![]() ![]() She hopes it allows participants to bond through their shared connections and expand perspectives of what Native people engage in and enjoy. “I was like…’Why would you question whether you belonged somewhere because you had something that was likable for the rest of the general public and assumed that it wouldn't be likable for Native people?’” she said. She shared how when she invited some of her friends to present their anime work at áyA Con, they questioned if anyone would like it. That’s the main reason Maldonado-Bad Hand wanted to create the convention – to show that Native art and culture is much more than the stereotypes of feathers and ancestors. The robot can say phrases in Ojibwemowin, Diné Bizaad, Taíno and Apache. KUNC Danielle Boyer holds up a Skobot, a robot she designed, during a panel at the áyA Con convention. And we can be innovators now and forever.” “I want to show our students that opportunities are available and that we can create things for our communities basically built by us, for us. “We've always been scientists, we've always been inventors, we've always been creating really awesome things,” she said. She hopes Indigenous youth will still pursue what they want to pursue, even when these spaces are predominantly white. ![]() Her idea came out of the discrimination she faced when she tried to join robotics clubs in high school and college. She also created the STEAM Connection when she was 18 to help teach Indigenous youth about robotics and provide some building kits for free. Hello,” and ask the child to repeat it back. “Basically, they sit on your shoulder, sense motion and help protect endangered Indigenous languages."įor example, she said, it’d say a phrase like “Boozhoo. “They are wearable language revitalization robots,” she said. ![]() She made a 3D-printed, talking and singing robot - called a SkoBot - that helps to preserve endangered Native languages. KUNC Danielle Boyer, a 22-year-old Ojibwe engineer, also presented at the festival. “Supporting organizations like this is super important because they're seeing us for us and what we love and what we support, and the amazing people that create the bands that we listen to.” ![]() “I think Denver and Colorado in general have a very romanticized version of what Indigenous people look like and how we are and what alternative cultures we participate in,” Kaiah said. That message reached audience members like Chelsea Kaiah, who was head-banging in the front row. “We're just turning the tides, basically, on everybody else, saying that we can evolve and we can do the things that everybody else can,” he said. Ruben Dawahoya, Merciless Indian Savages’s bass player, said he wants to show that Indigenous people belong in the heavy metal space, too. “I had tried to write lyrics several times, but I think it ended up just being an instrumental because I think the music just really speaks for itself,” said Amanda Castillo, a guitarist and vocalist with Suspended. The all-female group Suspended, from Albuquerque, N.M., played an instrumental track titled “Murdered and Missing,” after the thousands of unsolved cases of missing and murdered Indigenous people. Other bands that played Friday night explored similar themes. We want to empower our people and we want to denounce this way of saying it.” “So originally everybody knows, obviously, 'Kill the Indian, save the man,'” Ashley said, referring to the quote by Captain Richard H. One of the songs is titled “Kill Man, Save The Indian,” which references the “White man came across the sea” lyric from Iron Maiden’s “Run to the Hills,” a song about killing Natives. “Metal’s the perfect canvas to do that…Natives love metal and we’re no exception to that.”Īlong with lyrics about addiction and death, their songs often reference cultural genocide and traumas inflicted upon Indigenous people. “People think it's nonsense, but we’re spitting some knowledge that people are unaware of,” said Corey Ashley, the vocalist for Merciless Indian Savages. Performances ranged from stand-up comedy to poetry to heavy metal. “We've got comic books, there's anime stuff, there's horror stuff. “We have powwow dancing and we have a lot of our culture presenting, but we have toys up there,” Maldonado-Bad Hand said, motioning to the McNichols Civic Center, which hosted the event. The word “áyA” is from the Lakota language, meaning “to change, to become.” The goal is to expand the notion of what art from Indigenous communities looks like, according to Kristina Maldonado Bad Hand, the director and co-founder of the three-day event. The bands performing at the Rez Metal concert were among the many artists participating in áyA Con, an event designed to celebrate indigeneity and showcase Indigenous creators, similar to the Indigenous Pop Culture Expo, or IndigiPop X. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |