What is Thanksgiving?
A reflection on what Thanksgiving truly represents, and a reading list
In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln made Thanksgiving a national holiday. He did this to improve relations between northern and southern states, as well as to create an illusion of positive relations between the federal government and Native Americans.
In elementary school, when I was a kid living in Washington state, I was taught the myth of a peaceful meal shared between pilgrims and Native Americans. Despite being surrounded by rich Native American cultures, my life rarely intersected with theirs, and the histories I learned were not real histories, but propaganda which papered over a violent past. I didn’t know I was living on stolen land.
Although I later learned that the story of Thanksgiving was indeed a myth, it wasn't until I delved into research for my forthcoming book, Hotshot, that I learned how insidious this myth is— how it represents a pattern of violence and gaslighting enacted by our federal government.
There is some truth to the myth: when Europeans first arrived in the U.S., they were most often treated with kindness and generosity by local tribes (although this wasn’t always true). This is true for Sir Francis Drake: when he arrived on the western coast of the U.S. he was greeted by friendly tribes. It's also true for the Spanish who brought the horrific Mission system from Mexico into California, and it's true for many Europeans who arrived along the northeastern coast. Without the help of Indigenous people, most of these Europeans would have died.
In return, Europeans sickened tribes with deadly diseases, plundered sacred landscapes, and murdered, raped, tortured, and enslaved Native Americans throughout the U.S.
This is not hyperbole. If anything, the violence cannot be overstated.
A year before Lincoln created Thanksgiving as a national holiday, he sanctioned the hanging of 38 Dakota tribal members and the starvation of the tribe itself in order to force them off of their land.
Winona LaDuke reflects on this event:
“Four-thousand Minnesotans came out to watch the hanging, many throwing cold water on the Dakota. Hooded, when the men dropped, it is said they held hands and were singing a Dakota prayer song. Three years later, Shakopee and Medicine Bottle, who had fled to Canada, were drugged and brought back to die on the gallows on Nov. 11 at Fort Snelling.”
For nearly 100 years after the establishment of Thanksgiving, Native American children continued to be separated from their families and forced by the federal government into residential schools, where they were punished for speaking Indigenous languages and required to assimilate into European cultures. These children often died, were murdered, forced into indentured servitude, sexually abused, and essentially tortured. The effects of these residential schools and the violence enacted by our federal government continue, and Native Americans are still marginalized in myriad ways.
We often speak of reparations for enslaved peoples— these discussions should extend to tribal groups, for many Indigenous people were also enslaved and forced from their homelands.
That so many tribes, through everything, retained their cultural heritage is a testament to their resilience, but they should not have to be so resilient. There are still tribes who are unable to gain federal recognition because of draconian laws; still tribes who do not have access to their ancestral lands. Corporations profit from extracting materials from these lands while tribes struggle to gain a financial foothold in the United States.
Land acknowledgements are not enough. I attend a college whose mascot is a Seminole Indian. During sporting events there's a disgusting performance called the "Tomahawk Chop." All of this while the University does nothing to educate students about the violent history of colonization in the area. There is no professor in my department that specializes in Indigenous history or literature— and there should be.
We truly need to reassess Thanksgiving. We need to examine its origins and the history it erases. We need to teach children the truth of American history and uplift the voices of Native Americans. We need to advocate for the return of land to their rightful inhabitants. I urge you to educate yourself about this history, which I wrote about in my book, but which has also been written about by many Indigenous authors. I’m including a list below, and will be sending out more lists in the weeks to come.
Reading List:
My forthcoming book, HOTSHOT, engages with the history of federal fire suppression, which is inextricably linked with colonization.
“An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States” by Roxanne Dunbar Ortiz is a deeply researched comprehensive overview of the history of Indigenous people in the United States.
Substack’s own wrote a beautiful reflection on his personal heritage and the larger history of Métis people, called “Becoming Little Shell: A Landless Indian’s Journey Home.”
“On the Swamp: Fighting for Indigenous Environmental Justice” is a testament to the resiliency of tribal groups and people living in the Southeastern United States, written by Ryan E. Emanuel, a member of the Lumbee tribe.
Joshua Whitehead’s novel “Johnny Appleseed” tells the story of an Indigiqueer cybersex worker struggling with and ultimately finding their identity in a world that fetishizes Native American people.
Morgan Talty’s “Night of the Living Rez” is a stunning book of short stories— each of them a world unto its own and all simultaneously in conversation with one another.
“The Rediscovery of America: Native Peoples and the Unmaking of U.S. History” argues that understanding Indigenous history is essential to understanding the history of the United States (which is true). Ned Blackhawk’s writing is gorgeous and engaging, interweaving the personal with the historical.
If you want to learn more about the enslavement of Indigenous Americans, please read “The Other Slavery” by Andrés Reséndez, a deep dive into what is essentially a forgotten (or suppressed) history. The book was a finalist for the National Book Award.
I’ve written about Louise Erdrich’s “The Round House,” which is one of my favorite novels. It’s technically part of a trilogy but can be read as a standalone book (though I recommend everything Erdrich has written). You can read my post about it HERE.
“House Made of Dawn” by M. Scott Momaday is, simply, a classic of American literature. If you haven’t read it, do.
Likewise, Leslie Marmon Silko’s “Ceremony” is also a classic, and a book I’ve read and reread throughout my life. Both “Ceremony” and “House Made of Dawn” center you men who are recovering from military service and living (or trying to survive) in the liminal space between their Indigenous cultures and the industrialized world.
There are so many incredible books written by Indigenous authors, so I think I’ll stop here for now and send out a second (and maybe third) reading list over the next couple weeks.
As always: thank you for reading Wilderness.
Thank you for this.