Understanding Indigenous Gender Relations and Violence: Becoming Gender AWAke

ISBN-13: 9783031185823 / Angielski / Twarda / 2023 / 378 str.

Catherine E. McKinley

Opis

This book focuses on the inequities that are persistently and disproportionately severe for Indigenous peoples. Gender and racial based inequities span from the home life to Indigenous women’s wellness—including physical, mental, and social health. The conundrum of how and why Indigenous women—many of whom historically held respected and even held sacred status in many matrilineal and female-centered communities—now experience the highest rates of gendered based violence is focal to this work. Unlike Western European and colonial contexts, Indigenous societies tended to be organized in fundamentally distinct ways that were woman-centered and where gender roles and values were reportedly more egalitarian, fluid, flexible, inclusive, complementary, and harmonious. Understanding how Indigenous gender relations were targeted as a tool of patriarchal settler colonization and how this relates to women more broadly can be a key to unlocking gender liberation—a catalyst for readers to become ‘gender AWAke.’ Living gender AWAke encompasses living in alignment with agility (AWA) with clear awareness of how gender and other sociostructural factors affect daily life, as well as how to navigate such factors. To live in alignment, is to live from ones’ center and in accordance with one’s authentic self, with agility, by nimbly responding to life’s constantly shifting situations. This empirically grounded work extends and deepens the Indigenist framework of historical oppression, resilience, and transcendence (FHORT) by delving deep into the resilience, transcendence, and wellness components of FHORT while centering gender. Understanding the changing gender roles for Indigenous peoples over time fosters decolonization more broadly by enabling greater understanding of how sexism and misogyny hurt people across personal and political spheres. This understanding can foster the process of becoming gender AWAke by identifying and dismantling of sexism and by becoming decolonized from prescriptive gender roles that inhibit living in alignment with one’s true or authentic self. Readers will gain:

• a research-based approach linking historical oppression, gender-based inequities, and violence against Indigenous women
• understanding of how patriarchal colonialism undermines all genders a tool to dismantle sexism more broadly
• pathways to become Gender AWAke through the understanding of Indigenous women's resilience and transcendence

Spis treści

 

Part 1: Introducing the Problem: Sexism and its Effects

1.       The Approach: The Framework of Historical Oppression Resilience, and Transcendence (FHORT) (10 Pages)

I introduce the approach for this work,^[i] which is drawn from over a decade of qualitative research,^[ii] quantitative research,^[iii] and mixed methods research, along with clinical trials focused on developing and testing interventions to enhancing resilience and wellness while preventing substance abuse and violence.^[iv] The FHORT^[v] was developed to understand, explain, and predict intimate partner violence (IPV) against Indigenous women, and has since been extended to understand wellness, health, mental health, and other social issues; it incorporates the effect and consequences of historical oppression on groups of people while centering and acknowledge simultaneous resilience and transcendence.^[vi] As an Indigenous-centered framework, the FHORT pays particular attention to how colonization has rearranged and undermined what were often women-centered Indigenous societies, constraining the overall functioning and safety of women. Despite the FHORT being developed with Indigenous peoples, all people –Indigenous or not – live on colonized lands and experience its postcolonial effects, including rampant sexism. ^[vii]

 

2.       Patriarchy and its Handmaid, Sexism (30 pages)

At the basis of this work toward being liberated from oppression is the life vocation of women to become reclaim their wholeness and realize their more authentic selves and become more fully human. ^[viii] As such, the opposite historical reality of dehumanization of women has also been present for centuries. The patriarchal system creates a context where devaluing women is promoted, rewarded, and perpetuated. This system enables inequality as the basis of systems that privilege to men. Women are taught to accept, become resigned, normalize being socialized into domesticity, docility, and silence, lest they be retaliated against if they speak out. Having been devalued across the life course and through insidious messages throughout the media institutions, and their relationships, they may distrust, depreciate, and feel insecure about their own abilities. When anyone is in a role of dehumanizing others, it stains not only those who have been oppressed but those who are in the role of oppressors as well. It contorts and distorts the life path of everyone’s ultimate path to becoming more fully human.

