'There She Is, Miss Navajo' - Tim Giago Inducted Into SD Newspaper Hall Of Fame
Submitted by Eleanore Fanire
By FELICIA FONSECA, Associated Press Writer
Mon Nov 19, 2007
When competitors head off for the weeklong Miss Navajo Nation pageant, they bring along their evening gowns, jewelry, high heels, public speaking skills — and butcher knives.
On the nation's largest Indian reservation, where tradition reigns, contestants are required to speak their native language, make fry bread and butcher a sheep, the animal that represents life to the Navajos.
"The pageant really gets people's interest because they say, 'Oh my gosh, a pageant where you butcher sheep,'" said Billy Luther, a documentary film maker. "But I think people walk away learning the Navajo way of life and how much the Navajo people respect women."
Luther, whose mother was crowned Miss Navajo in 1966, offers a different take on what it means to be beautiful in his first feature-length documentary, "Miss Navajo," which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year is airing on PBS's Independent Lens.
Beauty is very much internal, Luther says. What Navajos perceive as beautiful might not be beautiful to others, he said.
"It's having the knowledge of your culture, it's having respect for your mothers and grandmothers, it's the language, fluency. As we say, that's harmony, that's what we strive for," said Luther, 32, who is Navajo, Laguna and Hopi.
Luther's documentary follows Crystal Frazier, a now-23-year-old Table Mesa resident, on her quest to become Miss Navajo during the 2005 pageant.
Held each year during the Navajo Nation Fair in Window Rock, Ariz., the pageant takes contestants of all shapes and sizes through skill and talent tests, and quizzes them on tribal government and Navajo beliefs.
For Frazier, a self-described introvert who raised chickens as a hobby, her insecurities centered on her ability to speak Navajo, an Athabascan language that long had been passed down orally.
A panel made up of former Miss Navajos greets the contestants in one part of the film with the intent of finding out whether the girls truly know their native language.
Frazier blanks on her turn. She wants the question repeated in English.
"I was just a deer in headlights," said Frazier, who was Miss Northern Navajo in 2004-05. "I remember being in the room and being in awe of seeing formal titleholders. You feel the pressure, and you see all the lights from the cameras, and you just freak. I remember I didn't even hear a word."
The queen's panel was added in 2005 at the insistence of Sunni Dooley — the 1982-83 Miss Navajo.
"They know they are supposed to talk Navajo, but as you saw in the pageant, a lot of them entered without knowing their language," said Dooley, a storyteller from Vanderwagon. "They probably had memorized their clan, where they came from, who their parents are and who their grandparents are."
What the judges wanted seemed simple enough: Give directions to your house.
The pageant began in 1952 as something of a popularity contest, with the winner crowned based on how much applause she got from the audience. And until the early 1960s, two Miss Navajos were named; a traditional one, and "one who looked like Jackie Kennedy," Dooley says.
Now only one queen is named, and the contest is open to any Navajo woman age 18 to 25 who is single and meets other contest requirements, such as having a high school diploma or GED and no children.
Faced with a dwindling number of contestants, Dooley and other former Miss Navajos created a nonprofit group in Arizona this year to address how to make the pageant last.
"I think what's scaring a lot of these contestants is the sheep-butchering part of it, also the (speaking) Navajo," she said.
Ultimately, Dooley said she would like to see one girl representing each of the Navajo Nation's 110 chapter houses in the pageant.
"I think whoever wins that pageant, they can say, 'Yeah, not only did I compete against 110 girls but I can butcher a sheep with one hand,'" Dooley jokes.
Although his original intent wasn't to make a film about Navajo women, Luther sees the final product as an inspiration for young girls, some of whom consider Miss Navajo the ideal woman.
Some people who have watched the film consider it an important one about women, an unexpected story of a contemporary Navajo family or a language-in-crisis film, he said.
Luther says simply: "This is a film about a beauty pageant contestant, and there's a winner and a loser."
"But sometimes, as in life, the winners aren't always the winners and he losers aren't always the losers.
Tim Giago - First Native American - Inducted Into South Dakota Newspaper Hall Of Fame
Lakota Country Times – Martin, SD
BROOKINGS - Four longtime newspapermen with outstanding careers in South Dakota journalism were inducted into the South Dakota Newspaper Hall of Fame on Nov. 10 in Brookings.
The four honorees are: Wayne Bertrand, former publisher and editor of weekly newspapers in Scotland, Tyndall and Springfield; Gordon Garnos, former editor of the Watertown Public Opinion; Tim Giago, founding publisher and editor of Indian Country Today; and Ralph Nachtigal, former publisher and editor of the Platte Enterprise.
The four newspapermen were honored at a Nov. 10th luncheon at the Performing Arts Center on the campus of South Dakota State University. Giago is the first Native American ever inducted into the South Dakota Newspaper Hall of Fame.
