'The Past Never Vanishes': A Contextual Critique of the Existing Indian Family Doctrine
'The Past Never Vanishes': A Contextual Critique of the Existing Indian Family Doctrine
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“过去永不消失”：对现有印度家庭教义的语境批判
DOI：
10.2307/20068871
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发表时间：
1998
期刊：
影响因子：
--
通讯作者：
Lorie Graham
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Lorie Graham
我不了解自己的文化。. .我需要你的帮助来理解。. . .教我，教我的孩子。这是一位43岁的纳瓦霍妇女在她出生后第一次回到纳瓦霍民族时说的话。她还是婴儿时就被偷走了，沿着她的双胞胎兄弟，在黑市上被收养，最后她与家人和社区团聚。她的回家之旅正值美洲原住民国家正在反对拟议的立法和法院制定的规则，这些规则试图限制1978年《印第安儿童福利法》（ICWA）的范围。国会通过ICWA是为了应对联邦、州和私人儿童福利机构将美洲原住民儿童大规模转移到非印第安人收养家庭、寄养和教育机构。虽然有无数相互关联的因素导致了这场印第安儿童福利危机，但其核心是主流社会未能承认和尊重美洲土著民族的文化价值观和社会规范。美国土著儿童在非印第安人环境中成长更好的同化态度并不是一夜之间浮出水面的。相反，它源于几个世纪以来美国批准的政策--从寄宿学校到安排项目，再到印第安人收养项目--旨在消除美洲土著文化。ICWA的通过标志着联邦印第安人政策的逆转，转向美洲土著民族的自决。然而，在司法上对《印第安人家庭法》创造的例外，如《现有印第安人家庭原则》，有可能破坏这一具有里程碑意义的立法，使我们回到过去的政策。为了证明这些司法创造的例外是如何延续过去的同化态度，本文开始与美国印第安儿童在这个国家的待遇的历史讨论。在这个更大的历史背景下，本文提供了一个批评现有的印度家庭学说，并探讨了一些当前的意识形态辩论，可能是潜在的最近的挑战，以ICWA。
I don't know my own culture, . . . I am going to need your help in understanding . . . . Teach me, teach my children. These are the words of a forty-three-year-old Navajo woman on her first visit back to the Navajo Nation since her birth. Stolen as an infant, along with her twin brother, and adopted out on the black market, she was finally reunited with her family and community. Her journey home comes at a time when Native American nations are fighting proposed legislation and court-made rules that seek to limit the reach of the Indian Child Welfare Act of 1978 (ICWA). Congress passed the ICWA in response to the massive displacement of Native American children to non-Indian adoptive homes, foster care, and educational institutions by federal, state and private child welfare authorities. While there were a myriad of interrelated factors that led up to this Indian child welfare crisis, at its core was the failure of mainstream society to recognize and respect the cultural values and social norms of Native American nations. The assimilative attitudes that Native American children were better off growing up in a non-Indian environment did not surface overnight. Rather it percolated from centuries of U.S. sanctioned policies - from boarding schools, to placing out programs, to Indian adoption projects - aimed at the erasure of Native American cultures. The passage of the ICWA marked a reversal in federal Indian policy toward one of self-determination for Native American nations. However, judicially created exceptions to the ICWA, such as the Existing Indian Family doctrine, threaten to undermine this landmark legislation and return us to the policies of the past. In order to demonstrate how these judicially created exceptions perpetuate past assimilative attitudes, this article begins with a historical discussion of the treatment of American Indian children in this country. Within this larger historical context, the article provides a critique of the Existing Indian Family Doctrine and explores some current ideological debates that may be underlying recent challenges to the ICWA.