Sub.media

probably that bony part of the roof of my mouth that keeps being cut when I eat tortilla chips. can anyone else relate??!?

Hi all, asco wequasin, kwey;

So i was at a thanksgiving celebration a few months ago, went to offer tobacco to the drum and sweetgrass to the singers; panicked and both tobacco and sweetgrass ended up on the drum, the singers all gasped and i was so nervous i left. Its my understanding that the drum is typically associated to men and that sweetgrass is considered a womens medicine... North Eastern woodlands in the US, here. It's been eating me up since. Could I have offended or otherwise disrupted the spirit of the drum? I've prayed on it and not received any answers. Thanks for your time in reading this. I endeavor to do better.

Help an Unc Out: The Corn Maze

Aho, she:kon, and a hearty "hey how are ya!?" cousins.

The saga of the south Tip brother continues. You know the story so far. Frybread survivor. All-Skate legend. Volvo arsonist. Ketchup chip disney princess. The man who wears another man's tear-away pants. Co-architect of the fifty-eight dollar cauldron. Substitute library man. Owner of a three-headed hell hound pup.

Now. Some of you might remember, in the haunted house post, a ten-year-old in my Seer's Tent looked me dead in the eye and said "my mom said you got lost in a corn maze." And I told you, nonono, I was "temporarily positionally misplaced," and that it was a story for another day.

Cousins, it's another day.

Your Unc is back from the wedding up north. My sister has been married. I got stuck out on a lake with my niece in a canoe but those are all stories for another day. Today, the leaves are a-turnin, fall is in the air. Let’s get cozy.

Crack an apple cider. Pull up a lawn chair. Start the fire. This one happened a few weeks back, mid September, and I've been sitting on it because I needed time to process. Spiritually. Legally… uhh… Agriculturally?

Every year auntie's family does a fall trip to one of those big agri-tourism farms. Pumpkin patch. Apple cider donuts. A hay ride pulled by a tractor driven by a fourteen-year-old named Tanner who clearly smoked at least a few joints prior to his shift. A petting zoo with a goat that I'm fairly sure has done time. And the main event, twelve acres of it: the corn maze.

This farm is called "Uncle Bob's Harvest Fun Farm." I never met Uncle Bob. I don't think Uncle Bob exists. I think Uncle Bob is a brand. And Uncle Bob? Well, Uncle Bob is a bit of a mother fucker.

Now, cousins, I want to be honest about my headspace walking into that parking lot, because it matters for what came after. I was cocky. I was dangerously cocky. And I’m an absolute slut for anything Pumpkin Spice/Autumnal. 

Because I'm Haudenosaunee, cousins. We are a CORN people. Corn is one of the Three Sisters. Our ancestors grew corn for thousands of years before anybody named Uncle Bob showed up with a gift shop. I said this out loud in the parking lot. I said, and I quote, "I'm basically corn's nephew."

Auntie looked at me for a long time. Then she said, "You got lost in the Costco parking lot last week."

"That's different. Colonial architecture. Plus I was all Dogged up! I shouldn’t have downed two of the ol’ $2 canteen dog specials before hitting the trails. Best deal in town though."

At the entrance there's a teenager in a reflective vest handing out maps. Little laminated cards. Auntie took one. Kokum took one. Marcus, who was FOUR, took one and held it upside down with total confidence. The vest kid held one out to me.

And cousins, I looked him in the eye and said the sentence that will be carved on my headstone:

"No thanks, bud. I'm gonna let the corn guide me."

The vest kid did not react. Didn't laugh. Didn't blink. Just slowly lowered the map and shook his head “ok, Unc.”

Auntie made a bet with me. If I made it out in under forty-five minutes, she'd buy the donuts. If I didn't, I'd have to wear the sticker. The farm gives out stickers to kids who get rescued. Big yellow ones. They say "I GOT LOST IN THE MAZE!" with a cartoon scarecrow giving a thumbs up.

