NAFPS Forum

Odds and Ends => Etcetera => Topic started by: Pono Aloha on May 16, 2012, 08:02:55 pm

Title: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: Pono Aloha on May 16, 2012, 08:02:55 pm
What do you make of this controversy? She claimed Cherokee heritage based on family lore and her grandfather's high cheekbones. She was listed as a minority professor at Harvard Law School. There is no evidence that she has Cherokee ancestry. http://www.bostonherald.com/news/politics/view/20220515genealogical_society_no_proof_of_warrens_cherokee_heritage_found/srvc=home&position=also
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: educatedindian on May 16, 2012, 08:30:31 pm
The writer of that headline and every other one based on racist puns surrounding this story need to get backhanded...

Warren never used that claimed family history to benefit herself. Her school did use the claim to count her as a minority, so any blame is with them.

Some conservatives (or more accurately, racists who pose as conservative) seem convinced that every last minority professor is hired based on quotas. It's just as phony a claim as the idea that NDNs get handed free money, and both ideas are equally based on race baiting. You get hired based on the work you've done, how good your writing and teaching are, period.
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: ShadowDancer on May 30, 2012, 11:48:12 pm
Came across this article today:

http://news.yahoo.com/cherokees-elizabeth-warren-don-t-claim-154806591.html

Quote
Cherokees to Elizabeth Warren: ‘We don’t claim you!’
The Daily Caller -

More than 150 Cherokee Indians have joined a group online demanding more information from Massachusetts senate candidate Elizabeth Warren about her claims of Native American heritage.

“You claim to be Cherokee. …We don’t claim you!” the group “Cherokees Demand Truth from Elizabeth Warren” declares on its website.

Warren has been embroiled in a controversy for weeks after it was revealed that the Harvard law professor once touted herself as an American Indian minority. She has since struggled to prove those claims as critics argue she claimed that heritage to further her career.

According to a mission statement posted on its website, the group is made up of “authentic Cherokees and descendants devoted to sharing the truth about our history.”

The group said they are made up of descendants from the Cherokee Nation, the United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians and the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians.

“Our mission is to help people understand what a real Cherokee is and to show why Elizabeth Warren claiming to be Cherokee without proof is harmful and offensive to us.”

Cornell Law School professor William A. Jacobson first reported the existence of the group Wednesday morning on his Le-gal In-sur-rec-tion blog.

The group states on its website that the group is led by Twila Barnes and David Cornsilk.

“I would like to meet with Ms. Warren, in person, and explain why her false claim of Cherokee ancestry is an issue,” Barnes told Breitbart.com. “She can ignore the questions of a reporter, but can she ignore the questions of a real Cherokee?”

A spokesman for the group couldn’t immediately be reached by The Daily Caller.
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: LittleOldMan on May 31, 2012, 09:49:37 am
I understand (read somewhere) that she is supposed to be 1/32 that is not that far back a good genealogist should be able to vet this.  "LOM"
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: critter - a white non-ndn person on May 31, 2012, 08:40:57 pm
Educated Indian, so you are saying that this whole thing is because of what the school did, not Elizabeth Warren, and that she herself never claimed to be Cherokee?
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: educatedindian on May 31, 2012, 09:13:04 pm
That was my understanding. The school chose to list her. Universities don't hire based on ethnicity but on your record as a teacher.

That Cornsilk doesn't care for her is no surprise. Cornsilk is unusual. He claims you have to be enrolled to be Native, period. But he also argues a tribe should be able to enroll anyone, so he argues that the Freedmen should be Cherokees although most don't have ancestry.

He also likes attention, so I'm guessing he doesn't care how his little group is going to be used by the right wing to go after Warren. This is such a minor matter IMO, and Warren has a good record of fighting for the little guy.
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: critter - a white non-ndn person on May 31, 2012, 09:32:58 pm
Thanks. I can see it as a minor issue in regards to Warren herself, but I also see it
as a larger issue based on what I've read on this board regarding the many who try to
use ndn identity, from the misguided to those who are knowingly setting out to
cultivate a profit.

