Abstract
Social media is allowing indigenous culture to be expressed more fluidly and is easily accessible by those not in the community. With the videos of indigenous regalia and traditional teachings becoming a viral sensation, accounts like @indigenoustiktok come about to put the similar videos in one place for people to go to. Connecting with a member of the Mohawk community, I was able to ask more in depth questions that may not have been discussed before from the colonist perspective.

Key words: Indigenous, culture, social media, TikTok, Instagram, North America, boarding schools, social movements, decolonization, Mohawk

Introduction
Indigenous communities have found a way to teach those outside of their communities, how to celebrate their cultures. They have found a new ownership of their cultures, resenting what the imperialistic mindset of the North American governments had pushed onto their ancestors’ generations. Due to the oppression that their ancestors faced, some of the culture has been lost and forgotten. It is this generation of adult indigenous peoples that are exploring their identities and are taking a stand against assimilation to hegemonic culture and learning of their heritage.

Literature Review

Rewriting History using Social Media

Throughout the history of indigenous peoples, there have been ranges of treatment. Whether it was suppression or genocidal incidents. Still today, the indigenous population remains the largest marginalized groups in North America. “The decline of the Indigenous protest cycle in Latin America by the mid-2000s meant that research on collective action turned elsewhere just as the use of social media was becoming more prominent in the tactical repertoire of collective action, and we know little about how Indigenous groups have adapted new technologies for the purpose of civic engagement” (Richez, Raynauld, Agi & Kartolo, 2020). This civic engagement between those in the culture and not in the culture is essential to understand one another.

The social media posts act as a bridge, connecting lives together and making sure those who do not understand have a chance to think differently. Having these social media accounts ensure that the culture has a chance to be understood and accepted with the youth, generally this will cause a domino effect on that generation’s children and so on. This could also mean that the youth is taking this time to teach an older generation about this culture and that because it’s out of the societal norms, doesn’t mean it’s wrong. “We find that some Indigenous organizations have benefited from the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in terms of enhanced communication, access to information, visibility, interest promotion, and commercialization of products and services” (Botangen, Vodanovich, & Yu, 2018). There are various social media accounts on different platforms that are helping to preserve history of a culture that has begun to vanish. To sustain the culture and to keep it going.

This might include language, dance, artistic forms, medicine, hunting, and many more. Social media has become so interactive that people from the other side of the world are able to learn about the culture. This then creates a sphere of influence, where the culture has a potential to change someone’s life. Because social media applications are tied to the new social world of communication, the ways that users are interacting has increased. They are now able to share, like, comment, modify content, react and discuss things on the platform, without having to meet the content creator in real life. These applications are classified into six groups by Kaplan and Haenlein based on the levels of media richness of the content and self-presentation of the user: collaborative projects, blogs or forums, content communities, social networking sites, virtual game worlds, and virtual social worlds. The sense-of-community that most social media applications possess elicited their popularity of use” (Botangen, Vodanovich, & Yu, 2018). The online world is continuously growing and changing, and therefore more initiatives of joining the discussions about the indigenous culture have more incentive – especially because of the call for social reform and social justice.

Exposing Boarding Schools on Social Media Platforms

Since indigenous languages are taught by indigenous peoples, there has been difficulty in finding those willing to teach and are able to teach. From 1879 to 1986, the endangerment to indigenous culture was increasing because of the government funded residential schools that indigenous children were forcibly enrolled.  These “aimed to systemically eradicate Indigenous languages, cultures, religions, identity, and communities” (Gomashie, 2020). The government funded schools were paving the way to white hegemony and the way to acclimate the indigenous to the way of the colonizers, making these boarding schools mandatory for the indigenous peoples’ children.

The families of these children would not be able to teach the indigenous traditional way of life, the language, or anything within their culture. In the residential schools, the students facd all sorts of abuse, including punishments for speaking their native language and celebrating their culture. “The residential school system “made integration into the dominant culture mandatory and laid the foundation for the linguicide of Aboriginal languages” (Gomashie, 2020). If the children were to go against the transition to white hegemony, they would be punished in ways that would never be forgotten. “The goal of the Indian Boarding Schools was to assimilate Indian children into the melting pot of America by placing them in institutions where they would be stripped of their traditional ways and required to adopt the values and traditions sanctioned by the federal government” (Carjuzaa, 2017). As stated by The University Press of Toronto, there were four types of abuse that children had experienced: sexual, spiritual, psychological, and physical.

