Jeffrey Corntassel   


Bio 
Jeff Corntassel (Cherokee Nation), received his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Arizona in 1998. Jeff is currently Assistant Professor and Graduate Advisor in the Indigenous Governance Program at the University of Victoria. Professor Corntassel’s research and teaching interests include Indigenous political mobilization/self-determination and international law/organizations. 

Jeff’s first book, entitled Forced Federalism: Contemporary Challenges to Indigenous Nationhood (Forthcoming in Spring/2008, University of Oklahoma Press), examines how Indigenous nations in the U.S. mobilize politically during the 1990’s up to the present day as they encounter new threats to their nations at the state and federal levels of governance. Another one of Jeff’s current research projects is an edited volume in collaboration with Professor Tom Holm entitled The Power of Peoplehood: Contemporary Indigenous Community-Building, which brings together native scholars from Canada, U.S and Mexico to discuss contemporary struggles of cultural and political regeneration within Indigenous communities (Forthcoming, University of Texas Press).

Other works in progress examine global Indigenous political mobilization during the United Nations’ 1st Indigenous Decade (1995-2004) and a comparative examination of state apologies/truth and reconciliation efforts as they impact Indigenous nations in Canada, Australia, Guatemala and Peru. Jeff’s research has been published in: American Indian Quarterly, Ayaangwaamizin, Global Governance, Human Rights Quarterly, Nationalism and Ethnic Studies, and Social Science Journal.


Contentious Citizenship: Rethinking Local and Global Pathways to Indigenous Self-Determination

Abstract: Indigenous peoples on Turtle Island have long viewed the imposition of U.S. or Canadian citizenship as incompatible with the lived experiences and kinship ties of their own nations. While state citizenship is a contentious, colonial concept that potentially undermines Indigenous self-determining authority (Deloria 1985; Porter 1999), it is increasingly viewed by Indigenous peoples as a multi-layered category “…in which one’s citizenship in collectivities in the different layers- local, ethnic, national, state, cross- or trans-state and supra-state – is affected and often at least partly constructed by the relationships and positionings of each layer in a specific historical context” (Yuval-Davis, 1999: 122). Given that Indigenous identities are (re)constructed at multiple levels – global, state, community, individual – it is important to recognize these multiple sites of resistance to state encroachment (Alfred and Corntassel 2005:600). In this paper, I will examine how this multi-layered and relational perspective of citizenship challenges state sovereignty. Additionally, what are some of the specific strategies being utilized by Indigenous nations at both the local and global levels to resist co-optation by the global settler political economy?

I begin the paper by examining some historical positions of Indigenous leaders, such as Smohalla (Wanapum), Dragging Canoe (Tsalagi) and Old Tassel (Tsalagi), which outline several important perspectives on ancestral homeland security that are useful in our discussion of contemporary citizenship. As Indigenous nations increasingly seek out global forums, such as the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, in order to challenge encroachment by shape-shifting colonial powers, they often fall prey to something I call “Free Tibet Syndrome”. This romanticization of global forums represents a politics of distraction that enables Indigenous leaders to cast their decolonizing gaze to “faraway” geopolitical spaces rather than emphasizing local, community-based practices of Gadugi (community comradery or regeneration). In providing several possible antidotes for Free Tibet Syndrome, I examine how global instruments, such as the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, deal with the question of state citizenship and then apply a multi-layered citizenship approach to three comparative case studies of Indigenous political mobilization in Quechuan communities (Bolivia), Six Nations’ reclamation of Caledonia (Canada), and Kanaka Maoli resistance to patenting their sacred plants (Hawai’i) in order to illustrate contemporary Indigenous self-determination strategies that challenge state citizenship claims.

References:
Alfred, Taiaiake and Jeff Corntassel. 2005. “Being Indigenous: Resurgences against Contemporary Colonialism.” Government and Opposition: An International Journal of Comparative Politics. 40(4): 597-614.

Corntassel, Jeff. 2007. “Partnership in Action? Indigenous Political Mobilization and Co-optation During the First UN Indigenous Decade (1995-2004).” Human Rights Quarterly, 29: 137-166.

Deloria, Vine, Jr. 1985. Behind the Trail of Broken Treaties. Austin: University of Texas Press.

Maaka, Roger and Augie Fleras. 2005. The Politics of Indigeneity: Challenging the State in Canada and Aotearoa New Zealand. New Zealand: University of Otago Press.

Mander, Jerry and Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, eds. 2005. Paradigm Wars: Indigenous Peoples’ Resistance to Economic Globalization. San Francisco, CA: The International Forum on Globalization.

Porter, Robert B. 1999. "The Demise of the Ongwehoweh and the Rise of the Native Americans: Redressing the Genocidal Act of Forcing American Citizenship upon Indigenous Peoples." Harvard Law Journal. 15:108-183.

Yuval-Davis, Nira. 1999. “The ‘Multi-Layered Citizen’: Citizenship in the Age of ‘Glocalization’.” International Feminist Journal of Politics, 1 (1): 119-136.