It's in the spotlight, and imo, creates an opportunity for Americans to be educated
on on this, it would be nice if Warren stepped up and took that opportunity.
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: Epiphany on May 31, 2012, 09:41:25 pm
About Elizabeth Warren's Family Story about being Cherokee http://americanindiansinchildrensliterature.blogspot.com/2012/05/about-elizabeth-warrens-family-story.html (http://americanindiansinchildrensliterature.blogspot.com/2012/05/about-elizabeth-warrens-family-story.html)

I wish Warren would use the spotlight & provide education. I think she could even come out ahead.
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: amorYcohetes on September 30, 2012, 07:24:39 am
See, Boston?  This is why we can't have nice things.   :-[ http://colorlines.com/archives/2012/09/cherokee_nation_demands_scott_brown_apologize_for_downright_racist_behavior.html

http://bostonglobe.com/metro/2012/09/29/brown-supporters-fun-not-amusing-native-american/Aq9QYyYPqfQoct4AYcLA9L/story.html

http://leanforward.msnbc.com/_news/2012/09/20/13997015-barney-frank-rips-scott-brown-over-his-attacks-on-elizabeth-warren?lite

But we've come such a long way, right?  I mean, hey, at least they didn't beat anybody with the American flag (http://www.usnews.com/news/national/articles/2008/04/04/a-flag-a-busing-fight-and-a-famous-photograph).   This time.  :o

Quote
That Cornsilk doesn't care for her is no surprise...He also likes attention, so I'm guessing he doesn't care how his little group is going to be used by the right wing to go after Warren.
Yeah, this is really unfortunate.  Our local right-leaning paper keeps going back to this Twila Barnes and her anti-Warren group (http://bostonherald.com/news/politics/view/20220927native_americans_rip_scott_and_liz), now with this recent incident, quoting them so as to make them sound like apologists for the Brown supporters' racist behavior, and like they are sniping at Principal Chief Baker of the CNO.  IMHO, this distracts from the message of condemning a group of White men publicly harassing a political opponent by performing a bunch of ugly, mocking, stereotypes of Native Americans.  *sigh*
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: critter - a white non-ndn person on October 01, 2012, 07:10:49 am
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/30/opinion/sunday/kill-the-indians-then-copy-them.html?smid=fb-share&_r=0

Kill the Indians, Then Copy Them

JUST over a week ago, a handful of Senator Scott P. Brown’s supporters gathered in Boston to protest his opponent, Elizabeth Warren. The crowd — making Indian war whoops and tomahawk chops — was ridiculing what Mr. Brown, Republican of Massachusetts, called the “offense” of Ms. Warren’s claim that she has Cherokee and Delaware ancestry.

To mock real Indians by chanting like Hollywood Indians in order to protest someone you claim is not Indian at all gets very confusing. Even more so because early Americans spent centuries killing Indians, and then decades trying to drive any distinctive Indianness out of the ones who survived. Perhaps we’ve come a long way if Americans are now going around accusing people who don’t look or act Indian enough of appropriating that identity for personal gain. But in fact, the appropriation of Indian virtues is one of the country’s oldest traditions.

Indians — who we are and what we mean — have always been part of how America defined itself. Indians on the East Coast were largely (but never completely) deracinated, and tribes like the Delaware were either killed or relocated farther west. At the same time, their Indianness was extracted as a set of virtues: honor, stoicism, dignity, freedom. Once, in college, an African-American student shook his head when I told him that I was Indian and he said he was jealous. Why? I asked. Because you lived life on your own terms and would rather have died than become a slave. That sentiment — totally at odds with the reality in which many tribes were indeed enslaved and a few owned slaves themselves — seemed a very wistful expression of what being an Indian meant.

In any case, the mythic Indian virtues of dignity and freedom adhere less to real Indians than they do to the very nation that deposed them. Just think of how much the ultimate American, the cowboy, has in common with the Indian: a life lived beyond the law but in accordance with a higher set of laws like self-sufficiency, honor, toughness, a painful past, a fondness for whiskey and always that long, lingering look over his shoulder at a way of life quickly disappearing. Contrary to the view held by a lot of Indian people, America hasn’t forgotten us. It has always been obsessed with us and has appropriated, without recourse to reality or our own input, the qualities with which we are associated.