 

3.       An Expansive Counternarrative to Dominant Gender Norms: Indigenous Gender (30 pages)

Feminism would not be necessary in a society characterized by gender equity. Indigenous societies were matrilineal, with lines of descent following along the female’s line. Throughout colonization, the centrality and authority experienced by Indigenous women has been impaired by clashing beliefs and practices. Despite experiencing historical oppression, I provide specific examples about how these women have continuously resisted colonial subjugation and have demonstrated resilience in response to adversity. Examining the gendered worldviews of Indigenous peoples prior to colonization and how they have changed as a result of colonization gleans insights, not only on more expansive, transcendent views of gender, but also about the effect of the imposition of patriarchal gender arrangements. With many Indigenous societies historically being female-centered and gender-fluid, the gender relations of Indigenous societies offer alternative and transcendent views of gender and sex for all.

 

Part 2: What Happened: How the Historical Oppression Drives Gender-based Inequities and Violence and Strategies Toward Emancipation

4.       Applying the FHORT to Gender Based Violence (5 pages)

In this chapter, I introduce and describe the FHORT and apply it to help explain the disproportionate rates of violence experienced by Indigenous people. The FHORT introduces the concept of historical oppression, which expands upon historical trauma to include both historic and contemporary forms of oppression. Using a relational worldview and strengths-based perspective, the FHORT brings together critical theory and resilience, offering an eco-systemic perspective that enables examination of risk and protective factors across individual, couple, familial, community, cultural, and societal levels. Applying the FHORT to violence against Indigenous women helps explain interconnections and interactions between risk and protective factors across ecological levels. I highlight, synthesize, and examine interconnections across a decade of research.

5.       Divides, Disruptions, and Gendered Rearrangements: How Historical Oppression Impairs Communities and Contributes to Violence (12 pages)

In this chapter, I examine systemic and community factors that have created a context of historical oppression giving rise to IPV, including: (a) experiences of oppression, including sharecropping, boarding schools, and discrimination; (b) historical and contemporary losses, including language, traditions, and lives; (c) cultural disruption (through technology/media and prescriptive policies); (d) patriarchal colonization, with exclusive patriarchal religious beliefs undermining Indigenous spirituality; (e) the imposition and internalization of IPV as a community norm; (f) community divides that impaired communities’ ability to support women who experienced IPV; and, (f) community inequity leading to a sense of hopelessness and lack of help-seeking (g) manifestations of oppression in the forms of mistrust and keeping things “hush-hush”; and (i) dehumanizing beliefs and values leading to social ills such as IPV. These findings demonstrate the ways in which colonial tactics of historical oppression continue to pose as risk factors for IPV in Indigenous communities.

6.       Contemporary Forms of Historical Oppression that Perpetuate Violence (7 pages)

Historical oppression continues through underfunded and ineffectual service systems. This chapter focus on Indigenous women’s experiences seeking help from the formal service system in their tribal community after experiencing violence with themes of: (a) living in highly related communities impacted help-seeking experiences; (b) experiencing multiple victimizations, including social services not acting in the best interest of the child, distrust or ambivalence toward mental/behavioral health services, and confidentiality concerns; (c) law enforcement experiences characterized by delayed responses and perpetrators escaping with impunity; (d) the need for an improved criminal justice system due to concerns about accountability and consistency; (e) the need for training within the service system to increase trust and effectiveness.

7.       What About Sexual violence? Experiences and Consequences of Gendered Sexual Violence experiences (7 pages)

Indigenous women in the United States experience disproportionate rates of sexual violence and are profoundly impacted by this violence across structural, relational, psychological, and spiritual dimensions. I synthesize mixed-methods research to learn about how Indigenous peoples describe sexual violence. Sexual violence experiences were reported solely from women and a lack of accountability for perpetrators of sexual violence was prominent. Experiencing sexual violence was associated with meaningful differences across many dimensions of wellness: (a) structural: higher historical oppression, historical loss, oppression, and discrimination; (b) relational: higher adverse childhood experiences and stressful life events and lower family resilience and social support; (c) spiritual: lower spiritual-well-being and life satisfaction; and (d) psychological/behavioral: higher levels of alcohol use, post-traumatic stress disorder, and lower levels of psychological resilience.

