Making a saint of California's imperial priest
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1Muscogulus
Pope Francis, while touring the USA this week, made Father Junípero Serra (1713-1784) a saint of the Roman Catholic Church. Serra, a founder of Roman Catholicism and Spanish imperial rule in California, established missions among the numerous Indian nations, including the kernels of the future cities of San Francisco, San Diego, Santa Clara, and Santa Barbara.
The familiar story of imperial conquest of indigenous peoples is particularly harrowing in California. Some 300,000 people may have lived along the Pacific coast of the modern state of California in 1750, but by 1900 their numbers were reduced to 16,000. Spanish efforts to "reduce" Indians to servile Catholic laborers took a heavy toll through disease and repressive violence. In the 1830s independent Mexico released California's Indians from the missions, but this was a mixed blessing. And the U.S. seizure of California in 1848, followed by the Gold Rush, opened an era of manhunts and massacres throughout the territory. (My schoolbook history of the California Gold Rush made no mention of Indians. Even California students, I gather, got an impression that Indians simply vanished once the missions closed.)
Surviving California Indians ascribe much of the blame for this litany of crimes to Fr. Serra. Many of these Indians are also practicing Roman Catholics who objected strenuously to the priest's canonization. This protest has been mentioned prominently in the media coverage of Francis's U.S. tour.
Here are some relevant links, ranked from general to specific:
* Richard González of National Public Radio (NPR) posted a brief history of Serra and his legacy just two days ago.
* In 2013 NPR host Tom Ashbrook interviewed Serra's biographer, Steven Hackel, and other guests for a show called Imperial Priest: California’s Father Junípero Serra. The page links to other readings.
* The PBS (public TV) website Indian Country Diaries has a page on genocide in California supplemented by an interactive map showing California tribal names, Spanish mission locations, and U.S. reservations (including tribes that incorporated some California Indians).
* Vinnie Rotondaro of National Catholic Reporter wrote a five-part series, Trail of History, expressing indigenous criticism of the Doctrine of Discovery established since the 15th century in Catholic canon law. This doctrine, which justifies the annulment of indigenous rights by Christians, not only shaped Spanish imperial policy but influenced U.S. common law (e.g., the 1823 case Johnson v. McIntosh) and Indian policy. The series is directed at a Catholic readership.
Hackel's biography is titled Junipero Serra: California's Founding Father.
The familiar story of imperial conquest of indigenous peoples is particularly harrowing in California. Some 300,000 people may have lived along the Pacific coast of the modern state of California in 1750, but by 1900 their numbers were reduced to 16,000. Spanish efforts to "reduce" Indians to servile Catholic laborers took a heavy toll through disease and repressive violence. In the 1830s independent Mexico released California's Indians from the missions, but this was a mixed blessing. And the U.S. seizure of California in 1848, followed by the Gold Rush, opened an era of manhunts and massacres throughout the territory. (My schoolbook history of the California Gold Rush made no mention of Indians. Even California students, I gather, got an impression that Indians simply vanished once the missions closed.)
Surviving California Indians ascribe much of the blame for this litany of crimes to Fr. Serra. Many of these Indians are also practicing Roman Catholics who objected strenuously to the priest's canonization. This protest has been mentioned prominently in the media coverage of Francis's U.S. tour.
Here are some relevant links, ranked from general to specific:
* Richard González of National Public Radio (NPR) posted a brief history of Serra and his legacy just two days ago.
* In 2013 NPR host Tom Ashbrook interviewed Serra's biographer, Steven Hackel, and other guests for a show called Imperial Priest: California’s Father Junípero Serra. The page links to other readings.
* The PBS (public TV) website Indian Country Diaries has a page on genocide in California supplemented by an interactive map showing California tribal names, Spanish mission locations, and U.S. reservations (including tribes that incorporated some California Indians).
* Vinnie Rotondaro of National Catholic Reporter wrote a five-part series, Trail of History, expressing indigenous criticism of the Doctrine of Discovery established since the 15th century in Catholic canon law. This doctrine, which justifies the annulment of indigenous rights by Christians, not only shaped Spanish imperial policy but influenced U.S. common law (e.g., the 1823 case Johnson v. McIntosh) and Indian policy. The series is directed at a Catholic readership.
Hackel's biography is titled Junipero Serra: California's Founding Father.
2Muscogulus
Probably the most popular book about California Indians was Ishi: Last of his Tribe (1964), a fictionalized account of the life of the last Yahi Indian. A better informed account of his life is Ishi in Two Worlds (1961), supplemented by Ishi the Last Yahi: A Documentary History (1981).
"Ishi," the Yahi word for "man," is a pseudonym, as he never gave his own name. (It was taboo for a Yahi to say their own name or the name of a dead person.) He was descended from the few survivors of an extermination campaign by California cattlemen and other settlers, encouraged by a bounty on Indian scalps. This went on from ca. 1865 to 1908, the year Ishi's elderly mother and sister died after land surveyors raided their camp. "Ishi" believed he was the last surviving member of his tribe when he was captured alive, about 50 years of age, in 1911.
He spent his last five years in the UCLA anthropology department, housed in a museum in San Francisco — not as an exhibit, fortunately, but as a salaried research assistant with a private apartment. Anthropologists interviewed him to reconstruct the language and some of the rituals of his tribe. He also demonstrated hunting and flint knapping techniques, and present-day understanding of Paleolithic tech (flint knapping) is heavily indebted to Ishi.
"Ishi," the Yahi word for "man," is a pseudonym, as he never gave his own name. (It was taboo for a Yahi to say their own name or the name of a dead person.) He was descended from the few survivors of an extermination campaign by California cattlemen and other settlers, encouraged by a bounty on Indian scalps. This went on from ca. 1865 to 1908, the year Ishi's elderly mother and sister died after land surveyors raided their camp. "Ishi" believed he was the last surviving member of his tribe when he was captured alive, about 50 years of age, in 1911.
He spent his last five years in the UCLA anthropology department, housed in a museum in San Francisco — not as an exhibit, fortunately, but as a salaried research assistant with a private apartment. Anthropologists interviewed him to reconstruct the language and some of the rituals of his tribe. He also demonstrated hunting and flint knapping techniques, and present-day understanding of Paleolithic tech (flint knapping) is heavily indebted to Ishi.