BEGINNING in the late 19th century, assimilation of the remaining American Indian population was official federal policy. This was around the time that the American frontier was considered closed: the West Coast had been reached and there were no more lands or peoples to conquer. And yet Indians still held on to much of our land and our identity. So at the behest of the federal government, thousands of Indian children were removed from their homes and sent to boarding schools. Indian languages and native religions were suppressed.

Even as late as the 1950s, the federal government ran a relocation program that promised American Indians housing and job training if they left their rural communities for cities like Cleveland, Chicago and Los Angeles. (Very few of these programs provided anything close to what the brochures handed out door to door on many reservations had promised.)

Meanwhile, Indians themselves found work or didn’t, left their communities, or didn’t. Fell in love and married — sometimes other Indians and sometimes not. Had children. Got hired, got fired, found Jesus or went to a sweat lodge. For many of us, our Indianness was more than a heritage or an ancestral tale about who our great-great-grandparents were; our cultures remained central to who we were. For others, not so much. In states like Oklahoma, where Elizabeth Warren is from, it’s almost unusual not to grow up hearing stories about your Indian heritage. So many tribes were moved there, there was such a saturation of Indians who worked and were educated and lived alongside other Americans and such pressure to assimilate, that to have such heritage was, in some ways, to be an Oklahoman.

Growing up as I did, on the Ojibwe Leech Lake Reservation in northern Minnesota, it was patently obvious to me that Indians came in all different shapes and colors. I’m fairly light-skinned and have been told many times that, looking the way I do, I can’t be an Indian, not a real one. I’ve heard this from colleagues, writers, neighbors. Once I was told I couldn’t be Indian because we’d all been killed. And yet I am. We are bound by much more than phenotype or blood quantum; we share a language, history, religion, foods, the bonds of family.

Only someone like Mr. Brown, who hasn’t spent any time around us or has only passing acquaintance with us, could say, as he did during a debate: “Professor Warren claimed she was a Native American, a person of color. And as you can see, she is not.” After the video of the tomahawk-chopping protesters emerged on the Internet last week, Mr. Brown apologized for their behavior. But he also explained that Ms. Warren had “claimed something she wasn’t entitled to.”

Thankfully, we American Indians are no longer forced to assimilate to accepted American culture. Instead, as the senator from Massachusetts suggests, we’re expected to assimilate to accepted Indian culture, a stereotype perfected in Boston way back in 1773, when protesters tossed tea into the harbor dressed as Mohawks in war paint. By going after Ms. Warren’s claim, Mr. Brown is appealing to an American narrative just as old as the one where Indians are noble and dark and on horseback, and just as divorced from the textured complexity of the American experience; one where the good guys are broad-chested and the villains twirl their mustaches; one where the only differences that are allowed are those that serve to reinforce American fantasies; one where Americans persist in eradicating problem Indians, so that they can wear our feathers.

David Treuer is an Ojibwe Indian and the author of “Rez Life: An Indian’s Journey Through the Land of His People.”
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: ShadowDancer on February 15, 2018, 12:48:44 am
Article on Feb 14 2018 Slate.com

Elizabeth Warren Addresses (but Doesn’t Apologize for) Contested Claims of Native Ancestry in Surprise Speech

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/02/elizabeth-warren-addresses-pocahontas-controversy-in-surprise-speech.html (https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/02/elizabeth-warren-addresses-pocahontas-controversy-in-surprise-speech.html)

Quote
Warren didn’t apologize for or retract her past claims per se—in fact, she asserted that “my mother’s family was part Native American.” But she acknowledged implicitly that this belief is supported only by family lore and does not meet many others’ standards of what it means to be a member of a Native community:

      I get why some people think there’s hay to be made here. You won’t find my family members on any rolls, and I’m not enrolled in a tribe.

      And I want to make something clear. I respect that distinction. I understand that tribal membership is determined by tribes — and only by tribes.
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: Defend the Sacred on February 15, 2018, 06:44:26 pm
She is still insisting that blood myths make her Native, even after Cherokee genealogists have proven the ancestors she claims are Cherokee are all white. She has not apologized to the Cherokee. She went to a general group, not a Cherokee one. She still thinks white fantasies override Indigenous people's rights to set tribal citizenship criteria.

