Long Beach City College hosted an event titled “Survival is Decolonization.”
The event was introduced by Linda Olmos and Sonia De La Torre, and was facilitated by Chrystos, a self-educated writer and activist.
Chrystos’ work as a poet and activist spans native land and treaty rights, freedom for imprisoned indigenous activists, and feminist two-spirit, as well as lesbian solidarity.
Her work also celebrates sovereignty and desire as counterforces against colonialism, genocide, patriarchy and hegemony.
Native American Heritage Month is an opportunity to honor and pay tribute to the history and rich tradition of the Native Americans.
The event was designed to offer a brief analysis of what decolonizing the mind could look like.
“The lifelong process of decolonizing the mind is the most important thing we need to do to learn to live together as people,” Chrystos said.
She went on to explain that the colonizer idea is anything you want is for the taking, whether it belongs to you or not. That concept is modus operandi of the United States of America.
This way of thinking has been celebrated as freedom, but is actually theft.
As part of her presentation, Chrystos read numerous of her poems such as “Meditation for Gloria Anzaldúa,” “The Border Raiser,” and “Ceremony for Completing a Poetry Reading.”
The included pieces were up to 40 years old and poems dedicated to friends, all shedding light on the plight the Native American people have had to endure.
After her presentation she opened the floor for questions.
The first question posed was from De La Torre. La Torre asked Chrystos, “How is your poetry connected to your activism?”
“The poetry and the activism are one in the same. Sometimes when I become involved in something, a poem comes out about that particular issue,” Chrystos explained.
She also provided advice for student writers who get “stuck” in the emotion of what they are writing, preventing them from exploring new avenues in their writing.
“One of the things that colonization does to us is it strips us of our emotions. Don’t ever back away from yourself for having feelings,” she explained. “The more feeling you allow yourself to have, the better your writing will be.”
At the end, those who attended the event thanked Chrystos for the privilege of having her speak and share her best insight on the topic of decolonization.
The session closed with her words, “The whole point of me writing is to figure out how to be a better person.”