8.       How Historical oppression Undermines Families and Drives Risk for Violence (5 pages)

In this chapter, I investigate risk factors that create vulnerability to and impair recovery from violence for Indigenous women. Findings reveal the following identified risk factors that are connected to historical oppression: (a) family division that occurs when family members form adversarial, unsupportive, and destructive relationships with each other that tended to perpetuate dysfunction and potentially violence; (b) intergenerational patterns of parental impairments, including alcohol abuse and disrupted parent-child bonds, which was also linked with parents’ absence due to death or abdicating responsibilities. These concepts are connected to a context of historical oppression, which perpetuates social problems over time.

9.       Interlocking Experiences of Violence Across Women’s Life (7 pages)

I examine the impacts of historical oppression on the lives of Indigenous women by exploring risk factors associated with IPV victimization. The following themes illuminate women’s experience of violence across the life course: (a) overlapping and cumulative victimization experiences –childhood maltreatment was connected to involvement in unhealthy relationships during adolescence; (b) pregnancy exacerbated relationship stress and increased IPV risk; (c) partners’ jealousy fueled by insecurity was linked to IPV perpetration; (d) patriarchal gender roles disadvantaging women while men were privileged by society; (e) substance abuse connected to abdicating family responsibilities and perpetrating IPV. I recommend community-based efforts to return to Indigenous teachings that award respect and status to Indigenous women.

10.   Understanding Indigenous Women’s Experiences and Barriers to Liberation from Violence (10 pages)

Through this chapter, I examine connections between historical oppression and the epidemic rates of IPV experienced by Indigenous women across two studies. In the first study, themes illuminate understanding of Indigenous women’s experiences of IPV: (a) an intergenerational cycle of normalized violence throughout the life course; (b) dehumanizing tactics used against women, including partners being dominating, manipulative and threatening, using children as tools of manipulation, exhibiting controlling behaviors, and perpetrating emotional and physical violence; (c) women breaking free from violent relationships after crossing a threshold that varied among participants (for example, personal boundaries being crossed, realizing life was in danger, children witnessing violence). In the 2^nd study, I uncover barriers from emancipation from relationships, including, controlling relationships, losing sense of priorities, using children, socioeconomic barriers, family pressures, and restricting relationships. These factors run parallel to the historical oppression tactics common in patriarchal colonialism.

11.   How Patriarchal Gender Roles, Early Childbearing and Early Marriage Contribute to IPV (6 pages)

This chapter more deeply explores the relationships of patriarchal gender roles, early childbearing, and early marriage pose risks for violence and for to women’s physical and psychological health and socioeconomic and educational status. I examined Indigenous women’s experiences with early childbearing and early marriage and found themes including early childbearing as a precursor to marriage, unequal and overburdened marriages, early childbearing, early marriage & IPV, and lastly, the continued harmful effects of multiple abusive relationships. These experiences should be considered in the context of patriarchal historical oppression that systematically dehumanizes and oppresses Indigenous women, who were once treated with respect and esteem. I call for decolonization and revisualization of the roles of women and girls to help address the negative outcomes that are associated with early childbearing and early marriage.

12.   Patriarchal Gender Roles: Interconnections with Violence, Historical Oppression, and Resilience (6 pages)

Current research shows that gender role attitudes influence a number of health-related outcomes, including IPV. However, little research exists about gender role attitudes of Indigenous peoples. Drawing from mixed methodology research, I explore U.S. Indigenous peoples’ gender role attitudes and quantitatively examine how key social determinants of health, including IPV perpetration, historical oppression, and resilience, relate to gender role attitudes. Findings revealed male sex and IPV victimization were associated with higher patriarchal gender role attitudes, while historical oppression and resilience were associated with lower patriarchal gender role attitudes. Resilience was also associated with lower “victim blaming.” This research highlights how key aspects of the FHORT might explain Indigenous peoples’ patriarchal gender role attitudes, suggesting the need to redress historical oppression and patriarchal roles through decolonization.

