00:00These aren't just clothes, they're not just styles, these are works of culture, understanding, teachings, and medicine for us, and that's something that was stripped away from us.
00:20What I found my place within ribbon working and my identity is that this is my purpose, this is my gift, and this is something that I was made to do.
00:30Before 2019, I always just went as like a gay person, a gay male. I found a video on YouTube specifying Two-Spirit. That's when I first started understanding the term Two-Spirit, and I just felt so connected to the word.
01:01The term Two-Spirit in itself is an umbrella term we use to help indigenous peoples find a way to connect with the LGBTQ community and have a sort of representation and presence.
01:13We as indigenous queer people have always been in existence for thousands of years in our origin stories. We just went by different names that came from our native language like Dapaaz, Natle, Winkday, Llamana, etc.
01:28In Dineh, Natlehe means those who transform and refers to one of four separate genders, masculine feminine, masculine masculine, feminine masculine, and feminine feminine.
01:39It is not okay for non-indigenous peoples to culturally appropriate or take hold of this identity of Two-Spirit in their own hands because this identity specifically was made by and for indigenous peoples.
01:57It's important to understand and realize that these are variations of different teachings and people across all indigenous communities, not only in America, but in Canada and Mexico and Amazons and Hawaii.
02:21When I learned the term Two-Spirit, I really got engaged with my identity. I've always had the love for fashion when I was younger, and I've just always been a designer at heart.
02:32So when I started wanting to dress more feminine, I wanted to take the gender role of a woman as well and to completely bask in my identity and grow from there.
02:43And so when I was researching a lot of my traditional women's wear in both Navajo and Apache culture, I found that there was a lot of ribbon work within it.
02:52So that's when I really started learning more about ribbon work and understanding that ribbon work in itself was mostly seen throughout all indigenous tribes.
03:13There's a lot of time, effort, energy, and above all, creativity as well as spirituality that goes into these ribbon skirts.
03:31These ribbon works do hold stories along so many different tribes in so many different ways. When I'm making a ribbon skirt, I make sure to incorporate the things that matter to me within that ribbon skirt, whether it's design, cut, the ribbon style, or even the colors of the ribbons and how they align with each other.
03:50America is stolen land. Taking people from their villages, raping them, murdering them, and then stealing from them is not conquering. That is plain genocide.
04:14We as indigenous peoples have been through so much trauma, so much harmful times where we wouldn't even be allowed to wear turquoise jewelry, ribbon work.
04:28It's not okay to be making a costume out of it anymore. It's not okay to be just honoring our people. When you're displaying your culture appropriation in public for everyone to see, that's very detrimental to us as indigenous people. These are really close to us, and this is something that we get to keep for ourselves.
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