Years later, these abuses would be affecting these children in their adult day-to-day lives. As a repercussion of the abuse in the residential schools, the attendees would resent their heritage and culture, eventually leading to the decline in celebrating their culture. If the former residential school student wanted to seek retribution, the government funded schools or church organizations would often be better represented because of their copious funds. The trials were open to the public, but in rare circumstances some were not. “For decades, the experience of residential school students was unknown to much of Canadian society… Many Canadians still remain unaware that such institutions existed, let alone that horrific abuses were perpetrate” (Llewellyn, 2002). In order to make a rightful retribution, the first step is to allow the citizens access to records of legal proceedings in order to understand why the schools were so harmful. The next step would be to educate the population as to why the indigenous children were placed in those schools in the first place. The citizens who have the advantage of being non-indigenous need the understanding of their privilege that they are not punished for existing in a way that threatens colonizers.

Indigenous Language on Social Media

Indigenous youth having access to their native languages is something entirely new to the online community. Teachers have been utilizing the easy access social media platform to help teach indigenous youth their native language. Often, indigenous youth do not learn their language in schools unless it is an indigenous ran program. Inuit students are leading a linguistic renaissance, reversing generations of language loss using social media. “Scroll through the Instagram feed of Inuktitut Ilinniaqta and you’ll find hyper-stylized visuals steeped in northern imagery – the Aurora Borealis, snow-covered vistas and larger than life animals – paired with Inuktut vocabulary and English translations.” (Kielburger, 2020). Pairing photos of the natural world with their language ties Indigenous peoples to their culture, as their cultures are tied to the earth in all aspects.

In many ways, this is an important way to preserve the language, by passing it down to another generations. 90% of the world’s languages will eventually disappear, the bulk of that is starting with Indigenous languages, since they comprise approximately 60% of the world’s languages. Therefore, utilizing social media to spread awareness and teachings is so important, it’s used as “an area of study and a social movement” (Gomashie, 2019). However, there are some that have lost their culture due to colonization, the boarding schools and white hegemony. Boarding schools were destroyers of indigenous culture and the students of those schools will have to learn how to reconnect with their culture and the people of their culture.

But because the population of Canada seems to be lacking in knowledge of these residential schools, the government would want to make retribution private for the former student. Those who had attended the boarding schools in Canada want their experience to be shared and understood by the non-indigenous peoples of Canada. When their stories are understood, the indigenous who attended the boarding schools become a part of the population consciousness. In other words, they will be considered in decisions moving forward, just like any other citizens. “This is more likely to happen if the issues are dealt with in a public forum and is difficult, if not impossible, if all cases proceed by way of private negotiations and settlements” (Llewellyn, 2002). This statement from Llewellyn states that the indigenous will become a larger part of the society once they are able to be a part of the consensus in the public forum. The indigenous purposefully had public-held legal proceedings instead of private ones, so that the records would become public knowledge. This was done in the hopes of the public becoming aware of the misdoings of the Canadian government and would also want to seek retribution. If the legal proceedings were held privately, there could be no public record of the trial.

Learning About Indigenous Culture on Social Media
The reconnection and revitalization of connecting with a culture has been improved with the use of social media. Online forums, like Facebook groups or subreddits, offer a place of security where indigenous peoples can share things with others of the same culture. Likewise, it is considered the soil that provides a society’s nourishment and the basis to define value systems, behaviour, morals, ethics, and its peoples’ future” (Botangen, Vodanovich, & Yu, 2018). The knowledge that connects the indigenous peoples to the natural land that they have lived on is being reinstated by correcting the suppression that had occurred in the evolution of the western world. Media is being used in a way that shares this cultural connection to natural elements, and in that sphere of influence is therefore shared with those outside of the culture or those learning of their culture after being suppressed. The internet has become a tool for the education of indigenous culture because of the timeliness it provides and the accessibility; this is one of the many perks of having modernity in technology.