13.   Gender Inequities in Home Life: Moms “Mostly Pulling the Weight” (6 pages)

In this chapter, I examine how women are experiencing contemporary historical oppression through being overburdened with “invisible” household labor such as childcare, housework, and financial responsibility. Shouldering this additional “invisible” load contributes to mothers’ overload, depression, distress, and health impairments. I analyzed interviews with participants from two southeastern tribes and found the following themes: (1) Moms “Mostly Pulling the Weight”; (2) Women and Childcare: “We do it all” and Men “If They're There, They're There”; (3) Financial Imbalances; and (4) Women’s Resilience and Resistance. I call for decolonization to reestablish gender egalitarianism as a means of addressing this oppression.

14.   Gendered Differences in Experiences of Violence and Violence Perpetration (5 pages)

In this chapter, drawing from mixed methods research, I share a snapshot of IPV victimization and perpetration experiences. Connections with adverse childhood experience (ACE), infidelity, and AOD abuse were emergent themes related to IPV victimization. Women experienced more severe violence, and PTSD and IPV victimization were higher among women. Oppression, ACE, AOD abuse, PTSD, and female gender were risk factors for victimization, whereas younger age, anxiety, and alcohol use were risk factors for perpetration. In order to address disproportionately high rates of IPV that affect Indigenous communities, I recommend family-focused and culturally grounded interventions that focus on AOD abuse, emotional regulation, and violence prevention.

15.   Consequences of Violence on Women, Children, and Families (6 pages)

I examine the impacts of IPV on women, children, and families, which offers a holistic perspective on the consequences of IPV. Consequences of IPV on women included: physical injuries and hospitalizations, psychological consequences (including PTSD, depression, and suicidal symptoms), and negative impacts on women’s relationships with others. Children often witnessed IPV which were typically traumatic early memories that resulted in mental health consequences, including major mental illness, identifying with the perpetrator, and having unmet needs for love and nurturance. Families also suffered IPV consequences, often intergenerationally, which resulted in normalizing violence and losing family members.

16.   Tipping the Balance: Violence Across the Life Course and Socioeconomic Strain Posing Risks While Family and Social Support Offsetting Anxiety and Depression (6 pages)

I examine interconnections with mental health (anxiety and depression) and multi-level risks from violence, socioeconomic strain, and adverse child experiences. I focused on promotive factors from family resilience and social support to offset risk. I found that clinically significant levels of depression and anxiety were elevated in this sample of participants from two tribes. The risk factors of poverty (lower income) and proximal oppression (IPV and adverse childhood experiences) were associated with higher symptoms of depression and anxiety. I found that protective factors were also statistically significant predictors of mental health, with family resilience associated with decreased anxiety and depression, and social support associated with decreased anxiety. These findings support the need to explore social and contextual determinants of mental health.

17.   Understanding Depression as an Embodiment of Historical Oppression and Ways to Transcend (6 pages)

Depression is an embodiment of historical oppression and common associate of violence. I assessed the relationships between risk and protective factors associated with historical oppression (and its proximal stressors) and depression. I found that historical oppression and proximal stressors were positively associated with depressive symptoms (risk factors), while higher income, life satisfaction, and family resilience were negatively associated with depressive symptoms (protective factors). Findings attest to the ways of transcending negative influence of historical oppression and its continued, contemporary stressors on Indigenous peoples’ mental health.

18.   Land, Loss, and Violence: Contemporary Manifestations of Historical Oppression (6 pages)

Land and sense of place is central, not only to the Identities of Indigenous peoples, but it is inseparable from patriarchal colonialism that treats land and women as possessions. Drawing from a mixed methodology, I examine multi-level risk and protective factors associated with hurricane experiences within southeastern tribes, specifically examining interconnections with IPV, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), historical losses, adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), discrimination, and family and social support. Qualitative findings revealed: (a) lack of federal recognition was a barrier to recovery for hurricane-impacted communities; (b) rapidly changing landscape due to hurricanes led to rapidly changing lives and communities, including shifting communities due to relocation; (c) loss of personal effects and family members due to storms. Quantitative findings demonstrate historical losses related to disaster, ACEs, discrimination, and IPV were risk factors for PTSD symptoms, while social and family support were protective factors for PTSD symptoms.

