Author: Tanner

Before this class, the Mexican-United States border to me was an abstract concept to me, as I had never experienced it in person. I imagined a large fence, with several visible command towers and a line of armed guards. This did not match up with the reality of what we saw on the border, as at areas it was a fence that was really only designed to block cars, not people. There was one border control car that was barely visible, parked a decent ways away in the back of the parking lot. Many of my classmates very briefly crossed the border, and as you can see in the picture above, I was even able to throw a rock across the border. Grayson and I had a brief conversation about how long our rocks would be there, as for both of us the idea of being a rock throw away from one of the biggest political issues of our time was both intimidating and weird. Contrary to what the media would have you believe, there were also no other people at the border when we arrived. There was no giant overflow of people, cars, drugs, or really anything. I know this one area probably does not represent the entire border, but it is amazing how different the reality was from the image that had been built in my head through the media. It also makes me think about our perception of reality and how different people could go to the border and have a completely different take from what I did. Our political views completely color our lenses in that regard, which makes questioning yourself and talking to other people about their perceptions even more important.

In our conversation with Selso Villegas, one thing that stood out to me, even beyond a lot of the other interesting things that he said was about why he felt the need to talk about his degrees. He said something to the effect of “if I do not tell people that I have three degrees in science, people do not take me seriously, or feel that I have anything to contribute.” In that moment, I thought back to other moments where I have heard this, as it seems to be a common feeling among non-white males feeling like they always have to prove themselves. It makes me think of one of the manifestations of my privilege as a white male, as people usually assume I am competent, even in situations where I have no idea what I am doing or what I am talking about. This is a horrible double standard that is ingrained within our society, and is one of the tougher ones to eliminate because it is implicit within human interactions. For someone as accomplished as Mr. Villegas to have to tell people about his degrees in order to gain respect is sickening to me, as it must be a cloud that hangs over him, as well as so many others. This is another reminder that we need to keep our implicit biases in mind in how we interact with one another if we want a better world, as everyone should feel as if they will be on even footing when they enter a conversation or meeting with a stranger as far as intelligence is concerned.

At dinner tonight, I was fortunate enough to be sitting on the corner next to Joe Joaquin, who has accomplished more in his life than I could ever imagine accomplishing in mine. One of the main things that I noticed as I was talking to him was the presence he had about him. He had one of those unmistakable auras that comes with a person with great presence of mind and body, as if he knew something that the rest of us did not. Of course, he actually does knows many things that the rest of us do not, but there are plenty of smart and accomplished people who are not able to carry themselves that Joe does.

In my conversation with him, he told me about his travels across the United States. Of all of the places he had been, he told me that other than his obvious love for his homeland, his favorite place that he had visited was Hawaii. This led me to a question about the nature of the O’odham rituals, as I was curious whether they could be performed outside of O’odham land. He told me that they could be, and in a few cases, they had to be when a member of the nation died while visiting other places. The traditions are largely tied to the land, but they also exist off of the land, as O’odham are able to perform some rituals and summon some spirits when away. When I asked him about the traditional crops of his people, partially motivated by my research paper and part genuine curiosity, he told me that they are what he grew up on and a good amount of what he still eats today, as he tries to eat whatever is in season, or whatever is stored away. I looked at the good shape that Joe was still in, despite his advanced age, and wondered whether this could largely be due to the traditional diet.

One other thing that I noticed when talking to Joe is the manner in which he told stories. Sometimes I would ask him a question and he would quickly give me a short answer, but then pause for 10-20 seconds and keep on going with a longer answer. There could be several different explanations for this, including his increasing age, but I did not perceive this as the likely answer. My theory is that he has so much information and so many stories stashed away that he occasionally has trouble figuring out how much detail to include in an answer, as on any given O’odham related subject he could probably go on for hours. He also had a particular way of forming some thoughts that reminded me of the older man who mentored me in baseball scouting this summer. I do not know exactly how to describe it other than the fact that his sentences were usually packed with information, but at least as a younger listener, you really had to listen closely in order to fully understand the meanings of the things that he said. I spent a good amount of the dinner nodding along as Joe was talking while I pieced together what Joe meant. I almost always got what I thought was his point by the time he finished speaking and was able to parlay it into a comment or another question, but to me, it was interesting that he spoke in this same way as my baseball scouting mentor. There are probably wisdom and generational gaps that help to explain this, but it is probably something I am going to be putting a little bit of further thought into in the near future.