Without the creation of the internet, or even the access to internet, indigenous culture would not be able to be known except in very niche areas of North America. However, with the suppression of indigenous culture in North America, modernity has greatly impacted the relationship between nature and humanity. The industrial revolutions had collected masses of people to relocate to cities, where there is a lack of natural constitutions. The eventual creation of social media, oral and visual representations are widely available, and in 2020/2021 becoming widespread sensational content. This content has been sensationalized because of the need for ruralization and a more natural lifestyle with outdoor activity and eating naturally created foods. “Indian people have understood for a great many years that it is only by educating our young people that we can reclaim our history and only through culturally responsive education that we will preserve our cultural integrity” (Carjuzaa, 2017). Therefore, outside of curriculum-based learning, social media can be useful for the content that is created to help better understand other cultures.

These oral and visual forms that are offered on social media have a broad spectrum in which traditional indigenous knowledge and culture are being represented, and because there are so many different forms, the interactivity between content creators and content consumers increases greatly. The interactive aspects of content can be defined as the facilitation of discussion about the content, sending the content to other users and modification of the content and redistribution. Part of that redistribution is word of mouth, but also the articles that are being written because of the phenomenon. For example, The New York Times has written an article about indigenous beadwork that has become well-known on Instagram. An indigenous woman named Tayler Gutierrez had posted multiple jewelry items for sale, that had been handmade, on her Instagram page. “Sales have been spurred by a national dialogue around racial injustice that has led to increased efforts to support Black and Indigenous artists and businesses” said Anna V. Smith, a writer for the NYT.

Gutierrez had also mentioned that in person sales were hard to come by because of the low population density where she had previously lived, but mostly due to different events being cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. “Partially, that’s because with craft fairs, powwows and art markets shuttered, many vendors and buyers are relying more heavily on the internet.” Having her Instagram set up for selling her beadwork, she is able to focus more on the quality, rather than the quantity. Social media followers are able to receive updates as she is working on other products and can patiently wait as she releases the items. “Growing up in Washington State near the Upper Skagit Reservation, Gutierrez didn’t learn as much as she would have liked about her Cherokee heritage. Beadwork has been one way of reconnecting.” The Cherokee Nation is located in what is now Oklahoma, quite a distance from where she grew up in Washington State.

Critical Race Theory Review
Critical Race Theory (CRT) is going to be applied in my research because of the history of indigenous peoples on North America. The discrimination because of their ethnicity has lead to many traumatic experiences for the indigenous. Even more so, the boarding schools that the indigenous children were required to attend has lead to significant psychological damage that is still affecting them today. “‘Race’, class, gender and their intersections have regularly been excluded from important social and political developments and landmarks in knowledge and dominant paradigms. As a result, the use of ‘voicing,’ storytelling and counter-storytelling have become popular tools in the expression of a CRT standpoint” (Hylton, 2012). Story telling from the victim standpoint as an indigenous person can cause them to be subjected to violence and more traumatic experiences; this would be the counter-storytelling of North American history textbooks. However, by storytelling they are able to voice their thoughts of indigenous history in North America and are able to share their culture with those who are willing to listen. Social media allows these stories to be told because of how accessible it is to people all over the world. From Hylton, 2012, CRT theorists realize that stories and types of intellectual conversations have been influencing historical research. Although hearing the other sides of the stories, even years later, can help to rewrite history. Even these stories that have truth can be taken and twisted, but with the use of social media, content creators and story tellers are able to record themselves and speak their truth.

If they are gaining enough attention, their stories may become widespread with thousands of people interacting with the storyteller. If this occurs, it then allows the storyteller to share their everyday experiences. This is important to look at with the lens of critical race theory because every day experiences are what makes a person a person; it’s the everyday life that gives the truth the spotlight. If one person shares what had happened to them one day, another could share their same experience. This then could create a chain of storytelling about experiences that could either be bad or good. For the most part it seems that only the bad are being shared because of social justice movements within indigenous culture, but the good should be shared as well. Along with critical race theory and the bad experiences, the good experiences could include a success story of an indigenous person exploring their culture and celebrating it. This comes with the education that social media allows for with the accessibility. Users can share and create content more freely and are able to educate others on their culture, even if those content consumers are outside of the culture.

Methodology Section
The data collection that I have participated in was to dissect Instagram pages run by indigenous peoples and analyze their content. By analyzing the content they produce, I can see their culture and the ways it has been oppressed. Social media has given the indigenous communities across North America the opportunity to express themselves culturally in a way that was not possible before.

I set up an interview with a member of the Haudenosaunee community here in Western New York and asked him to look at the accounts that I have been analyzing for the past few months. Steven Thompson-Oakes has been sharing his own indigenous content, mainly about the Mohawk traditions and resharing posts from the social justice sect of the indigenous online community. He has started to embrace his heritage by learning the traditional teachings of beading, understanding more of his family’s history and how the oppression of his great-grandfather is still effecting his family today.

