美国国家公共电台 NPR--'Like a living scrapbook': 'My Powerful Hair' is a celebration of Native culture

'Like a living scrapbook': 'My Powerful Hair' is a celebration of Native culture

Transcript¹

My Powerful Hair is a new picture book that turns a painful truth about racism² into a celebration of Native culture.

When Carole Lindstrom was a little girl growing up in Bellevue, Nebraska, she really wanted long hair. She would put the blanket she had as a baby on her head and, "pretend I had long hair, you know, swing it around," she laughs.

She couldn't understand why her mother wouldn't let her. "Every time it got a little bit long, she said, 'We have to cut it. It's too wild,'" Lindstrom remembers.

She says her mother didn't seem to have a good explanation. One clue was a black and white photograph that sat on top of the TV set — a picture of her grandmother and two great aunts. "They were wearing these white smocks and their hair was just really chopped short and they had bangs. They just didn't look right," says Lindstrom. "And I remember asking my mom about that picture...and my mom didn't really know much about it other than to say, 'Well, that was when grandma and your great aunts were sent to boarding school. Indian boarding school.'"

A brutal³ effort to erase⁴ Native culture

At Indian boarding schools, children were forbidden to speak their Native languages and forced to cut their hair, among other indignities⁵.

As an adult, Lindstrom set out to find out more about her culture and learned the truth about hair. "The hair is such a big part of who we are and our identity," she says, "It's like a living scrapbook."

In My Powerful Hair, a little girl relates the events of her life with the length of her hair.

"When my baby brother was born, my hair touched my shoulders. The gift of welcoming him into the world is woven into my hair," Lindstrom writes.

Lindstrom is Anishinaabe/Métis and an enrolled⁶ citizen of of the Turtle Mountain Band of Ojibwe.

Ten year old Talon⁷ Jerome, who lives on the Turtle Mountain Reservation, identifies with her new book. "Our hair is the source of our strength and power and memories," he says.

Talon and his mother, Cherona Jerome, are members of the Turtle Mountain Band of Ojibwe. Cherona teaches at Talon's school. She says books like My Powerful Hair are important for her students to read.

"It's a beautifully written story and very relatable to our own experiences," Jerome says. "My mother was a boarding school survivor⁸ and I do recall pictures of her also with very, very short hair. Her and some of my aunts who went to boarding school also."

In the story, the young girl cuts her hair when her grandfather (Nimishoomis) dies. "I sent it into the spirit world with him so that he could have my energies," she says.

"[This] kind of brought back some memories of my grandmother's passing," says Jerome. "I also cut my hair...and it went with her in the grave. It's just a sign of mourning for us."

Bringing more diverse books to readers

Jerome also relates to Lindstrom's desire to teach children Native traditions. She says the hard truth is that her mother and grandparents' were taught to be, "ashamed of their culture. They they weren't allowed to be proud of it." She continues, "We're the generation that's teaching them our culture again."

Lindstrom says there was a time when publishers wouldn't even look at her stories about Indigenous⁹ culture. "So I was writing tooth fairy stories and all those things," she jokes. Then, she says, We Need Diverse Books came about. The campaign, launched in 2014, pushed for greater diversity in publishing. "And when that happened, the world kind of suddenly went 'click,'" she says.

A publisher snapped up her book We Are Water Protectors. It won a Caldecott Medal and became a bestseller.

Lindstrom wishes the world had "clicked" sooner. She says she almost never saw children who looked like her in the books she read as a little girl. Those she did see, were depicted¹⁰ as savages¹¹. She says My Powerful Hair is her "gift" to children who look like her.

"I just want them...to see themselves in a positive way when they pick up a book. I didn't have that. It was always blonde hair, real light colored skin, not who I was when I was younger," she says, "I just didn't know where my people were."

Lindstrom says her mother died in 2015 without ever learning the power of her hair.

1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 racism   

n.民族主义；种族歧视(意识)

参考例句：

• He said that racism is endemic in this country.他说种族主义在该国很普遍。
• Racism causes political instability and violence.种族主义道致政治动荡和暴力事件。

3 brutal   

adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的

参考例句：

• She has to face the brutal reality.她不得不去面对冷酷的现实。
• They're brutal people behind their civilised veneer.他们表面上温文有礼，骨子里却是野蛮残忍。

4 erase   

v.擦掉；消除某事物的痕迹

参考例句：

• He tried to erase the idea from his mind.他试图从头脑中抹掉这个想法。
• Please erase my name from the list.请把我的名字从名单上擦去。

5 indignities   

n.侮辱，轻蔑( indignity的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The soldiers who were captured suffered many indignities at the hands of the enemy. 被俘的士兵在敌人手中受尽侮辱。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• What sort of indignities would he be forced to endure? 他会被迫忍受什么样的侮辱呢？ 来自辞典例句

6 enrolled   

adj.入学登记了的v.[亦作enrol]( enroll的过去式和过去分词 )；登记，招收，使入伍（或入会、入学等），参加，成为成员；记入名册；卷起，包起

参考例句：

• They have been studying hard from the moment they enrolled. 从入学时起，他们就一直努力学习。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He enrolled with an employment agency for a teaching position. 他在职业介绍所登了记以谋求一个教师的职位。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 talon   

n.爪；（如爪般的）手指；爪状物

参考例句：

• Can you get a little tighter with the talon?你能不能把摄像探头固定住不动？
• This kind of spice is made of eagle's talon and has a unique flavor.这种香料味道独特，是用鹰爪作原料制成的。

8 survivor   

n.生存者，残存者，幸存者

参考例句：

• The sole survivor of the crash was an infant.这次撞车的惟一幸存者是一个婴儿。
• There was only one survivor of the plane crash.这次飞机失事中只有一名幸存者。

9 indigenous   

adj.土产的，土生土长的，本地的

参考例句：

• Each country has its own indigenous cultural tradition.每个国家都有自己本土的文化传统。
• Indians were the indigenous inhabitants of America.印第安人是美洲的土著居民。

10 depicted   

描绘，描画( depict的过去式和过去分词 )； 描述

参考例句：

• Other animals were depicted on the periphery of the group. 其他动物在群像的外围加以修饰。
• They depicted the thrilling situation to us in great detail. 他们向我们详细地描述了那激动人心的场面。

11 savages   

未开化的人，野蛮人( savage的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• There're some savages living in the forest. 森林里居住着一些野人。
• That's an island inhabited by savages. 那是一个野蛮人居住的岛屿。