Female tribal leaders held a panel discussion at the University of Connecticut Law School on Thursday to mark Native American Heritage Month.
L.t Gov. Susan Bysiewicz moderated the panel. She was fresh off a visit to the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center.
They talked about misconceptions, how they got to where they are and what it means to be a tribal leader.
Bysiewicz asked each of them if there had been a defining moment in their careers—a moment when they knew they were meant to lead.
Eastern Pequot Tribal Nation vice chair Brenda Geer said it was when her tribe’s federal recognition was revoked.
“That devastated our community,” Geer said. “And to see everybody, our tribal members, the devastation that that caused, I thought, there has to be a way to turn this around. And I promised our people that I would do everything I could until there was no breath in my body to have this turned around.”
The tribe's federal recognition was revoked in 2005 because officials were concerned they would build a casino. The tribe unsuccessfully sued to have it reinstated in 2012.
Geer said that concern was a common misconception about tribal nations.
“Connecticut residents specifically assume that [with] federal recognition automatically comes a casino, which is not true,” Geer said. “From our perspective, it's all about education, housing and medical. Those are the things that any normal community would need.”
Sarah Harris, the vice chairwoman of the Mohegan Tribe, said for her, it was less about misconceptions and more about a “fundamental lack of understanding.”
“For instance, in New England, Native American peoples were basically almost written out of existence…When you leave all of those people out, Indian women in particular in this area, if you're reading the histories, the recorded histories of New England by any of the historians that were even just folks that were writing about this at the time, women are just absent,” Harris said. “But we were a matrilineal society.”
In 2022, Connecticut passed a law that requires students in grades K-12 to learn about Native American history.
“Which is wonderful, and we now have a curriculum department that is writing curriculum that can be plugged into schools,” Harris said. “But I think that's where it really starts.”
Watch the whole panel discussion here.