She admitted she's not enrolled - everyone already knew that.
She admitted her ancestors are not on the rolls - that means she's not Cherokee.
Then she insisted she's Cherokee anyway. Because her white privilege makes her that emboldened.

https://thinkprogress.org/elizabeth-warren-is-not-cherokee-c1ec6c91b696/

"She is not from us. She does not represent us. She is not Cherokee."

During her time in office she has not helped with Indian issues. She's only backed into a corner now due to her presidential aspirations. She is not an ally.
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: Defend the Sacred on February 15, 2018, 07:26:31 pm
Shadowdancer, that Slate article you posted is biased and inaccurate. They end the piece calling the Twitter stream - Elizabeth Warren native - "Right Wing Twitter" [sic]. Once again, valid criticism of her false claims is misrepresented as "right wing."

This is the twitter stream: https://twitter.com/search?q=Elizabeth%20Warren%20native&src=typd
Yes, there are right wingers there. Some of them are hideous racists. But she opened the door to them with her lies. But that stream also has Natives commenting on her false claims. Quite a large percentage of the posters I see are Natives, given the percentage of Natives in the broader population.

In Indian Country, the issue of Warren's false claims, and her other insults to Indian County, have  never been about Left/Right, Dem/Repub. It's about sovereignty. It's about a white person lying about who they are and screwing over NDNs in the process.

This has been the spin control since the beginning. When Natives speak out against her, the press calls all critics "right wing." It's a divisionary tactic to silence Natives. But the Natives who have tried to communicate with her, and then wound up protesting her due to her racism, are largely leftists and independents. Some of the Cherokee have spoken to conservative media despite the political differences simply because leftist media refuse to speak to anyone who criticizes Warren.  Like in the inaccurate article you posted, left-leaning media has lied and called Native protesters "right wing" since the first protests against her.
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: Defend the Sacred on February 16, 2018, 04:38:35 am
I'm changing the name of this thread to simply Elizabeth Warren's name. She, and her supporters and critics alike, need to keep Matoaka's name, and slurs based on it, out of their mouths. #LeaveMatoakaAlone

As for her talking about Matoaka now, she's still just doing it to boost her own career, and getting most of it wrong. It's no better coming from her than from Trump.
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: Defend the Sacred on February 16, 2018, 04:46:59 am
Elizabeth Warren's Genealogy, and other research debunking her claims, by Cherokee genealogists:

http://www.pollysgranddaughter.com/p/elizabeth-warren-information.html

Also includes links to coverage of how egregiously Warren has treated Cherokee people who tried to reach out to her. This is in no way resolved.

Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: Diana on March 12, 2018, 02:23:08 am
Warren rejects DNA test idea to prove Native American ancestry: 'Nobody is going to take that part of me away'

https://www.yahoo.com/news/warren-rejects-dna-test-idea-prove-native-american-ancestry-nobody-going-take-part-away-173657853.html

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., argued that her family’s claim to Native American ancestry is an indelible part of who she is — something that can never be taken away.

Warren defended herself on NBC’s “Meet the Press with Chuck Todd” Sunday morning when asked what she thought about taking an easily accessible DNA test, such as those offered by 23andMe or Ancestry, to settle the ongoing controversy over her heritage.

Rather than address that question specifically, Warren told a story about how her mother and father, born and raised in Oklahoma, met as teenagers and fell head-over-heels in love. Her father’s family was bitterly opposed to their relationship, she said, because her mother was part Native American, but the couple eloped and persevered.

“That’s the story that my brothers and I all learned from our Mom and our Dad, from our grandparents and all of our aunts and uncles. It’s a part of me, and nobody is going to take that part of me away — not ever,” Warren said.

After hearing this story, Todd returned to his initial concern: Why not do genealogical research or take a DNA test to find out her actual heritage? What’s wrong with knowing whether her family’s story was the truth?

“I do know. I know who I am. And never used it for anything, never got any benefit out of it anywhere,” she said.

Warren has many liberal admirers who wish to see her pursue the Democratic presidential nomination for the 2020 election. But she’s also been dogged by the allegation that she has claimed Native American ancestry to advance her academic career. The claim emerged as a controversy in 2012 when she successfully challenged Scott Brown’s Senate seat. But it took on new life when President Trump incorporated “Pocahontas” into his list of insults for political opponents.