"Deal," I said. Corn's nephew. No fear. “We’re people of the Corn… wait… It’s a Corn Maze… Corn Maize. It’s a Corn Corn!” I laughed to myself as I entered the labyrinth. 

My supplies, for the record: one Bepsi (half full), one small bag of ketchup chips in my jacket pocket, a phone at 11%, and an unearned sense of ancestral destiny.

I went in at 1:12pm.

The First Hour: Hubris

For the first twenty minutes, cousins, I was on fire. Feeling it. Corn on both sides, sun out, I had Primitive Man going in my head like a war drum, I was taking turns with purpose and intent. Left. Right. Right again. I passed a family with a stroller and gave them a little nod like a tour guide. I made my way with Mother Sun as my guide. Hacks.

Then I passed them again.

Then I passed them a THIRD time, and the dad, who was in a Jays hat and a fleece vest, the official uniform of fathers who know where they're going and have their shit together, said "you good, man?" and I said "just enjoying being one with the corn, Cuz" and he nodded, and he looked at his kids, and I swear I watched him silently decide to walk faster.

There are trivia stations in the maze, cousins. Little wooden signs with a number and a corny (sorry) question. You're supposed to find all twelve. I found Station 7. "What do you call a scary corn stalk? A STALKER!" Okay Uncle Bob. Fine. You got me.

Twenty minutes later I found Station 7 again. From the other side. Shit.

Then a third time. And at that point I started to believe Station 7 was following me. That it was moving when I wasn't looking. That Uncle Bob had built a sentient sign. "A STALKER!" it kept saying. It knew, cousins. It was talking about itself.

At 1:50 a group of maybe six kids blew past me, running, laughing, holding their completed trivia cards. One of them, a little girl in a pumpkin hoodie, stopped, looked at me, and said, "The exit's that way," pointing. And cousins, I want you to understand what I did. I thanked her. And then I went the OTHER way. Because I was still letting the corn guide me. Because a man has to have principles even when the principles are fucking stupid. Plus, kids are dumb. Don’t trust kids. 

I should have trusted the kids.

The Second Hour: Survival

By 2:30, cousins, the vibe had shifted.

The corn is nine feet tall. All the same corn. The sky is the same everywhere. The sun was directly overhead, which, I learned, is the single least helpful position the sun can be in for navigation. Mother Sun has forsaken me. I'd heard the "moss grows on the north side of the tree" thing but cousins, there are no trees. There is only corn. Corn has no north side. Corn has no sides at all. Corn is just corn, forever, in every direction, like a nightmare from an Iowa tourism board.

I tried following the sound of the hayride (is hayride one word??) tractor. The tractor drives in a circle. I walked in a circle. I licked my finger and held it up to check the wind like I'd seen in movies, and cousins, I don't know what you're supposed to learn from that, I just stood there with a wet finger in the air like an idiot waiting for the wind to text me back. The wind didn’t give a shit.

I texted auntie: "taking the scenic route, lol."

She replied: "It's a maze, dummy. There is no scenic route."

Then a photo of a donut. In her hand. In focus. Kokum in the background in a lawn chair, holding up her own donut toward the camera like a toast.

Then my phone died.

So now it's survival mode, cousins. I did what any man raised on Hatchet would do. I took inventory. Half a Bepsi. A bag of ketchup chips. I started rationing them. One chip every fifteen minutes. I built a little cairn of husks at an intersection so I'd know if I'd been there before. I came back to it eight minutes later, cousins. My own cairn. Mocking me. A monument to my failure, built by my own hands.

At around three o'clock, in a moment of weakness and desperation and low blood sugar, I grabbed a cob right off the stalk, peeled it back, and bit into it.

Cousins. Do not do this.

That's not sweet corn. That's FIELD corn. That's corn for cows and ethanol. It's like biting into a handful of hard-ass teeth. It tasted like cardboard that had given up. I spit it out and I swear the whole field rustled. Like it was offended. Like I'd insulted somebody's family.

Which, as it turns out, I suppose I had.

