Students in Dr. Anabel Galindo’s CCS 201 Indigenous Cultural Expression explored a wide variety of topics throughout the semester, including science, history, environment, cosmology, arts, language, and food through lectures, guest speakers, and hands-on activities to gain better understand the complex and vibrant Indigenous world. Two classes featured activities to support their understanding of the challenges of preserving Indigenous cultural traditions and learning about the significance of food in different societies. During one session, students had the opportunity to paint gourds in partnership with the Makerlab at Cline Library, which are are not only tools of storage and travel, but also important to music, language, art—it becomes a way to preserve history, memory and ceremony.
Each student selected a gourd and paint, following simple directions to paint what connects them to the world and to paint together as part of a community. The experience provided a way for students to participate is self expression but also take away knowledge about the diverse ways we can learn from our environment.
Similarly, the class spent time cooking together in the last module of the course on food. They prepared and then tasted traditional corn tortillas under the directions of a member of the Pascua Yaqui Tribe, Ms. Lewis. She shared with students not only her work in the health and wellbeing in the community, but also the significant role certain traditional foods have in the culture. She showed how to make the corn masa, and had students make their own masa and shape tortillas to take. Students also were able to taste freshly made tortillas, the difference in flavor from stone ground and corn flour. Some students shared their own recipes and memories of eating food with their families, as the activity “reminded them of home.”