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Matinee: 'A Navajo Photographer Reconnects'
1 April 2023
Saturday matinees long ago let us escape from the ordinary world to the island of the Swiss Family Robinson or the mutinous decks of the Bounty. Why not, we thought, escape the usual fare here with Saturday matinees of our favorite photography films?
So we're pleased to present the 494th in our series of Saturday matinees today: A Navajo Photographer Reconnects With Her Roots.
In this 3:57 video, Jaylyn Gough introduces herself from the Diné (Navajo) Tribe in New Mexico and Native Women's Wilderness, the organization she founded "to be a platform for Native voices, a place to express the love and passion for the Wild and to provide education of the ancestral lands we all love to explore."
A visit to Standing Rock, site of the Dakota Pipeline protests, inspired her to both learn more about her Navajo background and establish Native Women's Wilderness.
To learn more about her heritage, she had a valuable resource. Her grandfather.
They go to Mount Taylor, the sacred mountain which marks the southern boundary of the Navajo lands. He tells the story of Navajo incarceration for assimilation and, after liberation, the return to Mount Taylor.
When you visit a new place, Gough suggests, don't just plan on visiting the main attractions.
"Do research on the community itself," she recommends. Find a way to give back, buying from the local vendors, for example. Leave it a better place than you found it.
Advice we should no doubt take to heart no matter where we are.