On March 6, the Berkshire Eagle, a daily newspaper published in Pittsfield, Mass., published an editorial calling upon Warren to take one of the many commercially available DNA tests to settle the controversy. If the test showed Native American DNA, her claims would be vindicated, and it might even shut down Trump. If it did not, she could offer an apology to Native American tribes and anyone else offended by her claim.

“By facing the truth and taking responsibility for it, she would disarm her enemies and show potential voters that she was human and capable of mistakes, just like them,” the editorial reads. “Handled properly, it could become a testimonial to her integrity and truthfulness at a time when that quality is in short supply among the nation’s leadership.”


Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: Defend the Sacred on March 12, 2018, 05:48:56 pm
Again she pretends this story wasn't debunked during her initial senate run. So insulting.
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: Defend the Sacred on March 13, 2018, 06:27:09 pm
http://www.pollysgranddaughter.com/2018/03/elizabeth-warren-doesnt-need-to-take.html

Elizabeth Warren doesn't need to take a DNA test. Here's why...

To be very clear, despite everything Warren said and promised in her speech to the National Congress of American Indians and despite all her new efforts to support Indian country through legislation, she is not taking a pro-Indian position because she continues to claim she's Native American while admitting she is not enrolled.

Those who continue to insist Warren take a DNA test to "settle the issue" are not taking a pro-Indian position either. DNA doesn't define who is or is not an Indian. Only tribes can do that. To say anything else, including DNA, determines who is or is not Indian is a political attack on tribal sovereignty. The three Cherokee Indian nations who have government to government relationships with the United States have said Warren is not Cherokee. That should have been the end of it. Unfortunately it wasn't.

The genealogy of Warren has been done and shows no indication of Cherokee, Delaware, or any other Indian nation ancestry. The genealogy along with the fact no legitimate Indian nation claims her should have been the end of it. Unfortunately it wasn't.

Now we have no choice but to address the areas of family lore and DNA. This is where it gets ugly and I'm not happy that I feel I need to write about it. I will not get into a discussion of DNA as a whole. Warren's family lore is very specific and her claim hinges on one person as a racially 'full blooded Cherokee.' That person and their origins will be the sole focus of my discussion of DNA.

I'm a genealogist who adheres to the Standards for Sound Genealogical Practices adopted by the Board for the Certification of Professional Genealogists. The research our team did documents Warren's lineage back to Preston Crawford, a white man who was born in Tennessee and died in Missouri. At this time, no credible documentation has been found that conclusively lists the names of the parents of Preston Crawford.

Sadly, Warren doesn't care about documentation or facts. She's based her entire claim to being Cherokee or Native American on a family story that says Preston Crawford's parents were Jonathon Crawford and "Sarah" Neoma (Oma) Smith. This same story continues by declaring Neoma Smith as the daughter of Wyatt Smith and sister of William Bracken Smith.

_______________________________________________________________________

Excerpt above  copyright 2018, Polly's Granddaughter - TCB. Read the full article here: http://www.pollysgranddaughter.com/2018/03/elizabeth-warren-doesnt-need-to-take.html

It goes on to document the Y-DNA done by other members of Warren's family. Everyone is white. The man she said was the father of her "full blood Cherokee" ancestors was white. She reiterates that DNA has nothing to do with enrollment, but that for those who really, really will not shut up until they see some alleles, here they are: R-M269, the dominant branch of R1b in Western Europe. Aka, White.
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: White Horse on January 03, 2019, 02:49:34 pm
DNA tests are a JOKE!  Here is a link to a Canadian DNA test that was given to a Chihuahua that showed the DOG was 20% Native American belonging to 2 separate tribes.  The DNA test did NOT pick up the fact that this was a DOG and it has more "Native" ancestry than Elizabeth Warren.   

https://newsinteractives.cbc.ca/longform/dna-ancestry-test
Title: Re: Elizabeth Warren and her disproven claims of being Cherokee
Post by: Defend the Sacred on January 03, 2019, 06:47:24 pm
http://www.criticalethnicstudiesjournal.org/blog/2018/12/19/syllabus-elizabeth-warren-cherokee-citizenship-and-dna-testing

