NAISA members and all,

I am not participating in NAISA 2010 this year being held in Tucson, Arizona.

I cannot and will not abide with betrayal perpetrated by NAISA leadership. Violating the economic boycott urged by Congressman Raul Grijalva against the racist, profiling law passed by the Arizona legislature that violently affects and offends Indigenous people is betrayal.

I feel personally betrayed by Robert Warrior, president of NAISA, who I have helped in the past by writing a letter of reference-recommendation when he was a candidate for a position at Brown University, a job he turned down after all when it was offered, and also a letter for a special recognition of his scholarship and academic achievement accruing to his status as a professor at University of Oklahoma that he was subsequently awarded due, I’m sure, in some measure, to my help. Professor Warrior has been helpful to me too, I admit, by being a supporter, advocate, and proponent of my own work, and I appreciate that.

Most of all, I feel betrayed because of the betrayal of our Indigenous peoples that Warrior and his leadership and the present NAISA Council perpetrates not only by violating the boycott—giving legitimate-sounding reasons, of course, for doing so—but by refusing to redirect NAISA 2010 so that it would be an active and deliberate move and act of Resistance and a definite, demonstrable, manifest protest against the violent harm caused by Arizona’s passage of SB 1070 that is aimed directly at Indigenous and Indigenous descent peoples crossing the Mexican-U.S. border from the south allegedly “illegally” and at Indigenous peoples who live within the borders of the U.S. I cannot accept betrayal of our own people by our own people. We must not accept betrayal of our people by our own.

This is not a simple decision to make. Robert Warrior and I have been friends for years. I have admired and respected his academic and other work for the most part; I will continue to do so in some measure. I was raised to ah-yah-maatse—to help—in my Ahkuumeh community; we all need to help each other, and I believe in that.

To not participate formally in NAISA 2010 is my definite decision; unless NAISA changes its behavior and direction, I will not participate further in it. I have made my decision and I will live by it. I have friends who will continue their involvement with NAISA, not that I necessarily agree with them; that’s their personal decisions to make. In fact, I will probably come to meet with friends at the conference as I am not giving up on them—at least not at this point.

With courage and love and for the sake of the land, culture, community always, Simon J. Ortiz, Eagle Clan, Child of Antelope Clan, Acoma Pueblo, Professor, Arizona State University, American Indian Studies, Department of English