Going into our talks at the Tohono O’odham museum, I felt like I had bits of pieces of knowledge about the O’odham culture that I had learned in class, along with what I learned the rest of the trip, but I had a feeling like something was missing. The readings were incredibly helpful in laying a foundation, but the talks, even though they were long, were incredibly helpful. I reached a point where I started to feel comfortable with my base of knowledge about the Tohono O’odham, with the obvious caveat that I could study the O’odham for years and still not completely understand all of the intricacies of their culture. One piece that I especially felt uncomfortable with going into today was the border situation, which the Tohono O’odham chief of public safety really helped to clarify for me today. The fact that the O’odham police have jurisdiction over their land and their courts with the exception of immigration and the drug trade was slightly surprising to me, but both makes sense and is encouraging in terms of O’odham autonomy. The programs described by several of the speakers, such as the environmental preservation programs, archeological conservation programs, and economic development plans were all impressive to me. The O’odham are obviously not completely where they want to be in all of these areas right now, but they seem to have clear goals as well as nuanced plans to get where they want to go.

Our conversation with Bill Broyles yesterday, both at the hotel and at dinner, got me thinking again about walls. A wall, inherently, is built to separate people, countries and cultures.  The rhetoric is usually based around security, as people will argue that they need to be able to regulate who comes into their state. This sounds somewhat reasonable on paper, until you research it and learn that in fact that walls, historically, have not been effective for security purposes. As this article from the NYT explains, the results of walls for this base purpose are mixed. The most famous wall in history, The Great Wall of China, was largely ineffective, as people simply went around it. The Berlin Wall is an example of a wall that was effective at its stated purpose to separate Communist East Germany from Democratic West Germany in the aftermath of WWII, but today it is an infamous historic symbol, as it inflicted great pain upon people and families, and is a black mark upon German history. When you read through the numerous historical examples, you start to realize that the main purpose of many of these walls was not security.

So if security is not the most common purpose of a wall, what is the true purpose of a wall? My theory is that a wall is more of a political symbol than it is a practical tool. It creates a physical separation that allows for people with nationalistic tendencies to feel safe, even if it does not actually increase their safety. In this way, it acts a lot like the TSA, as both perform “security theater” to give the illusion of increased security/effort without doing much to actually increase safety. We like to think that the extra steps created in the TSA security line or the extra regulations on what we can bring on planes make us safer, but all of this extra hassle does little to make us safer. In a similar vein, building a wall will do little to make us safer, but will make some people feel safer. Meanwhile, other people, such as Tohono O’odham will suffer the consequences, as it will be even more difficult for the American side to remain connected to the Mexican side of the nation. It is also just flat out insulting to people such as the Tohono O’odham, as the American government once again will be essentially telling them that they do not care about their way of life or their rights as the original shepherds of the land.

The trip to San Xavier today made me revisit a common line of thought for me, which is how I process religion around me. I am personally agnostic, as I grew up in a non-religious household, but in Roanoke, Virginia so Christianity was assumed. I have had many awkward conversations around my religious beliefs, as instead of taking the path of least resistance in faking non-practicing Christianity I have always been honest when asked. Whether I want it to or not this has always impacted the way I process religion, as it is hard for me to have a full appreciation for religious sites without the belief. When I walked into the San Xavier church today, I felt awkward as I always do when I walk into a church, as I want to show deference to those who are having a spiritual experience, but this makes me feel very phony. The church itself was beautiful and I could feel some sort of aura from those devoutly practicing around me. At the same time, however, I felt like I was walking on eggshells, as I was merely a tourist in a building that did not feel like it should be open to outsiders. I wonder how the people who are there for the religious experience feel as tourists routinely go in and out, with what I am assuming are different levels of respect. I myself committed what I felt was a faux pas, as after sitting for a while and absorbing the scenery, I got up to look at the front area of the church. I looked around the corner to the right and there were people bent over in prayer. When I looked back at the seats, I saw people waving me to sit down, with disapproval in their eyes. At that moment, I felt the same as I always do in religious contexts; awkward, with a clear self-consciousness of sticking out like a sore thumb.

The part of being at Pueblo Grande that spoke to me was trying to extrapolate the images I saw in front of me of stone structures into dreams of hundreds of people living there. The foundation, paintings, and artifacts helped to inform those images dancing around in my head, but it is something that I know I will never have the full picture of. The Hokoham people lived lives that are completely different from any that we, as 21st-century U.S citizens, can truly grasp, as because they moved so often, they frequently had to turn something into nothing and create new structures and lives for themselves. I personally cannot imagine starting completely from square one in the middle of the desert, as these people so often did, which is in itself a reflection of how much we rely on the work our ancestors did. The conditions that we live in are the best in world history, even given the new challenges that have emerged, as our basic survival is rarely a question that comes to our minds. The fact that Hohokam adults spent most of their time building canals so that they would have access to water and structures for basic survival is something that I cannot conceive of for my life in the 21st-century. We are allowed and empowered to have hopes and greater aspirations for our lives that earlier people could not even conceive of, which is something that I am both amazed by and thankful for, even though we usually take it for granted in our day to day lives.