Jenna Cavelle Judith Lee Stronach Baccalaureate Prize Letter Home October 2012 1 Dear Stronach Committee and Supporters: I have many exciting things to report!! BE SURE TO CHECK OUT THE PHOTOS ATTACHED! Beautiful images... 1.) Focus Group Discussions - I am now holding the focus group discussions called "Paya (Water in Paiute) History Gathering" three times per month (once at each reservation site) for each remaining month of the project (until approx June). (see attached flyer for our first meeting, which is tonight) 2.) GIS/GPS mapping - I have began mapping alongside the group discussions because time and weather permit, and because it works better that way with everyone's schedules. While mapping the irrigation ditches with a Paiute elder, I typically see coyotes, jack rabbits, road runners, deer, picas, kangaroo rats (endangered species), blue heron, foxes, and other flora and fauna for which I often don't know the common or scientific names. The landscape is teeming with life. 3.) Weather - the mountains are now covered with snow (see attached picture of the first snow of the season taken from my Airstream on the reservation a few weeks ago) and many roads are closing. It gets very cold at night but the days are still beautiful. I anticipate a very cold winter and some issues with pipes freezing and such but I will deal with that as needed. 4.) Community - The community I have built around me is truly a blessing. I go to birthday parties, car races, karaoke, pow wows (see attached pictures), sweats, fishing excursions, council meetings (I gave my first presentation about the project at the last council meeting and it garnered official support from the council), parades, etc. I feel very welcome and safe in the community for the most part, but there is still much work to be done on that front. I could be doing a lot more...more community events, church
Jenna Cavelle Judith Lee Stronach Baccalaureate Prize Letter Home October 2012 2 events, school events, safety measures, and so on. 5.) Related Project News - *I presented my first academic paper at Stanford's Urban Jungles conference, given by the Department of Cultures, Languages, and Literatures on October 26th. The presentation used many aspects of my Stronach project and was appropriately titled "Urban Jungle in Water: Place-Making and Un-making, the Role of Water in Los Angeles and Owens Valley". (See attached flyer complete with our panel and paper abstracts) The presentation/paper was co-authored by Chris Morrow PhDc, UC Davis, Water Resources Engineering. One of my primary objectives as a scholar and community organizer is to engage in interdisciplinary efforts with hard scientists as much as possible. It's important to get social and hard scientists working together. **My primary advisor, Pat Steenland, is working closely with my project, the American Cultures Department, and the Bancroft library to incorporate her students from a class she is teaching next semester at UCB into my Stronach Baccalaureate Prize Project. Her class is titled "Researching Water in The West" and her students will assist the project by helping create a database of all Paiute related materials from the UCB library archives. These results will be housed on my project website, TuvaijuMemory.org, and become parts of the Bancroft and Paiute Culture Center exhibits next year. Students will also study the same materials that tribal members also review during our Paya History Gatherings. The students will engage regularly with our group next semester via Skype and will take a 3-day field trip to the project site to meet and learn from Paiute participants. This is working into their syllabus and is aimed at creating engaged scholarship between the community and UC Berkeley. This is especially exciting, as it was my work in Dr. Steenland's same class last year that served as the foundation for my Stronach project.
Jenna Cavelle Judith Lee Stronach Baccalaureate Prize Letter Home October 2012 3 ***My other advisor, Dr. John Walton with UC Davis, recently led a community event during which time he analyzed the movie Chinatown as part of a fundraising effort to help the community pay for legal affairs related to water rights. His service to Owens Valley has helped tremendously in how the community views and receives me. (see attached flyer) ****My Stronach project received some more press recently. Firstly, it will be featured in the Big Pine and Bishop tribal newspaper (links forthcoming). Secondly, it was featured in the UC Berkeley College of Natural Resources magazine, Breakthroughs in a features section called "The Next Big Thing". Check out the link here: http://nature.berkeley.edu/breakthroughs/fa12/next_big_thing Thirdly, it was mentioned in a Los Angeles Aqueduct 2013 Anniversary project by Cal Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities which can be viewed at the following link: http://thereitistakeit.org/williams/ (Harry Williams, who is also featured is a Paiute elder I work with). *****I would be remiss not to mention something about the elections so here it goes...yesterday in Santa Cruz County, Measure P, a ballot initiative the organization PeakWater.org (which I founded as a community college student 5 years ago) worked tirelessly (4 years) to get on the ballot - PASSED WITH MAJORITY - an astounding 71.4%. The initiative puts the right to vote on a proposed desalination plant in the hands of the voters. It was a historical measure in that we were only the second county in the history of desalination in California to successfully pass a Right To Vote initiative (Marin County is the other). This is exciting for my Stronach project because it stands as a reminder of what is possible when students and communities come together to imagine something big. It is also significant for my project because many of the strategies I used to build that campaign, I am
Jenna Cavelle Judith Lee Stronach Baccalaureate Prize Letter Home October 2012 4 currently using as a Stronach Scholar. It's all coming together so seamlessly...so much synergy and hope...i'm over the moon excited for what's to come. Thank you Judith Lee Stronach, thank you committee members, thank you Owens Valley, and thanks to all our supporters. YOU continue to make this incredibly important effort materialize. Yours, Jenna Flyer for the monthly community meeting
Jenna Cavelle Judith Lee Stronach Baccalaureate Prize Letter Home October 2012 5
Jenna Cavelle Judith Lee Stronach Baccalaureate Prize Letter Home October 2012 6 Paiute pow wow
Jenna Cavelle Judith Lee Stronach Baccalaureate Prize Letter Home October 2012 7 First snow on the mountains Flyer for film screening with Professor John Walton
Jenna Cavelle Judith Lee Stronach Baccalaureate Prize Letter Home October 2012 8 Flyer for the Stanford conference