19.   Family and Culture as Structures for Resilience, Resistance, and Transcendence from Violence(7 pages)

Depending on the family’s response to IPV, families can be protective or risk factors for Indigenous women’s wellness and recovery from IPV. In this chapter, I explored family and cultural-level protective factors for Indigenous women who experienced IPV, and found that the following identified factors are the bedrock of resilience for these women: (a) family support through IPV with family members acting as role models and various family members providing support; (b) family-affirming non-violent values to reduce the acceptability of violence; (c) tight-knit extended family unity and connectedness serving as support networks beyond the immediate family system; (d) elders instilling Indigenous principles through storytelling that reflected non-violent values; and, (e) enculturation fostering non-violence through protective traditions and teachings.

20.   Bending but Not Breaking: Resilience of Women Survivors of Violence (5 pages)

Through this chapter, I explore Indigenous women’s resilience narratives to identify protective factors related to IPV. Women reported to us the following protective factors that buffered or helped them recover from IPV and promoted strength and resilience: (a) educational orientation, with higher education instrumental to gaining the social and economic mobility needed to leave abusive relationships; (b) affirming talents and abilities which boosted self-esteem; (c) constructive coping by helping others and expressing emotions, helping them to heal and move past IPV; (d) faith as an important source of support; (e) optimism and resilient attitudes that helped women make meaning of adversity; (f) self-reliance and inner strength that sustained women through hard times.

21.   What to Do Now? Listening and Learning from Survivors and Professionals Affected by Violence (7 pages)

This chapter identifies solutions to prevent and ameliorate IPV within Indigenous communities. Indigenous women and professionals working in this area recommended a multi-faceted, holistic approach that includes: (a) increasing community engagement and awareness through outreach and educational initiatives; (b) bolstering the service system to provide more effective IPV services; (c) enhancing professional competency and training to ensure proper response to IPV; (d) child-focused prevention and education efforts to promote non-violent norms; and, (e) family-focused interventions that emphasize the ways IPV impacts the family system and offer prosocial family activities.

Part 3: It’s All Related: Violence, Health Equity, and Wellness

22.   Losing Lives and Embodied Oppression in Depression: Understanding Protections and Risks (6 pages)

Drawing from mixed-method research, I explore Indigenous women’s experiences of losing loved ones, and the risk and protective factors associated with the frequent and early loss of lives among Indigenous people. Qualitative findings revealed multiple causes of death including behavioral (suicide and violent deaths, alcohol and other drugs, and motor vehicle accidents) and physical causes (cardiovascular disease, diabetes and associated problems), and showed that losing a loved one often resulted in depressive symptoms and disrupted women’s higher educational pursuits. Quantitative findings demonstrate that the known risk factors of recent loss of a loved one, historical loss, PTSD, and lower income were associated with higher depressive symptoms, while the protective factors of spiritual well-being and family resilience were associated with lower depressive symptoms.

23.   Understanding Gender and Connections between Mental, Physical, Social, and Community, Cultural Health (5 pages)

I synthesize research on cardiovascular health among U.S. Indigenous peoples to identify multi-systemic risk and protective factors. Analysis revealed depression, anxiety, PTSD/historical trauma/stress, and AOD abuse as mental/psychological risk factors, exposure to violence and trauma, discrimination, acculturation, and neighborhood poverty as sociocultural risk factors, and Western diets, obesity, smoking, diabetes, hypertension, high cholesterol, age, race, and poor self-rated health as physical/behavioral risk factors. A sex-specific analysis across these dimensions revealed risks for CVD are elevated for females. Protective factors across these dimensions included: personal mastery, physical activity/exercise, enculturation (level of identification with and involvement in Native culture), traditional diet, religion/spirituality, individual resilience, social support, and health-promoting social environments.

24.   Understanding Interconnections and Factors Driving Gendered Mental Health Inequities (6 page)

In this review, I examine research on risk and protective factors related to mental health disparities among Indigenous peoples. Analysis revealed that historical oppression increases risk for a range of mental health problems. Additionally, the following risk factors were common: high-risk environments, child maltreatment, IPV (especially for women), trauma (PTSD risk); adverse childhood events, older age, lower education (depression risk); alcohol abuse, younger age, community fragmentation (suicide risk); historical loss, discrimination, younger age (substance use disorder (SUD) risk). SUD is also a risk factor for other psychiatric disorders. Protective factors included: social support, self-efficacy, higher income, self-esteem, hope, close-knit families and communities, enculturation, education, and community involvement.

25.   Cultural, Community, Familial, and Individual factors related to Wellness among Youth (5 pages)

I analyzed existing research across ecological levels related to the wellness of Indigenous youth. Historical oppression (encompassing perceived discrimination) was a societal risk factor, which represented 7% of factors identified; cultural factors represented 16% and included ethnic identity, spirituality, and connectedness; 23% of factors were at the community level, which included community environment, school environment, peer influence, and social support; family-level factors made up 41% and included family support, family income, parental mental health, and family trauma and stressful life events; and individual factors represented 13% and included self-esteem, subjective wellness, academic orientation, and locus of control.

Part 4: Past, Present and Future Pathways to Resilience, Resistance, & Transcendence

26.   Family Resilience: Resisting and Offsetting Historical Oppression While Transcending (7 pages)

I introduce background on what enables families and their members to survive, recover, and thrive despite experiences of historical oppression and adversity? As such, and through the contributions of over 1,000 participants and colleagues led to the development and validation of the Family Resilience Inventory (FRI), which identifies factors that help families overcome hard times (protective factors) and what things promoted their strengths regardless of life circumstances (promotive factors). Developed with Indigenous peoples, I summarize family protective and promotive factors. Family resilience not only strengthens families, but higher resilience is also associated with individuals’ lower mental and behavioral health problems, including depression, anxiety, and alcohol abuse. Finally, the parenting practices experienced during one’s upbringing tended to be passed down to children. Thus, how you parent and participate in your families today, affects not only your children and family, but likely, the future generations of your families.

27.   Decolonizing Family Connectedness Enhancing Family Resilience (5 pages)

This chapter more deeply explores the important protective role of family connectedness among Indigenous populations. Participants’ perceived family connectedness as an important component of family resilience characterized by: (a) families frequently “taking care” of each other by sharing responsibilities in the household, helping care for children, and being there for one another; (b) frequent interactions between family members providing a web of support; (c) “close-knit” and strong family ties with family members (notably siblings and involved fathers) providing social engagement and support; (d) extended family closeness rooted in broad definitions of family beyond the nuclear unit.

28.   “Your Kids Come First”: Plugged in and Protective Parenting Practices Promoting Resilience (5 pages)

Indigenous families demonstrate resilience by parenting children in some of the most difficult situations in U.S. society. In this qualitative research, I explore parenting philosophies and practices used to protect children from the risks of an oppressive context. Themes included: (a) “Your Kids Come First”: Prioritizing Children’s Needs; (b) “They Should Enjoy their Childhood”: Sheltering Children from Family Stressors; (c) “I Have to Watch Them Closely”: Closely Monitoring Children; and (d) “There’s No Drinking at My House”: Preventing Children’s Exposure to Substance Abuse. Findings indicate that parents use child-centric mindsets and positive parenting practices to protect their children from the harmful environment created through historical oppression.

29.   “Trust Us Enough to Come to Us”: Communication as a Building Block of Family Resilience (5 pages)

General research suggests that family communication fosters family resilience, but little research exists on communication in Indigenous families. In this mixed methods research, I examine Indigenous participants experiences of family communication and the protective factors for family resilience. Qualitative findings revealed themes related to family communication as an element of family resilience, including (a) Discussing Problems as a Family with the subtheme of honesty; (b) Keeping Adult Matters Separate; and (c) Open Communication Parent-Child Communication. Quantitative findings showed that higher community and social support, relationship quality, and life satisfaction were associated with greater family resilience. As such, I recommend clinical programs that provide tools to foster healthy communication as an avenue to promote wellness.

