Russell Means Quotes

In many respects, I think 'Bless Me, Ultima' is a novel about the indigenous.

Niaqornat particularly seemed to offer a heightened version of a story being played out across the world about traditional communities' struggle for survival and their attempts to renegotiate their identity in the face of modern life.

There's no way to escape the culture that has evolved, from which we ourselves have evolved. Naturally, we stress it, break it up, reassemble it to suit our own needs. But it is there - a source of vital strength.

For members of a traditional society where many traditions have been discredited, an interest in modernity can result in a restless sophistication. Mehmet Ertegun seems not to have been a restless man.

We do not want your civilization. We would live as our fathers did, and their fathers before them.

There must be in their [the Indian's] social bond, something singularly captivating, and far superior to anything to be boasted among us; for thousands of Europeans are Indians, and we have no examples of even one of those Aborigines having from choice become Europeans.

Civilisations which get cut off from their traditions and values do not survive for long.

Nobody else in the world has a form like the Native American musical, and Americans should be very proud.

I'm Cherokee, and there were times when social expansion was something that is needed by a cultural group or a national group.

I've got to where am in life not because of something I brought to the world but through something I found - the wealth of African culture.

Culture is just a shambling zombie that repeats what it did in life; bits of it drop off, and it doesn't appear to notice.

The one thing I've always maintained is that I'm an American Indian. I'm not politically correct.

People tend to believe that to be modern you have to disengage from your heritage, but it's not true.

I have long hair because I'm American Indian. I'm an Oklahoma boy, and I'm very proud of my heritage.

I have Aboriginal roots on my father's side, and have always indentified with that spirit. I feel a lot of my music comes from that place.

Cultures, for better or worse, are very stable.

It would be good for us Africans to accept ourselves as we are and recapture some of the positive aspects of our culture.

Black culture is a fight. We want to hold on to what we are, but sometimes the things that we are can be totally negative. You have to think: can't we try something new and not be seen as suspect?

When a tradition gathers enough strength to go on for centuries, you don't just turn it off one day.

I think that the Japanese culture is one of the very few cultures left that is its own entity. They're just so traditional and so specific in their ways. It's kind of untouched, it's not Americanized.

National cultures and heritages must compete for man's attention with the mind-absorbing advances of universal science.

Obviously, my Indigenous culture is very special to me.

Retaining culture takes effort and persistence and discipline. It's a commitment, not a flag. You can't just pull it out and wave it about when it's convenient.

If there is something that I respect about the Arabs, it's the fact that they never change their position.

Growing up around people with the same culture as me made me a lot tougher.