Yagheli du ch’u Naghe Nduninyu.
Dena’ina qenaga she/ ghun qenash.
Ruth Miller sh’izhi.
Ekuk ethnen shugu shqayeh qilanda.
Curyung e/nena shit’i.
I’m Ruth Miller.
I am a Dena’ina Athabascan Alaska Native woman from Anchorage, Alaska, and I am the
first Alaska Native Orator to speak at Commencement.
I offer a traditional introduction in my language to welcome past and future generations.
First we must acknowledge that we are on the occupied territory of the Wampanoag and Narragansett
peoples, who have protected and cared for this land for millennia.
A land acknowledgement is a crucial step in respecting the enduring relationship of indigenous
people with their land.
But it is not done for reconciliation – it is done for remembrance and uplifting.
True to both my Athabaskan and Ashkenazi Jewish heritages, I’d like to begin by telling
you a story.
When I was young, I was afraid of many things.
I was terrified that something terrible would happen to my family, and I wouldn’t be able
to save them.
My fear kept me up, night after night, and therefore, it kept my parents up, too.
Trauma and violence play dark roles in the history of both my peoples.
And maybe this echo crept into my mind at night, in vulnerable moments.
My mom would lie down next to me, put her head close to mine, and firmly tell me “Ruth,
you’re being ridiculous.
You come from a long line of strong, powerful, resilient Indigenous women.
They fought and sacrificed and endured so that you could be here.
They were Warrior Women.
I am a Warrior Woman, and you, Ruth, are a Warrior Woman.
And we all have “WW” tattooed on our butts.”
Okay, okay. Now, you’d think I’d have noticed this before, if it were true.
“But they’re Invisible tattoos,” she insisted.
In my moments of fear, my mother knew that laughter would strengthen me.
And while she has no tattoos yet, everything else she said is true.
I was raised to be a Warrior Woman, but it has taken me time to learn what that means.
Often, in my time at Brown, I haven’t felt like a Warrior.
Like many of us, I’ve felt tired, and weary.
Stretched too thin, yet never feeling I was doing enough.
When one thinks of a Warrior, one might think of the hard, the tough, the fierce.
Someone unrelenting, unyielding, and uncompromising.
But I learned that there are many ways to fight for what I believe in, and many weapons
to choose from.
Sophomore year, I felt I heard the ultimate call to be a Warrior for my community.
Indigenous people worldwide rallied to the cry of the Oceti Sakowin­­, the Standing
Rock Sioux.
This gathering of water protectors included eleven Brown students.
We stood against the environmental and cultural threat of the Dakota Access Pipeline.
We celebrated a commitment to the earth and to justice through peaceful gathering, using
the weapons of community care, and deep love.
These weapons were considered so threatening, that mass media vilified our efforts as violent
and radical but violence was only ever perpetrated by one side.
What did make the gathering radical, was that we found strength in community so strong that
it could not be broken by violence.
My time there was fueled by a sense of responsibility, but also by frustration, rage at injustice,
and that same crippling anxiety from childhood that there was nothing I could do.
I threw everything I had at this fight, and found myself burnt out, running on fumes.
At that time, I had to drop a deeply influential course.
And my Professor, Anila Dalautzai, shared the kindest parting words, especially given
I was ditching her class: “Ruth,” she said, “Pace yourself.
Because in 40 years, someone else will be doing something terrible and you’ve got
to fight it as much then as you want to fight it now.”
I was trying to destroy so much, that I was letting myself be destroyed.
Now I am leaving Brown with a new idea of how to be a Warrior: I will fight with compassion.
I will stop thinking of destruction, and instead towards reimagining and rebuilding – generating
seeds of change, and helping them grow, instead of just battling the weeds.
Today, we meet at a crossroads.
The world is passing into our hands, and it is time to decide what kind of world we want
to build together for those we will leave it to next.
I believe, in the words of queer Chicana poet Gloria Anzaldua, we could be “the healing
of the wound.”
At Brown, there are hundreds of Warriors devoting time and energy to Providence and beyond.
We’re tutors and mentors, workshop and protest makers, movers and shakers.
This moment is to honor the students at Brown, we who are the laborers, we who are the dissidents:
the students who sat on the Main Green to create a “new” “Open Curriculum” 50
years ago, and the students who walked out of class in 1968 and 2018 to advocate for
the rights of Black students to be here and be treated fairly.
This is for the students who demanded that Columbus Day – named for a perpetrator of
genocide– be changed to Indigenous Peoples' Day – named for our nation’s first and
everlasting defenders.
But we must also honor the administrative staffers, faculty members and workers who
have been allies and accomplices in creating a more equal, accessible, and ethical environment
for learning at Brown.
These are the people who fight to improve our school more each year, often in spite
of the institution itself.
It is truly the work of the student activists, often many of whom already at a disadvantage,
who are most often pursuing change within this campus.
All of these voices, this collective power, show us that the spark needed for positive
change is alive on our campus.
But how does a spark become a wildfire?
We have had unparalleled opportunities and access here, and now we find ourselves deciding
what to do with it: how do we fight for liberation beyond our campus.
Self-­described black feminist, lesbian, poet, mother, warrior Audre Lorde reminds
us that “the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house.”
Knowledge alone, when used as a weapon, will never be equalizing.
Knowledge is liberation when knowledge is exchanged.
In Lorde’s spirit, I challenge us all to abandon the tools of domination and oppression.
Today, let’s leave behind weapons of exploitation, exclusion and hubris.
Our weapon of resistance instead needs to be radical compassion.
Compassion is radical because the times that we live in have made it so.
It’s radical because we are not often taught that compassion can be a tool– in fact,
it is a tool, a weapon, an armour, and a peace offering all at once.
And there are infinite ways to use it.
I am going to suggest three: first, let’s be compassionate with each other – it takes
courage to be vulnerable, to sit before someone with whom you disagree and open your hearts.
Exercising compassion when tempted by bitterness, takes the strength of a Warrior.
Second, let’s create communities of compassion: spaces that are safe, patient, and accountable
to all people, and that means a deep commitment to inclusion and celebration.
Third, let’s be compassionate with ourselves: radical compassion means taking care of ourselves
too, so that “in 40 years, when someone else is doing something terrible,” we’ve
got the energy.
And to those who recognize these fights, who have felt the weight of the world’s burdens,
remember that being joyful is an act of resistance.
Laughter is medicine.
Class of 2019, I urge you to share yourselves with this world.
Our most precious asset, our most coveted strength, will always be our empathy.
Choosing compassion is not choosing passivity– it is using the strength of our love to overcome
hate.
Find the potential that comes with kindness, loving, and a resilient spirit that cannot
be dissuaded by adversity.
After graduating, I will be getting matching traditional tattoos with my mother, in...a
private location.
They will remind me of who has fought for me, and who I will continue to fight for.
We are all Warriors, and we now must choose what to fight for and how.
May your heart be your strongest armor and your greatest weapon.
Congratulations, to my fellow Warriors, the Class of 2019.
[APPLAUSE AND CHEERING]