because the ancestors are reminding me that I “can’t be right, self-righteous, and truthful at the same time.”
The President's blogs are meant, in part, to generate excitement about special sessions during our upcoming conference. This one is congruent with the presidential session honoring the 50th anniversary of the founding of Women of All Red Nations (WARN). We also hope you consider attending our Program Administration and Development (PAD) Pre-Conference and/or submitting proposals for our “Decolonial Theory and Praxis” sub-theme for additional opportunities to celebrate our courageous work and share strategies for resistance.
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1 The walkout was especially well-planned and implemented, but many faculty were not privy to the agenda. So, we didn’t always know what was happening from one moment to the next. When I reported back to a few friends about why Santiago and I ran from the circle so quickly, they responded with lament about not bearing close witness to Atquetzali’s singing but also with understanding and appreciation for our willingness to be there and represent for the larger faculty collective.
2 Gina and I served on the Governing Council together as Member-at-Large and Secretary, respectively.
3 Some Indigenous peoples refer to this day as the National Day of Awareness for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, and 2SLGBTQI+ Peoples (#MMIWG2SLGBTQI). Some refer to it as #MMIW, #MMIR, or #MMIWG. In the name of critical community-building and solidarity, may we always remember Indigenous peoples are not monolithic, which necessitates a complex, comprehensive approach to understanding and appreciating their many ways of being.
4 In communities that center those who are most vulnerable to systemic and systematic subjugation and oppression, we take a critical approach to understanding and engaging with so-called allies who focus more on being seen and recognized than the long, arduous work of seriously studying and addressing subjugation and oppression. When we draw that conclusion, we often say those folks are merely aiming to get “ally cookies.”