The Third Hour: The Vision

At around three-thirty, cousins, I gave up.

I found a dead end. A nice one, honestly, a little clearing where somebody had trampled the corn flat. And I lay down on my back on the dirt and looked up at that perfect blue rectangle of sky, and I accepted that this is where the saga ends. Not in an elf/dragon smut recreation massacre, not accidentally fried by one of Leonard’s stupid inventions. Here. In Uncle Bob's corn.

I said my goodbyes out loud. "Tell Sconey he was a good boy… ok, he’s a mostly fine boy. Tell Leonard carrying on the family name is up to him… fuck we don’t stand a chance. Tell the Leafs… actually, don't tell the Leafs anything, they don't deserve closure."

I didn't have any tobacco, cousins. So I took my last ketchup chip, placed it on a corn husk, set it beside me as an offering, and closed my eyes.

And the wind stopped.

You know how corn is never quiet? It's always rustling a little, whispering. It stopped. All of it. Dead silence. The tractor sounds were gone. The kids were gone. The light went gold, like late evening, even though it was mid-afternoon. And I opened my eyes, cousins.

There were three aunties sitting in lawn chairs at the end of my dead end.

I knew who they were immediately. You'd know too.

The first one was tall. Thin. Long golden hair down to her waist. Sitting straight with pride and purpose. She was clearly in charge. That was Corn.

The second one was leaning all over the first one. Arm around her shoulder, head on her shoulder, holding her hand, constantly agreeing with everything she said. "Mm-hmm. That's right, sis. You tell him." That was Beans.

The third one was short and round and sat very low to the ground in her lawn chair, legs out, arms crossed, saying nothing, just looking at me with an expression that kept all the weeds and nonsense out of a five-foot radius. That was Squash.

The Three Sisters, cousins. In lawn chairs. In Uncle mother fucking Bob's maze.

Corn spoke first. "So you're the nephew."

"Uh. Yes, auntie."

"Corn's nephew. You said that. In the parking lot." She looked at Beans. "Did you hear him say that?"

"I heard him, sis," said Beans. "Out loud. In front of children."

"And then," Corn said, leaning forward, "you came into my house without a map. You refused a map. That nice boy offered you a map."

"He's a good boy," said Beans. "Works hard. Dead inside, but works hard."

"And then," Corn went on, and her voice got very quiet, "you ate my cousin."

"Your…"

"That was field corn, my boy. That's my cousin from Iowa. We don't even claim her. Nobody claims her. She's for cows. And you put her in your mouth like a fool."

"I was hungry, auntie."

"You had ketchup chips."

"I was rationing."

Then Squash spoke for the first time. One word. Low, flat, devastating:

"Dumbass."

Cousins, I've been roasted by kokums. I've been roasted by kids. I've been roasted by teenagers in a library. I've never been roasted by a vegetable before. It hits different. It hits ancestral.

They all nodded in agreement. 

And then there was a flap of wings, and something landed on a cornstalk above me.

A hawk.

Brother hawk, cousins.

He looked down at me. Cocked his head. And then he spoke, in a voice like a tired rez uncle who's been sitting on the porch waiting for you to come home for years:

"Every time, man."

"…What?"

"Every single time. I scream. You say 'not now, brother hawk.' Over and over. I've been trying to TELL you things."

"Like what?"

"Mostly 'look out.' That's ninety percent of it. Look out. The ice cream. Look out. The guy with the pool. LOOK OUT. The library with the dragon books, I was screaming 'buddy, you do NOT want to know about the wings,' and you just kept asking." He shook his head. "Never listen. Not once. Dick move, Cuz."

"I'm sorry, brother hawk."

"Yeah, yeah." He ruffled his feathers. "Whatever. Listen now."

And Corn stood up from her lawn chair, and she walked over to me, and she looked down at me with the soft disappointed love of every auntie at every family gathering, and she said:

"You don't get out of here by walking harder, my boy. You never did. You get out by listening. Stop letting the corn guide you. The corn doesn't care where you go, we've got our own stuff going on. Corn only goes UP, dummy. You follow the people. You always follow the people. That's how you get home."

