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Seattle teen calls out her dad’s Native American art. He learns she’s right Sara Jacobsen, 19, grew up eating family dinners beneath a stunning Native American robe.
Not that she gave it much thought. Until, that is, her senior year of high school, when she saw a picture of a strikingly similar robe in an art history class.
The teacher told the class about how the robe was used in spiritual ceremonies, Sara Jacobsen said. “I started to wonder why we have it in our house when we’re not Native American.”
She said she asked her dad a few questions about this robe. Her dad, Bruce Jacobsen, called that an understatement.
“I felt like I was on the wrong side of a protest rally, with terms like ‘cultural appropriation’ and ‘sacred ceremonial robes’ and ‘completely inappropriate,’ and terms like that,” he said.
“I got defensive at first, of course,” he said. “I was like, ‘C’mon, Sara! This is more of the political stuff you all say these days.’”
But Sara didn’t back down. “I feel like in our country there are so many things that white people have taken that are not theirs, and I didn’t want to continue that pattern in our family,” she said.
The robe had been a centerpiece in the Jacobsen home. Bruce Jacobsen bought it from a gallery in Pioneer Square in 1986, when he first moved to Seattle. He had wanted to find a piece of Native art to express his appreciation of the region.
The Chilkat robe that hung over the Jacobsen dining room table for years. Credit Courtesy of the Jacobsens
“I just thought it was so beautiful, and it was like nothing I had seen before,” Jacobsen said.
The robe was a Chilkat robe, or blanket, as it’s also known. They are woven by the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian peoples of Alaska and British Columbia and are traditionally made from mountain goat wool. The tribal or clan origin of this particular 6-foot-long piece was unclear, but it dated back to around 1900 and was beautifully preserved down to its long fringe.
“It’s a completely symmetric pattern of geometric shapes, and also shapes that come from the culture,” like birds, Jacobsen said. “And then it’s just perfectly made — you can see no seams in it at all.”
Jacobsen hung the robe on his dining room wall.
After more needling from Sara, Jacobsen decided to investigate her claims. He emailed experts at the Burke Museum, which has a huge collection of Native American art and artifacts.
“I got this eloquent email back that said, ‘We’re not gonna tell you what to go do,’ but then they confirmed what Sara said: It was an important ceremonial piece, that it was usually owned by an entire clan, that it would be passed down generation to generation, and that it had a ton of cultural significance to them.“
Jacobsen says he was a bit disappointed to learn that his daughter was right about his beloved Chilkat robe. But he and his wife Gretchen now no longer thought of the robe as theirs. Bruce Jacobsen asked the curators at the Burke Museum for suggestions of institutions that would do the Chilkat robe justice. They told him about the Sealaska Heritage Institute in Juneau.
When Jacobsen emailed, SHI Executive Director Rosita Worl couldn’t believe the offer. “I was stunned. I was shocked. I was in awe. And I was so grateful to the Jacobsen family.”
Worl said the robe has a huge monetary value. But that’s not why it’s precious to local tribes.
“It’s what we call ‘atoow’: a sacred clan object,” she said. “Our beliefs are that it is imbued with the spirit of not only the craft itself, but also of our ancestors. We use [Chilkat robes] in our ceremonies when we are paying respect to our elders. And also it unites us as a people.”
Since the Jacobsens returned the robe to the institute, Worl said, master weavers have been examining it and marveling at the handiwork. Chilkat robes can take a year to make – and hardly anyone still weaves them.
“Our master artist, Delores Churchill, said it was absolutely a spectacular robe. The circles were absolutely perfect. So it does have that importance to us that it could also be used by our younger weavers to study the art form itself.”
Worl said private collectors hardly ever return anything to her organization. The federal Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act requires museums and other institutions that receive federal funding to repatriate significant cultural relics to Native tribes. But no such law exists for private collectors.
Bruce and Gretchen Jacobsen hold the Chilkat robe they donated to the Sealaska Heritage Institute as Joe Zuboff, Deisheetaan, sings and drums and Brian Katzeek (behind robe) dances during the robe’s homecoming ceremony Saturday, August 26, 2017. Credit NOBU KOCH / SEALASKA HERITAGE INSTITUTE
Worl says the institute is lobbying Congress to improve the chances of getting more artifacts repatriated. “We are working on a better tax credit system that would benefit collectors so that they could be compensated,” she said.
Worl hopes stories like this will encourage people to look differently at the Native art and artifacts they possess.
The Sealaska Heritage Institute welcomed home the Chilkat robe in a two-hour ceremony over the weekend. Bruce and Gretchen Jacobsen traveled to Juneau to celebrate the robe’s homecoming.
Really glad that this is treated as hard hitting news, no really, I am
This is why spaces like Tumblr are so vital in changing the narrative. We cannot back down from the truth.
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Watch me get progressively lazier with the backgrounds on this one 🙈
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bye i love this
Man: Siri, what is 1 trillion to the tenth power?
Siri: Calculation. The answer is one zero zero zero zero zero [continuing]
Man: *starts beatboxing to the rhythm.