About the online community
Social media has gained ground as a sphere of influence within 2019 and 2020. More often, users of social media platforms are seeing posts showing social justice, supporting other users in a niche community, showing racial inequality, and expressing themselves more. Indigenous populations have been using social media platforms as an outreach of their communities and cultures. Within this outreach, indigenous communities are sharing their cultural values with outsiders of that community. This is a key factor as to why the outreach has been increased. The indigenous populations have been suppressed since the “new world explorers” had discovered the western hemisphere.

The indigenous populations seek to rewrite history and bring to light the racial inequality that they have been experiencing since that time. Social media has been a driving force for indigenous populations to share their stories, connect with other indigenous populations and to teach outsiders about their surviving culture. In the analysis section, I studied various Instagram pages, hashtags, posts, and videos and made three conclusions from this compilation of different elements. As stated in the Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention of 1989, for people to be considered indigenous need to be: i) the descendants of those who inhabited a geographical area before colonization, or ii) they have maintained their own social, economic, cultural and political institutions since colonization and the establishment of new states (International Labour Organization, 1989).However, with imperialism and colonization, these standards may be difficult to follow. For those who became separated from their culture because of colonization and the forced assimilation of the colonizers, this would be especially difficult standards to meet in 2021 because they had not been involved in their own culture because of the oppression.

Accounts that I focused on via Instagram: @navabroisss, @stevestrr, @notoriouscree, @indigenoustiktok, @shinanova and @indigenouspeoplesmovement

I have brought my attention to the content that these accounts are sharing with the online community because they have been getting a lot of time in the spotlight for celebrating indigenous cultures.

Analysis
I had sent the accounts listed previously to my interviewee and asked four questions about the content of these online content creators. The accounts that I sent are all western based, but all have shared experiences with the oppression of their culture.

Susino: What is your first response to seeing these accounts?

Thompson-Oakes: A lot of these accounts I already follow and support very much. Especially the vocal singer, she is beautiful from way up north, she’s got a beautiful voice. I love all the accounts you sent from the @indigenoustiktok, just having all of these indigenous peoples all put into one spot on Instagram that are all from TikTok. I think I might even be on there somewhere. All of the accounts you sent I support them all and I love seeing our culture where they couldn’t be put out there before. We’re taking up spaces where our ancestors weren’t allowed to be in those spaces.

Susino: Do you think these accounts create an atmosphere of cultural learning and acceptance? What stands out to you?

Thompson-Oakes: I do believe these accounts do [promote an environment of cultural learning and acceptance], and actually some of these accounts inspired me to get on my TikTok game or get on my Instagram game when I was full blown into it. What stands out to me is the indigenous culturally driven atmosphere, it’s just beautiful to see our culture being celebrated.

Susino: Most of these accounts are about western indigenous communities. You are from the Mohawk community, correct? Would you like to see these accounts accurately represent your cultural experiences as well as their own?

Thompson-Oakes: I did notice that most of these accounts are western accounts, I am eastern native American, Kanien’kehá:ka, the people of the flint, also known as the Mohawk. I would actually like to see culturally relevant Mohawk experiences put out there. I am starting to see a little bit int he movies, like if you watch Barkskins, they were really respectful of the culture in there. I actually played in the background on that show. Yes, we may be different tribes, and they may be living way out on the west, and we’re way out on the east, but i feel we’re still connected and we’re still celebrating the same things. We just live in different areas and we have different environments so I love that they’re sharing their story, and us mohawks can share our story.

Susino: In your community, are the indigenous boarding schools talked about? If so, what about them?

Thompson-Oakes: “I’m afraid in our community we did have to deal with boarding schools, actually my grandfather was put through a boarding school as a young boy. My family is still dealing with the effects of the boarding school era. For example, my mom doesn’t speak the Mohawk language at all because it skipped a generation, and I feel it was from the boarding school era. What the boarding schools were for was to take the Indian out of the person, so you weren’t allowed to be Indian no more. You weren’t allowed to speak your language, you weren’t allowed to dress in your culture’s regalia, you weren’t allowed to represent your culture at all. So [my grandfather] he lost all that and I feel that just trickled into my mom’s generation. My generation is the generation that is finally putting in the healing work and getting back to our cultural way, our ancestral ways by learning the language, learning our teachings, learning to be connected with our Mother Earth. Spirituality is a big thing with our culture, also with our songs, just everything in general is so beautiful in our culture.