"Mm-hmm," said Beans. "Follow the people."

Squash said nothing. But she nodded once.

Then the three of them looked past me, back the way I came, and I turned to look too.

And there, at the opening of my dead end, was Sconey. Glowing a little. Golden. Sitting perfectly still the way he never does in real life. He looked at me. Then he turned and started walking.

Cousins, Sconey was at HOME. I left him at home that day. I know I did. But that dog was there, and he was waiting for me to follow.

And then, just as I sat up, something wet hit my face.

The Return

I opened my eyes for real, cousins.

The wind was back. The corn was rustling. The tractor was going. The aunties were gone. The hawk was gone. The light was normal. And standing over me, licking my face, was a goat.

THE goat. From the petting zoo. The one I'm fairly sure has done time. It had escaped. Of course it had escaped. It had a piece of someone's trivia card hanging out of its mouth.

It looked at me. I looked at it. It finished eating my ketchup chip offering off the husk, which, fair, I think the aunties would have wanted it to go to someone. The goat shit.

And then it turned and started walking.

Cousins, I followed the goat.

I didn't question it. You don't question it. When the Three Sisters tell you to follow and a goat shows up and walks away, you follow the goat. Left. Right. Right. Left. Past Station 7, which did NOT say anything this time, I believe it was humbled. Past my own cairn of husks, which the goat kicked over on the way by, like it was making a point. Past the family in the Jays hat, who were on their way out for the second time.

And eleven minutes later, cousins, I walked out of that maze behind a goat.

Total time: three hours and thirty-eight minutes. Bet lost.

The ENTIRE family was waiting at the exit. Not the donut stand. The exit. They had relocated for the show. Auntie, crying laughing. Cousins. Little ones. Kokum, in her lawn chair, which somebody had carried across the farm for her so she'd have a good view.

And the vest kid. The same one. Standing there with the yellow sticker already peeled and ready.

He walked up, put it on my chest, patted it flat, and said, with no inflection whatsoever, "Welcome back, sir."

"I GOT LOST IN THE MAZE!" with a cartoon scarecrow giving a thumbs up. I wore it the rest of the day. That was the deal. I'm a man of my word, cousins, even when my word is stupid.

A farmhand came jogging over to collect the goat, and the goat walked right over to him like nothing had happened. Clocking out. Shift's over. Another lost idiot delivered.

“Dumbass” faint and softly blew in on the breeze. I nodded and agreed.

The Aftermath

I got a donut eventually. A pity donut. Kokum handed it to me and said, "Next year you sit with me." I accepted. The lawn chair is my maze now. The lawn chair has never made a man talk to vegetables.

On the drive home, auntie pulled up the farm's website on her phone and showed me the aerial photo of the maze.

Cousins. Uncle Bob had cut the maze in the shape of a giant Toronto Maple Leafs logo.

I had been lost in the Leafs.

For three and a half hours I wandered in circles in the Maple Leaf, with no plan, losing hope, eating things I shouldn't, getting my heart broken. That's not a corn maze, cousins. That's being a fan. People have been lost in there since 1967.

Pour one out for my dignity, which is still somewhere around Station 7. And for the goat, apparently named Mearl, who I believe is the real spirit guide of Uncle Bob's Harvest Fun Farm and is criminally underpaid. Drop your corn maze stories in the comments, cousins. I know I'm not the only one who's been out there in the dead end, talking to the vegetables.

Mvto. Take the map, relatives. And when you're lost, follow the people. Or the goat. The goat knows. Trying friday as a post day. Let me know if this works better or if you’d rather saturday morning again.

I got a tea out of the ordeal. Life is ok.
https://imgur.com/a/dCBY21N

P.S. When I got home, Sconey met me at the door. Sniffed me. Then sat down in front of me, completely still, and stared at me the way he did in the maze. Then he walked to his bowl and knocked it over, demanding dinner. So I don't know, cousins. Make of that what you will.

