Finding Nvnih Waiya: Reflections of an Indigenous Scholar

Finding Nvnih Waiya: Reflections of an Indigenous Scholar

Hannah Blackwell

There is a hill in Mississippi. Her name is Nvnih Waiya It is said that we came from her. She is our mother mound. Is she home to me?

Raised up in bottomland in southeast Oklahoma. Government “Promised Land.”

Chahta allotment land.

Choctaw Reservation land. For those who walked home land. Is she home to me?

There is a road in Tushka Homma, Oklahoma. It is called Nanih Waiya Road. Dead ends at our original sacred capitol grounds

Bronzed statues memorialized in time They are what is left for us to nd. Is she home to me?

There are government buildings erected to educate. Designed to eradicate. Some attempt to illuminate. A tool to assimilate. People to take. Money to make. Is she home to me?

There are forests for the trees. For some to do as they please. Raining down grief. Little left for our piece/peace.

Mined up. Dried up.

©2023 Feminist Formations, Vol. 35 No. 1 (Spring) pp. 71–72

Achieve and leave. The American Dream. Is she home to me?

There are faraway places with jobs to teach. If I polish and publish and be the Native they need. While my people left here are out of reach, I’ll squelch the voice that says their aim is to leech. Leaving me sick, deprived, and alone. It’s the price I’m told. Is she my home?

There is a place deep inside of me. It never has to agree. It’s a place that is free. Free of doubt, fear, and shame.

It’s never harsh and it doesn’t blame. Blame can be rightfully bestowed upon some. But, in this place, there is only room for love.

It’s from this place that I look at angles from above At the hurt and anger and unfair ways

At abuse and death and pride and hate. I carry these things through my body, mind, and soul. There’s power here. It’s strength for walking this road. And when it proves to be too heavy a load I dissolve it with prayers prayed now and long ago from my relations around me both known and unknown and turn it into love in the place I call home.

Hannah Blackwell is a citizen of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. She recently completed her PhD at the University of Oklahoma and currently serves as a Professor of Education at Collin College. Her research focuses on higher education, Indigenous/ Native education, media (country music, performance, and print culture), and socioeconomic class (speci cally within rural cultures).