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Critical Ethnic Studies

Published by University of Minnesota Press


SYLLABUS: ELIZABETH WARREN, CHEROKEE CITIZENSHIP, AND DNA TESTING

December 19, 2018

Introduction

The goal of this syllabus is to frame the recent claims to Cherokee ancestry by US Senator Elizabeth Warren as part of a longer history of cultural appropriation, erasure, and settler colonialism. Warren’s claims reveal the pervasive influence of biological essentialism--through the supposed certainty of DNA testing--in the globalized present. As is documented in this syllabus, the juncture of culture, genetics, and Indigenous sovereignty has become a crucial domain of discursive and political contestation. At stake is the ability of sovereign Indigenous nations to determine citizenship and belonging according to their own cultural beliefs and historical understandings of community. In compiling this syllabus, we underscore the work of Indigenous writers, scholars, and activists, and we have focused primarily on the historical position of the Cherokee Nation in these debates. We hope that this syllabus can serve as a practical guide, but also to alleviate some of the emotional and intellectual labor that we, as Indigenous peoples, are often forced to produce in such a moment as this. In the days after Warren released her DNA test results the demand from the media was such that scholar Kim Tallbear was forced to create a press release detailing the points she has made exhaustively since her writing on Native DNA began over a decade ago. Others of us fielded dozens of interviews with reporters, and were forced to spell out the basics of Indigenous identity and sovereignty over and over. It is our hope that this syllabus can be a tool for deeper understanding, but also a first stop for those who know little about Cherokee history, identity, and DNA. Thus, rather than having to explain one more time, we hope you can say: take a look at this syllabus and then we’ll talk.
Preface

In October 2018, US Senator Elizabeth Warren released the results of a DNA test in an effort to prove her claims to Native American ancestry. Far from resolving the question of her supposed Cherokee and Delaware heritage, her actions distracted from urgent issues facing Indigenous communities and undermined Indigenous sovereignty by equating “biology” with culture, “race” with citizenship. In response, Indigenous scholars, activists, and the Cherokee Nation itself, rebuked the dangerous connection between DNA testing and Indigeneity.

The syllabus project aims to contextualize the history of colonialism erasing and assimilating Indigenous populations through the regulation of blood--found in the contemporary iteration of DNA testing. It collects some of the responses from Indian Country in the wake of Warren’s misguided political gamble, and fills in historical gaps with important scholarship about Cherokee citizenship, blood quantum, DNA and genetic testing, and tribal sovereignty.

The following texts have been compiled by three citizens of the Cherokee Nation, Adrienne Keene (@nativeapprops), Rebecca Nagle (@rebeccanagle), and Joseph M. Pierce (@pepepierce).

Key Words

DNA and Genetic Testing

Indigenous Citizenship

Cherokee History

Erasure

Cultural Appropriation

Blood

Tribal Sovereignty

Readings by Theme and Topic
DNA and Genetic Testing

Gupta, Prachi. “‘Our Vote Matters Very Little’: Kim TallBear on Elizabeth Warren's  Attempt to Claim Native
     American Heritage”. Jezebel. October 16, 2018.
     https://theslot.jezebel.com/our-vote-matters-very-little-kim-tallbear-on-elizabeth-1829783321

TallBear, Kim. 2013. Native American DNA: Tribal Belonging and the False Promise of Genetic Science.     
     Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
     https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/native-american-dna

Tsosie, Krystal. “Elizabeth Warren’s DNA Is Not Her Identity”. The Atlantic. October  17, 2018.
     https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/10/what-make-elizabeth-warrens-dna-test/573205/

Tsosie, Krystal and Matthew Anderson. “Two Native Americans geneticists interpret
     Elizabeth Warren’s DNA test”. The Conversation. October 22, 2018.
     https://theconversation.com/two-native-american-geneticists-interpret-elizabeth-warrens-dna-test-105274
Early responses from Indian Country to Warren

Franke-Ruta, Garance. “Is Elizabeth Warren Native American or What?”. The Atlantic. May 20, 2012.
     https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/05/is-elizabeth-warren-native-american-or-what/257415/