The possible consequences of the results that I found from my research are positive. The indigenous culture is making great headway in the social media aspect, and that will lead to more discussions outside of the media platforms as well. With the viral phenomenon of the indigenous TikTok videos, pages like @indigenoustiktok arise, putting all of the indigenous created content on one page. This allows other users to become aware of the different indigenous content creators that are actively opening themselves up and sharing their culture.

Conclusion
My thesis statement has been satisfied by my research. Indigenous peoples are using social media as a means of outreach, specifically in the learning aspect. They are aiming to teach each other, and those outside of their community, how to celebrate their culture. Social media has aided in the outreach of indigenous community, like with Steven Thompson-Oakes and learning about western indigenous culture, and being able to share his own culture with them as well.

References

Botangen, K. A., Vodanovich, S., & Yu, J. (2018). Preservation of indigenous culture among indigenous migrants through social media: The Igorot peoples. Ithaca: Cornell University Library, arXiv.org. doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.niagara.edu/10.24251/HICSS.2017.278

Carjuzaa, J. (2017). Revitalizing indigenous languages, cultures, and histories in montana, across the united states and around the globe. Cogent Education, 4(1) doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.niagara.edu/10.1080/2331186X.2017.1371822

Gomashie, G. A. (2019). KANIEN’KEHA / MOHAWK INDIGENOUS LANGUAGE REVITALISATION EFFORTS IN CANADA. McGill Journal of Education (Online), 54(1), 151-171. Retrieved from https://ezproxy.niagara.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.ezproxy.niagara.edu/scholarly-journals/kanienkeha-mohawk-indigenous-language/docview/2275866826/se-2?accountid=28213

Hiller, C., & Carlson, E. (2018). THESE ARE INDIGENOUS LANDS: Foregrounding Settler Colonialism and Indigenous Sovereignty as Primary Contexts for Canadian Environmental Social Work. Canadian Social Work Review / Revue Canadienne De Service Social, 35(1), 45-70. doi:10.2307/26593191

Hylton, K. (2012) Talk the talk, walk the walk: defining Critical Race Theory in research, Race Ethnicity and Education, 15:1, 23-41, DOI: 10.1080/13613324.2012.638862

International Labour Organization (ILO), Indigenous Tribal People Convention, C169, 27 June 1989, C169. Retrieved from https://www.ilo.org/dyn/normlex/en/f?p=NORMLEXPUB:12100:0::NO:12100:P12100_ILO_CODE:C169.

Kielburger, C. (2020, Feb 23). Indigenous Youth Turn To Social Media To Help Reverse Language Loss. Times – Colonist Retrieved from https://ezproxy.niagara.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.ezproxy.niagara.edu/docview/2361636028?accountid=28213

Kunze, S. (2018). This benevolent experiment. Indigenous Boarding Schools, Genocide, And Redress In Canada And The United States. Social Science Journal, 55(2), 216. Retrieved from https://ezproxy.niagara.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.ezproxy.niagara.edu/scholarly-journals/this-benevolent-experiment-indigenous-boarding/docview/2076371088/se-2?accountid=28213

Llewellyn, J. J. (2002). Dealing with the Legacy of Native Residential School Abuse in Canada: Litigation, ADR and Restorative Justice. University of Toronto Law Journal, 52(3), 253-300. doi:http://dx.doi.org.ezproxy.niagara.edu/10.2307/825996

Peace, T. (2013). Decolonization and Resilience in North American Indigenous History. Journal of Colonialism & Colonial History, 14(3), 1. Retrieved from https://ezproxy.niagara.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.ezproxy.niagara.edu/scholarly-journals/decolonization-resilience-north-american/docview/1462376565/se-2?accountid=28213

Social media and society; Investigators at University of Windsor Describe Findings in Social Media and Society (unpacking the political effects of social movements with a strong digital component: The case of #idlenomore in Canada). (2020, Jun 15). Internet Weekly News Retrieved from https://ezproxy.niagara.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.ezproxy.niagara.edu/docview/2414161014?accountid=28213

Thompson-Oakes, S. (2021, April 22). [Instant messenger interview by the author].