Apple: Skin to the Core

Content Warning: This section contains discussions of anti-Indigenous racism, colonial violence, and cultural genocide.

The impact of white colonialism is central to Apple. Indigenous people across North America have experienced countless profound losses over the last few centuries. Eric Gansworth notes that the earliest agreements between the Haudenosaunee Confederacy and European settlers were based on equality, friendship, and mutual cultural respect. The Haudenosaunee Confederacy is still fighting for those ideals today. Instead of respecting Indigenous cultures, European settlers enacted violence and an ongoing campaign of cultural genocide against their new Indigenous neighbors. In Apple, this cultural genocide is most clearly represented by the legacy of residential schools. Gansworth is two generations removed from the members of his family who attended these schools, but his life is still shaped by their intergenerational trauma. His mother refused to let him participate in traditional activities because her own mother considered Onondaga and Tuscarora traditions “backwards.”

Likewise, colonialism is responsible for many of the hardships Gansworth experienced as a child while growing up on a reservation. Limited economic opportunities, limited access to affordable education, and very poor infrastructure and social services all contribute to an ongoing cycle of poverty in Indigenous communities. Gansworth grew up in one of the wealthiest countries in the world yet lived in a house without heating and rarely had enough food to eat. Some members of his community had even less than he did: For example, his father’s house had no insulation. In theory, Gansworth’s family leased their salt mines to the US government, but the financial compensation they received was laughably small. The legacy of colonialism is an endless list of broken promises and unfair arrangements that benefit white settlers and disadvantage Indigenous communities.

Another pervasive element of colonialism is anti-Indigenous racism. Gansworth notes many instances where people treated him differently because he was Onondaga than they would have if he were white. His accomplishments were impressive “for an Indian” (196); his failures were expected because they played into stereotypes about Indigenous people. He felt perpetually out of place, not just as an Onondaga among Tuscarora people, but also as an Indigenous person observing white American culture. Growing up, most of the media representations of Indigenous people that Gansworth saw relied on racist stereotypes instead of portraying Indigenous people and communities as they actually were. These stereotypes made it harder for Gansworth to develop his own identity and contributed to the continued erasure of Indigenous lifestyles, vibrant cultures, and ongoing challenges in favor of an outdated, flattened image of indigeneity.