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Nov 29: Week in Photography
Your lens to the internet's most powerful photographs.
📸For Your 👀 Only: A Look At Reservation Mathematics Tailyr Irvine is a documentary photographer who splits her time between Florida and Montana. One of her recent projects, "Reservation Mathematics" Navigating Love in Native America" examines the impact of blood quantum, which, she explains, is the amount of tribal blood that an individual has, which has a huge impact on tribal benefits and lineage. Irvine started the project by looking at her siblings and their children, and she included other tribal couples as well in a powerful project that brings a difficult concept to life.
Can you talk about the title? Why is this called “Reservation Mathematics”? “Reservation mathematics” is something I’ve heard a lot growing up on the Flathead Reservation and in Native America in general. It’s a term coined because of the math required to figure out who Native Americans can date. If you’re enrolled in a tribe, then you are given a fraction at birth that tells you how much of that tribe you are. You then have to use that fraction to find a partner with a fraction high enough for your theoretical children to be enrolled in your tribe. So right away as a kid, when you begin to date other tribal members, you’re doing this unique math to determine who is eligible for you and your future children. Tailyr Irvine When I named this project, it was the first thing that came to mind. To me, math is this cold, calculated thing — so to pair it with the warmth of love seems grossly counterintuitive. But that’s exactly what blood quantum does, and I wanted the title to reflect that. In the universal struggle to find a life partner, generations of young Native Americans have had an added burden that was put upon them long before they were born.
Can you talk more about what blood quantum is?
In 1934, the US Congress passed the Indian Reorganization Act, a law the Bureau of Indian Affairs established with the intent to bolster tribal authority on their own lands. It mandated that tribal governments should be organized constitutionally and dictated that individuals must have a certain fraction of Indian blood, or blood quantum, to be enrolled as a member in a given tribe. Blood quantum is determined by the amount of Indian blood of a person’s ancestors. For example, if someone had one parent who was full-blooded and one who was non-Native, that person would have an Indian blood quantum of ½. If that person were to have a child with a non-Native or person of another tribe, this child would be regarded as having a blood quantum of ¼ within his or her tribe. This blood quantum system has many pitfalls. For example, an increasing number of American Indians are of more than one tribe or race, and so [they] have ¼ or less Indian blood, and different tribes require different degrees of blood quantum for enrollment. Consequently, Native people who wish their children to be enrolled as a member of their tribe must choose a partner with enough of their tribe’s blood for their offspring to qualify. Tribal membership is tied to land access, hunting rights, and healthcare — and without access to certain lands and activities, it directly affects how much an individual can participate in their own culture. Tailyr Irvine Michael Irvine and Leah Nelson look at their daughter Nizhónà Irvine’s paternal family tree, printed at the tribal Enrollment Office. Wow. Will this system ever be phased out?
The way the system is set up doesn’t allow it to become irrelevant. Being Native American is not just an identity, it is a legal status. And that makes it really complicated to reform. It’s politically tied to so much, and there is a really complicated, painful history that makes it even more difficult to amend. The entire system was created to complete the genocide of Native Americans, but it was set up with so much red tape that makes it extremely difficult to step away from. There is no answer here. It’s going to evolve because it has to, but in what way I have no idea.
Can you talk about some images from this series?
For me, the portraits of my siblings and their babies are my favorite. I think they perfectly demonstrate the complicated nature of this issue. The portraits felt very intimate to me and allowed me into a side of my siblings’ life that I normally wouldn’t get to experience. That makes those images very special to me. It was an honor of my life to get to document a small chapter of theirs.
Where is this going next?
The next chapter of the project is funded with a grant from the National Geographic Society. In the first chapter of this project, I focused on a more personal narrative of explaining how it affects my family by following my siblings’ pregnancies and documenting the differences between having a partner from your tribe and having a partner from another tribe. The next chapter will focus less on multiple portraits and more on a narrative flow. I plan to follow a few young Native individuals and couples as they navigate the dating world. I hope to stick with them as their relationships develop and document how blood quantum affects each step of the process. My first chapter focused a lot on the family aspect, but I would like this next chapter to focus on the difficulties of dating when it’s dictated by blood quantum. When you have such a limited pool to choose from, what does that look like for this generation? I want to focus on the sacrifices and decisions that need to be made by teenagers and young adults and how the pressures associated with blood quantum affects who they feel they are allowed to love. Tailyr Irvine Tiana Antoine took her newborn daughter, Prairie, to the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes’ Enrollment Office to receive her enrollment card, also known as a Tribal ID. On each card is the tribal member’s photo, enrollment ID number, and blood quantum, indicated by a fraction. Any final takeaways that you want the viewer to know about this project?
Overall I hope the viewers feel inspired to continue educating themselves on Indigenous issues. There are so many fantastic Indigenous photographers, artists, and writers telling the stories that the United States has refused to teach or acknowledge in this country’s school curriculum. There are whole chapters of Native American history being retold from Indigenous perspectives. I hope this project inspires people to continue learning and supporting the work that challenges the way they see the world. 📸THE WEEK'S PHOTO STORIES FROM BUZZFEED NEWS 📸 This week, we took a good look at the world, and at what stories still need telling — and who is telling. Here are some stories that caught our eye and kept us thinking. WHEN DOMESTIC ASSAULT DISABLED HER MOTHER, SHE DOCUMENTED THE EFFECTS Hannah Kozak SEE THE FULL STORY
A PROJECT 20 YEARS IN THE MAKING TELLS WHAT IS HAPPENING IN GEORGIA Gillian Laub SEE THE FULL STORY
15 CONTEMPORARY INDIGENOUS PHOTOGRAPHERS TO KNOW Evan James Benally Atwood SEE THE FULL STORY
THE SURREAL EXPERIENCE OF 2020 IN THE US Sinna Nasseri SEE THE FULL STORY
📸SOME HOPE 📸 Alexander Ermochenko / Reuters Robots haven't invaded —yet! These installations were made by local enthusiasts and employees of an automobile repair workshop on the outskirts of the rebel-controlled city of Donetsk, Ukraine. "That's it from us this time — see you next week!" —Kate “We are making photographs to understand what our lives mean to us.”— Ralph Hattersley Want More? Go To JPG Homepage
đź“ť This letter was edited and brought to you by the News Photo team. Kate Bubacz is the photo director based in New York and loves dogs. You can always reach us here.
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