Preceding the luncheon, a ceremony unveiled a new display for the South Dakota Newspaper Hall of Fame which was held in the first-floor lobby of Anson and Ada May Yeager Hall on the SDSU campus.
Bronze plaques recognizing all 100 Newspaper Hall of Fame members are displayed in the lobby of the SDSU journalism building, which is named for former longtime Sioux Falls Argus Leader editor and Hall of Fame member Anson Yeager and his wife.
Giago, a member of the Oglala Lakota Tribe, founded the Lakota Times on the Pine Ridge Reservation in 1981. Giago and his newspaper withstood firebombs, office windows shot out and multiple death threats. The newspaper was renamed Indian Country Today in 1992. Giago served as editor and publisher for 18 years, building it into the largest independent Indian newspaper before selling it in 1998.
He started the Lakota Journal in 2000 and served as its editor and publisher until his retirement in 2004. He was a founder and first president of the Native American Journalists Association. He was awarded the prestigious Nieman Fellowship in Journalism to Harvard University in 1990. His weekly column, "Notes from Indian Country," appears in newspapers across the country and on prominent news Web sites.
The SDSU Department of Journalism and Mass Communications has been home to the Newspaper Hall of Fame ever since it was established in 1934.
TO SUBMIT an ARTICLE, OPINION PIECE, COMMENTS to the Native Unity Digest, e-mail bobbieo@digitaldune.net.
NATIVE UNITY - A place for Native American Peoples to solidify their tribes to make a positive impact on the cultural, social, economic and political fabric of American society and a place for non-Natives to better understand the ways of the American Indian.
NATIVE ISSUES BLOG
Professor Robert J. Miller
http://lawlib.lclark.edu/blog/native_america/
AIROS NATIVE NETWORK plays music, news and other great programs from Indian Country - www.airos.org
FOR NATIVE CELEBRITY NEWS - go to www.nativecelebs.com
Visit Vietnam Vet. LARRY MITCHELL at http://www.potawatomivet.com and click on his blog at the site.
NATIVE BIZ LEARNING CENTER - www.learn.nativebiz.com was developed for tribal education specialists serving tribal communities. Any tribal community can register at NO COST.
SUPPORTING NATIVE AMERICAN/FIRST PEOPLE - ARTISTS, FILM MAKERS, ENTERTAINERS, ETC. http://www.krystynmedia.blogspot.com.
By FELICIA FONSECA, Associated Press Writer
Mon Nov 19, 2007
When competitors head off for the weeklong Miss Navajo Nation pageant, they bring along their evening gowns, jewelry, high heels, public speaking skills — and butcher knives.
On the nation's largest Indian reservation, where tradition reigns, contestants are required to speak their native language, make fry bread and butcher a sheep, the animal that represents life to the Navajos.
"The pageant really gets people's interest because they say, 'Oh my gosh, a pageant where you butcher sheep,'" said Billy Luther, a documentary film maker. "But I think people walk away learning the Navajo way of life and how much the Navajo people respect women."
Luther, whose mother was crowned Miss Navajo in 1966, offers a different take on what it means to be beautiful in his first feature-length documentary, "Miss Navajo," which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival earlier this year is airing on PBS's Independent Lens.
Beauty is very much internal, Luther says. What Navajos perceive as beautiful might not be beautiful to others, he said.
"It's having the knowledge of your culture, it's having respect for your mothers and grandmothers, it's the language, fluency. As we say, that's harmony, that's what we strive for," said Luther, 32, who is Navajo, Laguna and Hopi.
Luther's documentary follows Crystal Frazier, a now-23-year-old Table Mesa resident, on her quest to become Miss Navajo during the 2005 pageant.
Held each year during the Navajo Nation Fair in Window Rock, Ariz., the pageant takes contestants of all shapes and sizes through skill and talent tests, and quizzes them on tribal government and Navajo beliefs.
For Frazier, a self-described introvert who raised chickens as a hobby, her insecurities centered on her ability to speak Navajo, an Athabascan language that long had been passed down orally.
A panel made up of former Miss Navajos greets the contestants in one part of the film with the intent of finding out whether the girls truly know their native language.
Frazier blanks on her turn. She wants the question repeated in English.
"I was just a deer in headlights," said Frazier, who was Miss Northern Navajo in 2004-05. "I remember being in the room and being in awe of seeing formal titleholders. You feel the pressure, and you see all the lights from the cameras, and you just freak. I remember I didn't even hear a word."
The queen's panel was added in 2005 at the insistence of Sunni Dooley — the 1982-83 Miss Navajo.
"They know they are supposed to talk Navajo, but as you saw in the pageant, a lot of them entered without knowing their language," said Dooley, a storyteller from Vanderwagon. "They probably had memorized their clan, where they came from, who their parents are and who their grandparents are."