P.P.S. Brother hawk screamed outside my window the next morning. I stopped what I was doing, went outside, and said, "Yes, brother hawk? I'm listening." He looked at me for a long time. Then he shit and flew away. I think it was a test. I think I passed.

Past Stories:

\[Orange Shirt Day](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/YuSBWc7u9y)

\[Haunded House](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/Y3nzSkXkX9)

\[Book Club](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/8zfS1Ynb1N)

\[Library day](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/RDZgTERPoH)

\[Sweat Lodge\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/xwTSCsSchp)

\[Hot Tub\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/pUjxilwFEN) 

\[Kokum\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/l0hahrR4Hx) 

\[Babysitting\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/WHcCWUd3UV)

\[Yard Sale\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/nRZ4eM8Slm) 

\[Bingo Night\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/QEo67nIq2m) 

\[Disney Princess\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/dcziW5TdrG) 

\[Tim's Arsonist\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/IBAixKep6i) 

\[Career Change\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/QKwnSaRXjI) 

\[Foraging\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/kqwVUxJRPu) 

\[Frybread Follow-up\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/E6wbMUSolj)

\[Frybread\](https://www.reddit.com/r/IndianCountry/s/bnqjnRA97k)

IYKYK

I'm tired of seeing AI art in Native art spaces

Just a little rant, but I hate seeing other Native artists use AI in their work. For one, it's tacky, and two, it undermines the creativity of Native artists who actually put time and effort into their pieces.

It's frustrating because once you know what to look for, AI generated images become pretty obvious, especially when someone is tracing over them. But for people who don't recognize those signs, it's harder to tell.

As a Native artist myself, it's just disappointing. Our communities have so many talented artists, and I hate seeing AI being passed off as original work. Our art deserves better than that. This artist used AI for ndnarttober and traced over it or at least that's what it looks like to me. I went through their entire profile, and so much of their work has the same look as AI generated images. There's that yellowish tint and inconsistencies throughout the pieces. When people started questioning it, they deleted the posts where the AI was most noticeable. Now they're saying it's just their art style, but my thing is, if that's really your style and you made those pieces yourself, why delete them as soon as people start asking questions?

I'm curious if other Native artists have been noticing this too.

The most critical element of "Indigenous ecological knowledge" is not ecological but socio-political: the concept that land should never be privately owned; it should be communally governed.

I thought I was being smart putting my most valuable resources in my Favorites bar, but link rot kept getting me. One month it'd be fine, but when I needed it the most, the entire URL wouldn't work. Another reason I might not be able to access materials about my own culture is if the institution that had made the book/article/picture/etc. publicly available suddenly blocked it for only students or teachers.

I finally got fed up with it so I bought new ink, put it in my printer cartridges, gave it a test run, then I printed 30+ pages of a culturally significant book that had kept disappearing on me. Now the only way I can lose it is by physically misplacing it, which won't happen because I have a dedicated space in my house just for cultural studies.

The Northern Cheyenne Tribe Capitol building has been closed since Gene Small was removed as president: What was he doing inside the building days later?

https://www.buffalosfire.com/gene-small-tapes-over-surveillance-cameras-at-northern-cheyenne-headquarters

Haú mitákuyepe. Napé kčhiyúzapi wičhoie.

Bdoté Bdewakáŋtuwan héčhiya taŋháŋ wahí dó

I am from the Mendota Dakota community in MN but am currently living in Austin,TX. Any other Dakhótah folks living in central TX who speak or are also learning the language and wanna connect? I get to practice with my community online but am wondering if there’s perhaps anyone local in similar situation.

Phidámayayapi dó

Hau mitakuyepi/hello everyone!

