Community Discourse
Jacksonville's name commemorates Andrew Jackson, the seventh President of the United States and "a forceful proponent for Indian removal" on the Florida peninsula ("Indian removal"). Ol' Hickory spent very little time in the Sunshine State, and none at all in Jacksonville. This is ironic, as our city has what could best be described as a transient population. There is a heavy military influence on Jacksonville's commerce and industry; some estimates hold that up to 20% of our population is directly related to the United States Navy.
So Jacksonville is a place named for a man who never lived here. It is largely populated by people who came here from somewhere else. That's not to say that this place lacks character. To the contrary, the region has a rich and colorful history that was forged by Spanish, British, and French influences over the centuries. Native American populations also called what is now Duval County home, though their presence in the region was irrevocably altered by the forced removal of the five major Indian nations of the American South:
Early in the 19th century, while the rapidly-growing United States expanded into the lower South, white settlers faced what they considered an obstacle. This area was home to the Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw, Chicasaw and Seminole nations. These Indian nations, in the view of the settlers and many other white Americans, were standing in the way of progress. Eager for land to raise cotton, the settlers pressured the federal government to acquire Indian territory. ("Indian removal")
The idea of "standing in the way of progress" informs some of the rhetoric that I recall studying back at Pendleton High School, when we discussed the disappearance of Celilo Falls and the cultural and material losses of an entire social group's way of life. Despite grave misgivings expressed by Bureau of Indian Affairs Commissioner William Brophy, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers built the dam at The Dalles. As the Web site to the right suggests, this project has been integral in bringing progress to the Columbia River Valley:
Since its construction, the dam has generated more than 9.2 billion kilowatt hours of electricity and passed up to 10 million tons of river cargo annually. The authorized primary project purposes are navigation and power generation.
But one person's progress is another person's sacrifice, and in the cases of both communities that I have called home throughout much of my adult life, those sacrifices were born by the native populations of the regions. So how can we use the power of community history to prevent such abuses in the future? At least part of
the answer lies in the practice of documenting the aporia—of making sense of
what is at stake when we bring the full measure of our will to bear on nature.
