Informational, Polished
This one-hour special is an insightful account of how Hopi and Navajo peoples in Arizona navigate their dislocation from the reservation (Rez). The featured voices and stories render the pain and some humor about loss, racism and stereotypes.
For me, the most interesting stories were the ones woven between the opening and closing bookends of news reports. I understand the wisdom of re-tooling news reports, but the actual storytelling from a first-person account is much stronger. Plus, the news reports contain references to local pegs, which aren't relevant to stations around the country.
But what unfolds is powerful. Whether you're listening to Mona Seamon return to her birthplace in Navajo country and talk about what lies in ruin because of the government's mandate to move, or to Radmilla Cody, a biracial (African-American and Navajo), professional singer, who talks about how she was ostracized by many in her Native American family because of race, the storytelling hooks you.
Getting subjects to open up and share their innermost thoughts and feelings is hard. I also know that for Native Americans, the proposition is doubly difficult. Why should they entrust their stories to non-natives? KNAU succeeds here.
If you wish to gain good understanding about our ignored native tribes, of which many end up in more urban environments, this piece lays a strong foundation with well-produced sound and content.
Yolette Garcia
February 24, 2007
A documentary exploring the lives of Native American and non-Native people who live in Northern Arizona towns neighboring the Hopi and Navajo Nations
Taki Telonidis
