Rethinking Columbus Day Panel Explores the Genocidal Impact of Colonization

On Monday, Grand Valley State University’s (GVSU) Native American Student Association and the Office of Multicultural Affairs held a panel discussion titled “Rethinking Columbus” that examined the legacy of Christopher Columbus. The event, organized to fall on the same day as the official “Columbus Day” holiday, was attended by approximately fifty students. The panel featured four panelists—History professor Brian Collier, Modern Languages and Literature professor Yvette Fuentes, Latin American Studies professor Khedija Gahoum, and Jeff Smith of the Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy (GRIID). The four panelists, while addressing a variety of different subjects pertaining to the legacy of Christopher Columbus, generally presented arguments affirming the fact that Christopher Columbus should be viewed not as a hero to be celebrated, but as a criminal who was responsible for setting in motion over five-hundred years of colonization that has resulted in ongoing genocide and racism toward the indigenous populations of the Americas.

The panel began with GVSU history professor Brian Collier who explored the historical origins of Columbus Day as a federal holiday. Collier described that the holiday—“offensive to so many [indigenous] people”—was first celebrated in the 1870s, but during the years of 1908 to 1912 was actively sought by Italian immigrants. He explained that Italian immigrants, coming to the United States out of a context of natural disasters in Italy and a poor economy, sought the holiday as a means of promoting their cultural heritage. At the time, with Italians immigrating in large numbers, opportunistic politicians were willing to support the holiday and it was eventually made a federal holiday without considering the ramifications that celebrating such a holiday would have on indigenous people living within the United States. Collier reminded the audience that over 800 million indigenous people were killed during the colonization of the Americas and that the death toll alone makes the day offensive, but that the day is further a reminder that the dominant culture discounts indigenous knowledge and promotes the superiority of western ways of thinking. He also described the “intellectual genocide” of indigenous people in the United States through the boarding school years, during which eight generations of indigenous people were sent to boarding schools at which they were taught to forget their languages and their tribal ways, forced into a system of colonization without physical violence. He urged the audience to support native communities by looking at the ways in which indigenous knowledge can benefit everyone (for example, the concept of restorative justice rather than punitive justice), supporting full sovereignty for native peoples, and opposing characterizations of native cultures such as Columbus Day parades, “Indian” Halloween costumes, and Thanksgiving pageants.

Following Collier’s presentation, professor Yvette Fuentes discussed the impact that Columbus had on the Taino people who inhabited the Caribbean when Columbus arrived in 1492. The Taino, who were the first to greet Columbus, were promptly enslaved and those who were not enslaved were killed, with a population of an estimated 8 to 10 million in 1493 being exterminated in the course of a few years. Fuentes explained that while this has been the traditional discourse on the fate of the Taino people, there has recently been an effort on the part of indigenous people to reexamine the idea that the Tainos were exterminated. Indigenous people, inspired by the American Indian Movement in the United States, have challenged traditional history that states that the Tainos were primitive or weak because they left no buildings or written language. They have highlighted the fact that many people in the Caribbean observe indigenous traditions and that they have maintained their culture in rural areas and through inter-marriage. This argument is also supported by academic research, with Fuentes citing a 1999 study that found that 61% of the Puerto Rican population carry the mtDNA of indigenous people.

Professor Gadhoum of the Latin American Studies program opened her portion of the discussion with a quote by noted Uruguayan author Eduardo Galeano about how America was “not discovered” by Columbus but that it was already there. Gadhoum argued that this was part of the effort of “inventing America” that began with a German cartographer in the 1500s who started to write “America” on maps of the continent and continues to this day as the history of the Americas has been written from a perspective of capitalism that excludes the fact that Columbus introduced ways of life that destroyed native practices. While the Catholic Church famously ruled that indigenous people had no rights in the 1500s, colonization continues today via multinational corporations extracting natural resources that should belong to indigenous people, via the “curse of wealth” where those with greater financial wealth dominate them. Indigenous people are thus either completely marginalized or “exoticized” by the dominant culture. Gadhoum also described how the process of colonization is a process of “de-civilizing” whereby the colonizer engages in rape, hatred, violence, and racism.

Jeff Smith of the Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy explained how not only must we view Columbus Day as five-hundred years of colonization, but also as five-hundred years of resistance on the part of indigenous people in the Americas. Smith described how as colonization has continued to take new forms—trade agreements, resource extraction, and the theft of indigenous knowledge—indigenous people have resisted these efforts by being at the forefront of movements organizing around these issues. Smith argued that anyone enjoying neoliberal capitalist culture must understand that their way of life comes at the expensive of indigenous people and that we need to both acknowledge this and honor indigenous resistance by working on the aforementioned issues or confronting racist school mascots that belittle indigenous peoples and beliefs. He described how indigenous people in Mexico have been the most affected by the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and that indigenous people in Central America will be the most affected by the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). Aside from these economic policies, Smith argued that colonization continues through media representation where indigenous perspectives are only heard of if there is a pow-wow or a casino, but not on any other issues relevant to indigenous communities. Furthermore, indigenous people are relegated to secondary roles in entertainment and never as primary characters. If this and other forms of ongoing colonization of indigenous people is seen as a genocidal policy, Smith argued that they violate international law and that everyone living within countries engaging in such polices have an obligation under international law to stop these policies.

Following the panel, Native American activist Deb Mueller described how colonization began with Columbus and continues through the mockery of sacred items, forced hair cutting, experimentation on women, and other means. This issue is particularly important in Michigan, which has the 9th highest population of Native Americans in the United States and she urged the audience to understand that “Indian country is here” and that there are opportunities for people to either work directly with indigenous people or in solidarity with them on a variety of issues. She explained that thousands of native children like her were socialized to hate who they were through the media, museum exhibits, or through popular forms of entertainment that worked to marginalize native culture. Despite these realities, indigenous people have survived and continue to organize to preserve their culture.

Related Posts:

1. Rethinking Columbus Day Event Held at GVSU
2. Today’s Columbus Day Celebrates the Genocide of Indigenous People
3. Celebrating Genocide: National Columbus Day Holiday
4. Columbus and other Cannibals
5. Panel Discussion Explores Police Responses to White Supremacist Rallies in Michigan

Tags: americas, colonialism, columbus day, indigenous peoples, racism