Woman 1: *joins in*
Woman 2: *starts singing to the rhythm*This is sO GOOD
never gets old
I could listen to this on loop for hours.
A correct to the transcript:
The man is beat boxing. The first woman joined in with jathiswaram. The second woman starts alap/alapanai.
(via r2y9s-notartblog)
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On the last leg of my hike I came across a little girl in a jean fabric dress and wearing glitter eyeshadow. She patiently watched me take pictures of cows lying in the shade before she approached me and asked if I wanted to buy something from her flea market stall since no one had bought anything yet. “I even have a deer skull!” I was told, so of course I followed her a few steps along the road to a house by the edge of the village where she had, indeed, set up a blanket and a table in the front garden with trinkets and a (small) mounted deer skull.
There were little yellow post-it notes with an elementary schooler’s handwriting on them, describing items and listing prices.
Nearby in the garden, a woman watched over us while lighting a cigarette and gave me a nod as the girl offhandedly mentioned that she was her grandma.
After a moment of contemplation I selected a small cup with a strawberry print and handed over the 70cents the girl asked for. In her excitement she miscounted and told me I had only given her 60cents, so I spread the coins on her palm again and we counted together: 50cents, plus ten, plus ten again makes?
She was very happy about her first successful sale and I went home with a cute little cup.
This was the cup by the way!!!
(via r2y9s-notartblog)
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Sub-Radio, the band that did Stacy’s Dad, coming out with another banger for Pride.
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Old piece of art of Magnadramon that I made. I still love it dearly. I think in the future I would like to see about remaking it. Think I could add more to it.
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birds have truly mastered feathers like what do you Mean they can be shiny. how fucking cool is that
glossy ibis
european starling
greater blue eared starling
nicobar pigeon
purple martin
glowing puffleg
violet backed starling
+ special shoutout to rob garren and his purple poultry project. he is breeding his chickens to be very shiny and very purple
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It just hit me that in KH1 when Sora, Riku and Kairi are building the raft… Riku probably mostly solo built that thing. ‘Cause like, he’s complaining about Sora just sleeping on the beach and not working and Kairi seems to be barking orders for rations and fiddling with seashells while the boys do the heavy lifting. Riku’s just over there building the raft like 'want to see other worlds’ meanwhile Sora’s like 'I sleep’
Oh yes this. The feeling of being secondary is such a core point of Riku’s character in the beginning. Kairi and Sora growing closer and pulling away from him makes him act out yet that only results in them pulling away even more. Throughout KH1 Riku throws prickly comments at them and then smoothing them out claiming he’s joking. A tactic to make everyone else feel less confident in themselves while appearing confident himself.. while he’s the truly insecure one. He wants them to need him.
It really makes me think about the future. Riku’s found his trust in his friends and himself, but what about Sora? Sora still believes himself to be less than. Sora still believes his friends to be stronger than himself, that he needs them or else he is nothing. Where will he find the strength Riku found for himself?
It’s so fascinating comparing Sora and Riku from KH 1 to KH 3: Riku grows from being insecure to confident, while Sora experiences the opposite. It’ll be very interesting to see how Sora handles being in Quadratum. Strelitzia may be there to guide him through this new world, but Sora is mostly on his own now and will have to rely on his own abilities.
Which is why the scene of Sora running towards the Darkside in the trailer is so powerful: he’s got no friends, and he has no idea if he’ll be able to take down the Darkside by himself. But the city is in danger, and whether he’s strong enough or not, Sora won’t stand by and let innocent people get hurt.
I don’t think Sora really ever has been confident, he’s been defiant. Trying to prove everyone they’re wrong about him, but his resolve has started to waver. The doubts been creeping in.
KH starts out with Sora the Darkside engulfing him, to the tune of the words “Don’t be afraid”, yet that’s what Sora truly is, afraid. Sora just fights his fear with getting angry instead and taking action.
But it truly is so, that no matter how he feels he’ll always choose to protect those around him, the true courage to act even when he’s afraid. Maybe KH4 and Quadratum is where he finds that confidence he needs, the strength to become a true keyblade master~
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this shit fucked me up
This is why I hate the like, casual ha ha aren’t men awful jokes that people like to casually throw around.
Like, men are victims of the patriarchy too, and loneliness and isolation is what brings out the worst in people.
I’m not saying you have to be nice to or defend wretched men, but don’t treat them as wretched just because they are men. Treat them as wretched because they are wretched.
A departure from rigid, binary gender norms benefits all of us.
(via little-robin-h00d)
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I hate that planned obsolescence is starting to reach fandoms. I hate that fandoms are starting to die after two, three years, I hate that whenever you stop getting content that means the fandom will die and be gone.
I need people to stop trying to brush off old interests as being ‘cringe’ as soon as you lose interest, or worse: make it seem like it’s imoral to like something that they themselves held so dear before.
Fandoms are meant to last for years and years, the moment content stops being created is the moment we truly thrive because we keep creating the content ourselves the way we love it and expand on the things that are already there for us.