Nagle, Rebecca. “I am a Cherokee Woman. Elizabeth Warren is Not”. ThinkProgress. November 30, 2017.
     https://thinkprogress.org/elizabeth-warren-is-not-cherokee-c1ec6c91b696/
Indian Country's response to Warren's DNA test

Blake, Aaron. “Why the Cherokee Nation’s Rebuke of Elizabeth Warren Matters”. The
     Washington Post. October 16, 2018.
     https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2018/10/16/why-cherokee-nations-rebuke-elizabeth-warren-matters/?utm_term=.f16f0a23d75a

Brewer, Graham. “Warren’s DNA Test Perpetuates Stereotypes, Native Communities
     Say” WNYC The Takeaway. October 16, 2018.
     https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/warrens-dna-test-perpetuates-stereotypes-native-communities-say

Cherokee Nation. “Cherokee Nation responds to Senator Warren’s DNA test”. October 15, 2018.
     http://webtest2.cherokee.org/News/Stories/Archive_2018/20181015_Cherokee-Nation-responds-to-Senator-Warrens-DNA-test

Echo Hawk, Crystal. “Changing Elizabeth Warren's story to one about Native America”.
     Indian Country Today. October 18, 2018.
     https://newsmaven.io/indiancountrytoday/opinion/changing-elizabeth-warren-s-story-to-one-about-native-america-pG7k5kLvkkKfeb023EFhqA/

Estes, Nick. “Native American Sovereignty Is Under Attack. Here’s How Elizabeth
     Warren’s DNA Test Hurt Our Struggle.” The Intercept. October 19, 2018.
     https://theintercept.com/2018/10/19/elizabeth-warren-dna-native-americans/

Hayes, Kelly and Jacqueline Keeler. “Elizabeth Warren connected DNA and Native
     American heritage. Here’s why that's destructive.” NBC News. October 17, 2018.
     https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/elizabeth-warren-connected-dna-native-american-heritage-here-s-why-ncna921166

Hilleary, Cecily. “Native Americans Speak Out on Elizabeth Warren DNA Controversy”.
     Voice of America. October 16, 2018. 
     https://www.voanews.com/a/native-americans-speak-out-on-elizabeth-warren-dna-controversy/4615743.html?fbclid=IwAR2WaKcxC3G52su9AncvZTHRj35RY3vAgl4-7tAt8I0xZyCjeixxe77Ae0A

Martin, Nick. “Elizabeth Warren’s Deception”. Splinter. October 16, 2018.
     https://splinternews.com/elizabeth-warrens-deception-1829755302

Moya-Smith,Simone. “I am a Native American. I Have Some Questions for Elizabeth
     Warren”. CNN. October 15, 2018.
     https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/15/opinions/elizabeth-warren-native-heritage-where-has-she-been-moya-smith/index.html

Nagle, Rebecca. “Elizabeth Warren’s ‘part’ Cherokee claim is a joke, and a racist insult
     to Natives like me”. USA Today. October 18, 2018.
     https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/voices/2018/10/18/native-american-elizabeth-warren-cherokee-ancestry-column/1668763002/

 NoiseCat, Julian Brave. “Elizabeth Warren Is Not Native American”. Huffington Post.
     October 16, 2018.
     https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/opinion-elizabeth-warren-native-ancestry_us_5bc5f8d9e4b055bc947a6e13

Reese, Debbie. “A Curated List of Indigenous Responses to Elizabeth Warren.”
     American Indians in Children’s Literature. October 20, 2018.
     https://americanindiansinchildrensliterature.blogspot.com/2018/10/a-curated-list-of-native-responses-to.html
Cherokee History (Especially regarding Diaspora, Allotment, Adoption, and Identity)

Brown, Kirby. 2018. Stoking the Fire: Nationhood in Cherokee Writing, 1907-1970.
     Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.

Carter, Kent. 1999. The Dawes Commission and the Allotment of the Five Civilized
     Tribes, 1893-1914. Orem, Utah: Ancestry.com. 

Deboe, Angie. 1940 [1991]. And Still the Waters Run: The Betrayal of the Five Civilized
     Tribes. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Garroutte, Eva Marie. 2003. Real Indians: Identity and the Survival of Native America.
     Berkeley: University of California Press.

