" In Elizabeth Warren’s family, we have gotten to approximately 1824, fourteen years prior to the removal of the Cherokees from the east and there is no indication of Indian blood or association with the Cherokees through her Crawford line, the line she claims to be Cherokee through. That means we have gone back about 188 years and still not found a Cherokee ."
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What’s your point?
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She claimed to be Cherokee. Which is likely why the CN responded/felt the need to respond. Bear in mind the CN, more than any other US Native American tribe have had to contend with people asserting as true their family legends of Cherokee ancestors.
@Wanderfound is right that the response is predictable. As I indicated in an earlier comment a supposed “blood quanta” is not how every race/ethnicity evaluates membership, and those that do use some understanding of blood quanta will have their own rules for it. One ethnic group I belong to doesn’t consider you a member unless your father is, and will usually consider you a member no matter how dilute your bloodline if you have an unbroken patrilineal chain.
Native American groups are very sensitive about this (part of why they discourage their members from participation in genetic testing) because they rightly worry about largely white privileged people wanting to claim ancestry for cool factor, with no appreciation for the issues affecting contemporary Native Americans today.
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I’m a democratic socialist, not a Democrat or a Republican, so this has nothing to do with party politics. This has to do, yet again, with what many of us in the community call the convenient Indian problem – that is, people who claim to be Native only when it serves their personal agenda but are nowhere to be found otherwise.
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Notice that the reference populations used in this analysis are Chipewyan, Algonquin, Cree, Ojibwa, Yaqui, Tepehuno, and Mixe, and not from the lower 48 states.
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Hmm. Interesting research and what I suggested one should look into in an earlier post. Though it is good evidence, it doesn’t disprove heritage. If someone passed for white and wasn’t on the tribal rolls, then that would be why there weren’t documented as such.
Not sure they had a point - just presenting more evidence that her linage was traced back to the early 1800s and everyone was listed as white. While not conclusive, it is at least as important as DNA ancestry tests which aren’t perfect either.
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The test, as I understand it, shows that she has 1/1024 Mexican, Peruvian, or Colombian heritage.
A review of her family heritage by a Cherokee genealogist showed no Cherokee ancestors, and a careful study of her family history showed her great grandfather once shot a “drunken Indian”, and another of her relatives falsely claimed in 1902 to be part Choctaw.
None of this is much proof of Cherokee heritage. Certainly not enough to support the claim to be a “woman of color”.
“Bankruptcy Expert”? That’s true–Warren studies and teaches Bankruptcy law-- but Shiva seems to be implying something nefarious.
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Do you mean Native American populations that live in what is now Mexico, Peru and Columbia? Because Native Americans come from all of Central, South and North America.
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Did she ever call herself a woman of color?
What I’ve gathered is that her school used her that way, and she was unaware it did so.
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It seems correct that others used the term for her. But they did so based on claims she made to them.
“As I have confirmed before, I let people know about my Native American heritage in a national directory of law school personnel,” Warren said in the statement. “At some point after I was hired by them, I also provided that information to the University of Pennsylvania and Harvard. My Native American heritage is part of who I am, I’m proud of it and I have been open about it.” CBS News- 5/31/2012
Yeah, so? You say that like it’s a bad thing.
What’s your point?
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I’m really not of fan of this kind of crap because all too often I’ve seen folks claim Native American heritage like it’s a “get out of being called a beneficiary of empire and genocide” card. Like my parents claim we might have Cherokee or whatever in the family tree but the way I look at it is that I’m not Cherokee and I’m not Native American. I wasn’t raised as one, and I’m not visibly identifiable as one (as in I’m as white as you’d expect someone with German and Welsh ancestry). So whatever Native American ancestry I got isn’t relevant and nor should it ever been for Elizabeth Warren who’s clearly never set foot onto a reservation or ever dealt with Native American issues. So I think the fact she chose to fall for Trump’s telltale tactic of wrestling someone into the mud shows she’s not an astute politician despite being a Senator. She has much to learn if she really wants to take a clown like Trump down. Namely, you don’t do what he wants you to do. You do what he doesn’t want you to do (i.e. demand he address issues he’s promised to fix but hasn’t like the opioid crisis).
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FFS, when you even apply for a job these days, prospective employers are required to include a survey question that asks about your race/minority status. Some don’t allow multiple selections. Some don’t include an opt-out, or “other.” It’s BS.
I’m pretty sure that’s how Harvard found out about Warren’s heritage, through a filled-in bubble on some online or scantron form. It’s not fucking fraud.
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I tend to agree that it was not an intentional fraud on her part, but I have no idea why she decided to kick this specific hornet’s nest at this time. It convinces no one. It benefits no one. It’s not going to shut down that line of attack. And it takes oxygen from candidates who really need this time for the midterms that are coming up in three weeks
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I agree completely.
I’m just worried that relying on dubious science to prove a point is a bad strategy politically for Democrats and their supporters.
It’s not dubious. It’s pretty spot-on for the markers that are consistent with ancestry. What would be dubious is to try and pinpoint a particular ancestor at that level of remove. But sequencing is perfectly capable of the specified level of certainty for general ancestry.
It only seems to be taking oxygen from those candidates because of progressives who are being baited into inadvertent concern-driving trollies about Warren’s insensitivity to Native Americans.
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Is it “inadvertent concern-driving trollies” to actually listen to Native voices?
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There is a very large difference between saying “I am Native American” (she did not) and saying “I have a distant ancestor who was Native American” which is an accurate statement, proven out by DNA testing. If she was claiming to be Native American, she could be called out for that. She is claiming that Native American is part of her ancestry. That is just a fact, and not really subject to moral judgment. The right has been famous for using facts like this to claim that you are “not white” and therefore not eligible to participate in the rights and privileges historically reserved for whites. Is the left now going to start claiming that if a “white” person acknowledges an ethnic ancestor, that is somehow racist? Very few of us are “pure” anything, and denying “inconvenient” ancestral contributions to our makeup is just not a progressive position.
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Yeah, but being an opportunistic “convenient Indian” isn’t one either.
A lot of Native voices are criticizing her on this (and many are also doing so while saying Warren would be great otherwise). Maybe listen to some of them, yeah?
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