30.   “He Had Rules and He Had Guidelines”: Establishing Family Accountability and Structure (6 pages)

Existing research suggests that effective disciplinary practices can act as a protective factor against social and behavioral health disparities. In this chapter, I explore Indigenous peoples reported experiences of disciplinary practices. The following themes emerged related to experiences disciplining children: (a) Establishing Structure and Boundaries; (b) Taking Away Privileges and Rewarding Good Behavior; and (c) Teaching Right from Wrong. Findings indicate that despite experiencing historical oppression, Indigenous peoples report decolonizing disciplinary and parenting practices that contribute to family resilience and were present prior to colonialization. Community and family support contribute to positive parenting practices, which indicates the importance of promoting clinical treatments that are holistic and inclusive of extended family.

31.   Love: A Decolonizing Act of Rebellion to Promote Family Resilience and Reduce Alcohol Use (6 pages)

I examine family and community risk and protective factors associated with alcohol abuse within two tribes and mixed methods research. Qualitative findings revealed love as an important component of family resilience, expressed through verbal affection, physical affection, and frequent rituals of love and affection within families. Participants also noted generational changes in expressions of love, with younger generations being more expressive, which was confirmed in quantitative findings showing that family resilience in one’s upbringing was lower than in one’s current family. Quantitative findings also show that family resilience protects against the risk factor of alcohol abuse, with higher family resilience in both family of upbringing and current family associated with decreased alcohol abuse symptoms, and indications that family resilience in current family mediates the impact of family resilience during upbringing on alcohol abuse.

32.   “They Called [Great Grandmother] the Famous Storyteller Around Here”: Elders Transcending Historical Oppression through Language, Story, and Culture (7 pages)

In this chapter, I explore the protective/promotive roles that tribal language and the oral tradition, elders (often grandmothers), and family play in Indigenous people’s wellness and resilience within a context of historical oppression and its related risk factors. Qualitative findings revealed several culturally-relevant protective themes: (a) a strong grounding in tribal language(s), and concerns about loss of language and culture; and (b) elders acting as conduits for language and cultural transmission through storytelling and the oral tradition. These family-level protective factors demonstrate how Indigenous peoples remain rooted in their languages and cultures despite experiencing various forms of historical oppression.

33.   “She always knows what to do”: Mothers Maintaining Central Roles in Family (5 pages)

This chapter centers the societal risk factor of historical oppression in two tribes by exploring expectations and roles for mothers, which were impacted by the imposition of patriarchy during colonization. I found that mothers play a variety of roles, including caretakers of the family responsible for physical and mental household labor, and center of the family and role models acting as the glue that held families together. Women were expected to prioritize family over economic and educational aspirations, often sacrificing their own pursuits in order to care for children. Decolonizing norms for mothers were also evidenced through some women negotiating more flexible and balanced roles despite restrictive, patriarchal norm.

34.   Women at the “Center of Family Life” and Food Sovereignty Promoting Harmony, Transcendence, and Wellness (8 pages)

In this research, I use the FHORT to understand how food sovereignty relates to women, wellness (including diet, exercise, and psychospiritual aspects), and sustainable foodways. Drawing from interviews from Southeastern rural and Northwestern urban tribal setting, themes indicate that food sovereignty was often organized through female-centered households and promotes balance, which has been undermined by historical oppression. Food sovereignty promoted a healthy diet and lifestyle, enhanced participants’ spirituality and mental wellness, and offered a form of stress relief. Indigenous food sovereignty also promotes key Indigenous values such as reciprocity, generosity, balance, and sustainability.         

35.   “We Never Go Hungry There Cause my Mom Uses the Resource of the Land”: Returning to Sacred Roots of Subsistence to Promote Wellness and Resilience (7 pages)

I explore how protective/promotive factors associated with subsistence living relate to well-being and resilience. Traditional, subsistence living style promotes well-being by: (a) fostering fond memories and family bonding through “living off the land” which instilled a sense of pride in being self-sufficient; (b) enabling experiential, intergenerational teaching and learning by passing down subsistence traditions; and (c) promoting resourcefulness (imbuing Native communities with unique knowledge, skills, work ethic) and offsetting economic marginalization (allowing them to be self-employed and provide for their families even in the context of historical oppression).

