Basic HTML Version
metal-frame bed, a couch, an over–
stuffed chair and an end table piled
high with old magazines. A transis–
tor radio and a battery-powered cas–
sette player sit
in
one comer of the
bedroom-living room.
A small window
in
the kitchen
is
brokén. Stan fixed it with a card–
board, temporarily. Maybe he can
afford a new windowpane sometime
later, but he will have to wait.
Money
is
scarce now, as income
from his part-time job of fighting
forest fires is unpredictable. Even
so, Stan is lucky. Most - 65 percent
- of the Navajo labor force is
unemployed.
Stan's two-room house has no
electricity, no running water, no
ftush toilet, no gas heat. Yet Stan's
family is, again, considered lucky by
his neighbors. Many families within
this underdeveloped Indian world
live in one-room dwellings with dirt
ftoors. Only
in
recent years have
38
most acquired beds to sleep on.
Formerly, nearly everyone slept on
sheepskins laid around the perime–
ter ofthe six-sided log and mud huts
called "hogans."
Seeing Through American
lndian Eyes
I met Stan and his family one day
in July while visiting Window Rock,
Arizona, the Navajo capital city.
Stan and his family were there for
shopping.
I was there to interview tribal of–
ficials and !ay people to find out as
much as I could about life on a
modero Indian reservation. 1
wanted -to see and understand the
problems facing Indians from
their
perspective. During my visit, 1
talked with tribal officials and
educators, sheepherders and Jumber
mili workers, trading post operators
and farmers, young and old. I trav–
eled over most of the passable roads
JULIA YAZZIE
lives w ith her three
daughters Carmen, Mae and Bonita in
this tradit ional Navajo hagan. lnside
the hagan (right) a teen-age friend vis–
its Carmen while mother entertains
Bonita. This primitive dwelling is sur–
prisingly cool inside, even in summer.
and spent time with dozens of Na–
vajos.
I sat Navajo style, watching
grandfathers admire grandchildren
at play. I observed women weaving
rugs made from wool sheared, car–
ded and spun by their own hands.
1 breathed the dry Arizona air
while sunsets painted puffy white
clouds brilliant hues of red and or–
ange. On other days, my teeth
gritted together and my .eyes burned
as 1 trudged through stinging sand–
storms in this land of continua}
drought. 1 walked through irrigated
cornfields and relaxed with friendly
Navajos in their hogans.
Photographing freely, 1 endeav-
PLAIN TRUTH Februory 1973