I don’t care if you lost interest on something, it’s fine and normal even, but stop trying to blame and make fun of people who still do love the fandom and the content and the things we can create.
I need people to enjoy fandom again
Me and the 20+ year old princess tutu fandom continuing to hold fandom exchanges, rewatch, make merch and support each other, write fanfic and make art, and we will continue to:
Enjoy your fandom.
(via little-robin-h00d)
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If you ever feel like you must be the most unobservant person in the world, remember: I once spent half a year failing to notice that my new favourite restaurant was a money-laundering front for the Ukrainian mafia.
(I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but in retrospect, the fact that it was always dead no matter the time of day - I think the busiest I ever saw it was five people, myself included - well, that should have been a tipoff. Also, the waitstaff kept calling me “Mr. Prokopetz”, which I had assumed was just part of the restaurant’s gimmick, but given that “Prokopetz” is a Ukrainian surname, I’m now force to wonder whether they’d thought I was, you know, in the business. I just liked the pierogi!)
What I need to know is how on earth did OP finally realize his favorite restaurant was a money-laundering front for the mafia.
I’d like to say I put together the clues, but in reality, I just showed up one day to find that the place had been indefinitely shut down, and later learned it was because the managers had all been arrested.
What I really want to know is how good the food was?
Excellent, if your tastes run to the “heavy cream and too much garlic” end of the spectrum.
Every crime front I’ve ever eaten at has had completely amazing food, honestly. I am pretty convinced that if you want to open a front, you don’t choose “restaurant” as your front-business unless you have a relative who loves to cook.
It tickles me that this is evidently a sufficiently common experience that people find it relatable. (Seriously, check the notes!) We should write reviews or something.
did I just read the line “every crime front I’ve ever eaten at” with my own two eyes
Look, I went to college and lived my early adulthood in a town whose entire thing was import/export, and we had a lot of restaurants that were suspiciously empty except when they were closed and filled with very serious men in nice clothes.
They were usually run by someone who was about the right age to be some adult’s parents or grandparents, and in the case of the two Korean restaurants matching this description, they didn’t speak English. Universally though, they were very pleased to see customers, very proud of their cooking, and very very interested in keeping us far away from the aforementioned serious men in nice clothes. And despite having huge dining rooms and never having more than a couple customers, they never went out of business.
Also, because I am very, very stupid and sometimes don’t think before I talk, I once said loudly, over the phone, while sitting in one of these places, “Hey! Yeah if you want to meet us, we’re eating at [place]. You know…[place]? You totally know it. The Front, on Warwick st!”
The looks I got from every single employee were amazing and then I left.
We had a corner store/deli-place near our apartment in college. Everyone knew they were in on something and no one cared because they looked out for their customers and their neighborhood as a whole.
They started stocking my favorites because I mentioned them within hearing range once, would tell their “vendors” to move out of the way if we stopped in. I walked a different route home and got harassed one night and they asked after me. When they found out what happened, they declared “Consider it taken care of, you should never be afraid around here.” Never happened again.
Everyone needs their friendly neighborhood crime lord.
This is both my favorite and makes me fondly remember home. Less of the eateries, more of the mysterious retail joints that never seem to close despite no one ever buying anything, though. Well. Aside from the juice bar. Didnt last, though.
I found these places everywhere I lived. My favorite was an omurice place near my home in Japan, and a mother/son officially ran it. The food was incredible, and one night I was there and there was a boisterous crowd of BLATANTLY yakuza men eating and drinking. They started talking to me, and were super nice. Said they wanted to “practice their English,” and paid for my food and drinks and then said they wanted to take me to karaoke. That was a little alarming, but the mother/son, who seriously looked after me as the only foreigner in the area, said I should go, and the son came along. So we piled into a white landboat Cadillac and partied until dawn.
One of the older men at the party took me to my neighborhood and dropped me off out front (the car was literally too big to fit down the small neighborhood streets) and said that I had his blessing.
Which was confusing, but I was drunk, so whatever. Then I went back to the restaurant about a week later and the mother said, “the family approves of you. You may marry our son if you wish and be welcomed.”
I did not marry him, but wow. There were no hard feelings, either. They still helped out if I got harassed by the cops (which happened a lot in these smaller towns with no foreigners) or anything like that.
And to this day, no omurice has ever compared.
(via little-robin-h00d)
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lucyheartfiliaxxnatsudragneel:
THIS IS THE BEST THING I HAVE EVER SEEN
I’VE BEEN TRYING TO FIND THIS FOR SEVEN YEARS
DO YOU UNDERSTAND HOW HARD IT IS TO ?????
That last fatal scream tho
THE TERROR IN HIS SCREAM OH GOSH
i’m crying
WAAA-
I will always reblog this on the off chance some other poor soul has been searching for it
IT’S BACK
HOYL SHIT ITS B A CK
IT’S BACK?? ON MY DASH?
re-blogging again xD
what was that we were just saying about still having posts circulating from ridiculous numbers of years ago? 😂
(via little-robin-h00d)
