Year: 2023

If you’ve listened before you may know I am a White person and my spouse is Indigenous. This summer we went to several powwows and Indigenous events in New England. At the Pocumtuck Homelands Festival in Massachusetts we had the privilege of hearing Grandmother Carole Bubar-Bledgett speak. Grandmother Carole was in the middle of a month-long walk along the Connecticut River – although she calls it the Quinetucket River. This is the river’s original name, a Pequot word meaning Long Tidal River. Every year Grandmother Carole is called to walk the length of a major North American waterway. She walks 13-18 miles a day, and performs ceremonies to renew the energies of the water and the finned, winged and 4-legged creature that rely on it. She also teaches classes and…

While choosing songs for this episode, I was reflecting that I haven’t told the full story on the air of how the show came about. My spouse Aimee descends from the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe. In the past few years, she has been working to reconnect with her indigenous heritage. Thru her journey, I’ve learned a lot about the authentic experience of the indigenous people of North America, which is very different than I learned in school. At the same time, I was listening to Uncertain.FM, which as you may know, TJ started in 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic was new and everything felt Uncertain. TJ plays a song called Navigate by the artist Wayquay. It’s an astonishing song, synthesizing native chants with hip-hop beats, behind complex lyrics that speak of…

This week I’m reading an amazing new book by an Indigenous author, called Project 562. In 2012, author Matika Wilbur sold all her belongings and hit the road with the goal of photographing and engaging with people from all five hundred sixty-two federally recognized Native American sovereign territories in the United States. Over ten years and hundreds of thousands of miles later, this book is the stunning result. It’s full of oral history, portraits, and photos from the daily life of Indigenous Americans. Learn more and order the book at project562.com.  

Did you know Link Wray's Rumble is the only instrumental song (no objectionable lyrics) ever to be banned on American radio? Watch the documentary Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked The World. I learned so much about the essential Native American influence on a century of music history. Turtle Island is a metaphor that many Indigenous nations use to describe North America.