Jacobs, Margaret D. 2014. A Generation Removed: The Fostering and Adoption of
     Indigenous Children in the Postwar World. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.

Peterson, Dawn. 2017. Indians in the Family: Adoption and the Politics of Antebellum
     Expansion. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.

Smithers, Gregory D. 2015. The Cherokee Diaspora: An Indigenous History of
     Migration, Resettlement, and Identity. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Stremlau, Rose. 2011. Sustaining the Cherokee Family: Kinship and the Allotment of an
     Indigenous Nation. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
Becoming Indian and Cultural Appropriation

Deloria, Philip J. 1998. Playing Indian. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Farzan, Antonia Noori. “A DNA Test said a man was 4% black. Now he wants to qualify as a minority
     business owner.” Washington Post. September 25, 2018.
     https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2018/09/25/a-dna-test-said-he-was-4-black-now-he-wants-to-qualify-as-a-minority-business-owner/?utm_term=.26e2cc1e883d

Keeler, Jacqueline. “Pocahontas isn’t a name that should offend you”. Yes! Magazine.
December 1, 2017.
     https://www.yesmagazine.org/people-power/pocahontas-is-not-a-name-that-should-offend-you20171201?fbclid=IwAR06oy_zJX5DmeWHeiGItzOLOeCqSW7oeUo5IRxjNVHuQZo0iOQGHiWJTTM

Pierce, Joseph M. 2017. “Adopted: Trace, Blood, and Native Authenticity”. Critical
     Ethnic Studies. 3:2: 57-76. [.pdf]

 Pringle, Paul and Adam Elmahrek. “House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s family
     benefited from U.S. program for minorities based on disputed ancestry”.
     Los Angeles Times. October 14, 2018.
     https://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-na-pol-mccarthy-contracts-20181014-story.html

Scott, Brandon. “Cherokee Nation citizens like me are used to people claiming our
     heritage. It’s exhausting”. Vox. October 17, 2018. 
     https://www.vox.com/first-person/2018/10/17/17985886/elizabeth-warren-claims-native-american-descent

Smithers, Gregory. “Why Do So Many Americans Think They Have Cherokee Blood?”.
     Slate. October 1, 2015.
     https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2015/10/cherokee-blood-why-do-so-many-americans-believe-they-have-cherokee-ancestry.html

Sturm, Circe. 2011. Becoming Indian: The Struggle over Cherokee Identity in the
     Twenty-First Century. Santa Fe: School for Advanced Research Press.

Wiles,Tay. “Anti-public lands and anti-Native groups converge in Montana”. High
     Country News. October 19, 2018.
     https://www.hcn.org/articles/sagebrush-rebellion-in-whitefish-montana-anti-public-lands-and-anti-native-groups-converge?fbclid=IwAR3o6vIVXA3c3Cu6Foan4aHEOUYqfxtM7q5Vb4n7yA2gvDfAorvpm4jtEuA

COMPILED BY:

Adrienne Keene is a citizen of the Cherokee Nation and an Assistant Professor of American Studies and Ethnic Studies at Brown University. Her research interests include Indigenous students in higher education, Indigenous student activism, and Native representations and cultural appropriation. She is the author of Native Appropriations (nativeappropriations.com), where she blogs about topics of Native representations.


{ apologies for the loss of Cherokee Syllabary here, our forum can't translate that font - ed }

Rebecca Nagle is a writer, advocate and citizen of Cherokee Nation living in Tahlequah. Currently, Nagle does writing by night and language preservation and revitalization for her tribe by day. You can read her views on issues of Native representation and tribal sovereignty in the Washington Post, Teen Vogue, USA Today, The Huffington Post, and more.


Joseph M. Pierce is Assistant Professor in the Department of Hispanic Languages and Literature at Stony Brook University. His research focuses Latin American literary and cultural studies, Indigenous studies, queer studies, and hemispheric approaches to citizenship and belonging. His book Argentine Intimacies: Queer Kinship in an Age of Splendor, 1890-1910 is forthcoming from SUNY Press. He is co-editor with Fernando A. Blanco and Mario Pecheny of Derechos Sexuales en el Sur: Políticas del amor y escrituras disidentes (2018, Editorial Cuarto Propio). He is a citizen of the Cherokee Nation.