What the judges wanted seemed simple enough: Give directions to your house.
The pageant began in 1952 as something of a popularity contest, with the winner crowned based on how much applause she got from the audience. And until the early 1960s, two Miss Navajos were named; a traditional one, and "one who looked like Jackie Kennedy," Dooley says.
Now only one queen is named, and the contest is open to any Navajo woman age 18 to 25 who is single and meets other contest requirements, such as having a high school diploma or GED and no children.
Faced with a dwindling number of contestants, Dooley and other former Miss Navajos created a nonprofit group in Arizona this year to address how to make the pageant last.
"I think what's scaring a lot of these contestants is the sheep-butchering part of it, also the (speaking) Navajo," she said.
Ultimately, Dooley said she would like to see one girl representing each of the Navajo Nation's 110 chapter houses in the pageant.
"I think whoever wins that pageant, they can say, 'Yeah, not only did I compete against 110 girls but I can butcher a sheep with one hand,'" Dooley jokes.
Although his original intent wasn't to make a film about Navajo women, Luther sees the final product as an inspiration for young girls, some of whom consider Miss Navajo the ideal woman.
Some people who have watched the film consider it an important one about women, an unexpected story of a contemporary Navajo family or a language-in-crisis film, he said.
Luther says simply: "This is a film about a beauty pageant contestant, and there's a winner and a loser."
"But sometimes, as in life, the winners aren't always the winners and he losers aren't always the losers.
Tim Giago - First Native American - Inducted Into South Dakota Newspaper Hall Of Fame
Lakota Country Times – Martin, SD
BROOKINGS - Four longtime newspapermen with outstanding careers in South Dakota journalism were inducted into the South Dakota Newspaper Hall of Fame on Nov. 10 in Brookings.
The four honorees are: Wayne Bertrand, former publisher and editor of weekly newspapers in Scotland, Tyndall and Springfield; Gordon Garnos, former editor of the Watertown Public Opinion; Tim Giago, founding publisher and editor of Indian Country Today; and Ralph Nachtigal, former publisher and editor of the Platte Enterprise.
The four newspapermen were honored at a Nov. 10th luncheon at the Performing Arts Center on the campus of South Dakota State University. Giago is the first Native American ever inducted into the South Dakota Newspaper Hall of Fame.
Preceding the luncheon, a ceremony unveiled a new display for the South Dakota Newspaper Hall of Fame which was held in the first-floor lobby of Anson and Ada May Yeager Hall on the SDSU campus.
Bronze plaques recognizing all 100 Newspaper Hall of Fame members are displayed in the lobby of the SDSU journalism building, which is named for former longtime Sioux Falls Argus Leader editor and Hall of Fame member Anson Yeager and his wife.
Giago, a member of the Oglala Lakota Tribe, founded the Lakota Times on the Pine Ridge Reservation in 1981. Giago and his newspaper withstood firebombs, office windows shot out and multiple death threats. The newspaper was renamed Indian Country Today in 1992. Giago served as editor and publisher for 18 years, building it into the largest independent Indian newspaper before selling it in 1998.
He started the Lakota Journal in 2000 and served as its editor and publisher until his retirement in 2004. He was a founder and first president of the Native American Journalists Association. He was awarded the prestigious Nieman Fellowship in Journalism to Harvard University in 1990. His weekly column, "Notes from Indian Country," appears in newspapers across the country and on prominent news Web sites.
The SDSU Department of Journalism and Mass Communications has been home to the Newspaper Hall of Fame ever since it was established in 1934.
TO SUBMIT an ARTICLE, OPINION PIECE, COMMENTS to the Native Unity Digest, e-mail bobbieo@digitaldune.net.
NATIVE UNITY - A place for Native American Peoples to solidify their tribes to make a positive impact on the cultural, social, economic and political fabric of American society and a place for non-Natives to better understand the ways of the American Indian.
NATIVE ISSUES BLOG
Professor Robert J. Miller
http://lawlib.lclark.edu/blog/native_america/
AIROS NATIVE NETWORK plays music, news and other great programs from Indian Country - www.airos.org
FOR NATIVE CELEBRITY NEWS - go to www.nativecelebs.com
Visit Vietnam Vet. LARRY MITCHELL at http://www.potawatomivet.com and click on his blog at the site.
NATIVE BIZ LEARNING CENTER - www.learn.nativebiz.com was developed for tribal education specialists serving tribal communities. Any tribal community can register at NO COST.
SUPPORTING NATIVE AMERICAN/FIRST PEOPLE - ARTISTS, FILM MAKERS, ENTERTAINERS, ETC. http://www.krystynmedia.blogspot.com.
posted by BobbieoAZ @ 9:14 PM
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