36.   “We’ve Kind of Always Come Together”: Humanizing, Complementary, Fluid, Balanced, and Transcendent Gender Roles to Move Forward (28 pages)

Before colonization, Indigenous gender relations were characterized as egalitarian and complementary, but little research has explored gender relations in Indigenous communities today. In this chapter, I synthesize themes from interviews, observations, and focus groups with participants from two U.S. tribes. Gender relations often reflected egalitarian and cooperative but gendered norms, and participants shared how tribal members are transcending patriarchal colonialism. Such gender norms may protect families from risks associated with historical oppression and promote family resilience. I outline pathways forward for transcendent gender for all.

[i] See catmckinley.com for an overview and information of research.

[ii] Qualitative research focuses on individual, subjective experiences, and personal meaning described by people by systematically analyzing narrative text. The type of research I have primarily focused on has been ethnographic, focusing on the culture and context of specific topics, and phenomenology, an existential approach that focuses on the meaning and universal aspects of life experiences.

[iii] Quantitative research focuses on numbers, patterns, and averages, to make predictions, test hypotheses, and when appropriate, generalize results to wider populations.

[iv] The FHORT has been applied to Indigenous peoples and informs the Weaving Healthy Families (WHF) intervention program for substance abuse and violence prevention that promotes wellness and resilience in families. This holistic and wellness program include communication, resilience, emotional regulation, goal setting, boundaries, substance abuse, conflict resolution, balance, among others Thus, this work is informed by my background in work around substance abuse, violence, resilience, and wellness, and I will connect pieces from this work as relevant.

McKinley, C. E. & Theall, K. P. (2021). Weaving Healthy Families Program: Promoting Resilience While Reducing Violence and Substance Use. Research on Social Work Practice. (Published online March 18, 2021) https://doi.org/10.1177/1049731521998441

[v] Burnette. C. E. & Figley, C. R. (2017). Historical oppression, resilience, and transcendence: Can a holistic framework help explain violence experienced by Indigenous peoples? Social Work 62(1), 37-44. 10.1093/sw/sww065

[vi] The framework of Historical Oppression, Resilience, and Transcendence (FHORT)^[vi] was built upon a decade of empirical research on resilience and transcendence using a holistic, wellness perspective that looks across societal, community, familial, relational, and individual levels. The FHORT was informed by critical and existential thinkers, in particular the work of Paulo Freire^[vi] with Indigenous or Native American people in mind.

[vii] Although the FHORT was developed with Indigenous peoples in mind, we can all learn from and benefit from the relational and interconnected holistic perspectives of wellness and health. Many pre-colonial cultures celebrated this more relational view of the person in her environment.

[viii] Freire, P. (2008) Pedagogy of the Oppressed (30th Anniversary Edition), New York, Continuum.

O autorze

Dr. McKinley’s funded research focuses on centering sex and gender differences while promoting health equity for Indigenous peoples (American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiians). As a lead editor on a special issue and associated book entitled, “Indigenous Health Equity and Wellness,” she is a leader conducting community engaged and culturally grounded health equity research. After a decade of work on violence against Indigenous women and families and associated disparities, her clinical trial research focuses on developing and testing a culturally relevant and family centered intervention (the Weaving Healthy Families, or Chukka Achaffi’ Natana Program). This program promotes health and wellness while preventing the underlying causes of premature mortality and morbidity among Indigenous peoples, namely alcohol and other drug use and violence. Along with examining sex differences related to the effect and uptake of this intervention that incorporates mhealth, sex differences related to social determinants of health related to cardiovascular, cancer, diabetes, and other chronic health problems are focal to this work. She led the development of the Indigenous-based and ecological “Framework of Historical Oppression, Resilience, and Transcendence (FHORT)”, which identifies, and culturally relevant risk and protective factors related to wellness across community, family, and individual levels from a relational perspective. This framework was chosen for inclusion in the edited book, Grand Challenges for Society: Evidence-Based Social Work Practice, and her work has also been highlighted as Best Paper by the Journal of Ethnic and Cultural Diversity in Social Work in 2018, "Indigenous Women and Professionals’ Proposed Solutions to Prevent Intimate Partner Violence in Tribal Communities.”