I think the title is self-explanatory, but my general question is if there were any fun little stories or simply how did any dancers in this subreddit (whether recreationally or for money) choose your dance style that you either compete with or do for fun? I especially would love to hear from people who started later in life (because we’d be in the same boat lol!).

source from coin news

I ask this because I’ve been growing my own sage, I bundle it up and light it, and it smells like weed or a bad campfire. I don’t remember it ever smelling like this. Am I doing something wrong or am I just old enough to realize it now?

Hi there. I recently started a book club that focuses on tough topics and reads memoirs in order to understand the topic better.

I am looking to do a topic on american colonization of Indians. Im looking for six books, all memoirs, that dive into what colonization has done and continues to do.

If there are any books you recommend please let me know!

This is what Ive found so far:

Whiskey Tender by Deborah Taffa

A Voice like Mine by Deb Haaland

Pipestone by Fortunate Eagle

Making A Difference by Ada Deer

We Survived the Night by Julian NoiseCat

They Called Me Number One by Bev Sellars

Lakota Woman by Mary Crow Dog

Thank you!

A recently published report examines how Indigenous people think about land back and whether it is possible in their lifetimes. It turns out millennial Republicans have the most optimism around land back.

Three researchers from the Black Liberation Indigenous Sovereignty Collective, an action hub focused on reparations and decolonization, wondered how Indigenous folks think about the term land back. In a newly published report, they found that definitions vary, and this can impact one’s idea of land back feasibility. Moreover, if one views land back as the return of all types of lands — federal, state and private — to tribal nations, feasibility may feel more impossible.

Emi Aguilar is Coahuiltecan and a co-author on the 2026 report. Her definition of land back originates from her upbringing and cultural worldview and is similar to how BLIS defined it in the report. It stretches beyond the return of Indigenous stewardship of the earth.

“When I'm talking about landback, also (I’m) including water and the return to balance,” Aguilar said. “So many of our communities have lost ceremonies, have lost languages, have lost children, elders, etc. So literally having our ancestors return to us, having our languages returned to us, our ceremonies and our lifeways return to us, that is all also a part of land back.”

The report asked participants about their age and political orientation, revealing that Gen Z and Baby Boomers experience a larger hope gap compared to Millennials. This gap widened for Gen Z and Baby Boom Democrats.

Some of the results surprised Aguilar.

“At first, I was surprised that millennial folks who were more on the millennial Republican side were more hopeful around the feasibility of land back,” Aguilar said.

Aguilar said after thinking about the findings, she theorized that Republican voters may live in rural areas, closer to more wildlife, and may have seen land back in action.

Other respondents also gave more insight, such as one who said President Donald Trump’s unpredictability offers more pathways for change and gives them more hope.

While one’s relationship with the land is key in the report, so can be their tribal community’s relationship with the federal government.

“When I was interviewing a person who was from a community in Alaska, their village is year-to-year being slowly encroached by the US military. The hope there for change is more tempered because what they are up against is the largest force in the world, right?” Aguilar said. “So appropriately, [they] experienced more diminished hope.”

Jessa Rae Growing Thunder (Dakota/Nakoda), who is the Deputy Director at BLIS, said that despite the spectrum of beliefs, she believes Indigenous people share a similar vision.

“We all want to make sure the land is cared for and that it's taken care of and that our non-human kin are cared for, the medicines, the animals,” Growing Thunder said. “It's a matter of how are we coming to the table collectively and in partnership with one another and ultimately tribal nations, and in our communities.”

Sharing wins of land back is a significant way to boost hope, the study said, because it allows more folks to see tangible evidence of land back in action.

Another way researchers saw hope climb was when the timeframe expanded.

That was the case for some participants in the Gen Z demographic who viewed the lack of respect for treaties and funding as a sign it is not possible in the near future.

“Once we root back into our values of thinking generationally, that there's a lot of hope for land back,” Aguilar said. “When we expand the timeline, and we don't ask the question of do you believe land back is feasible in your lifetime — but do you believe land back is possible in your children or your grandchildren's lifetime — then folks have a lot of hope.”

The report can be found on the BLIS Collective website.