American - Author | February 15, 1946 - December 8, 2015
We cannot change the political system, we cannot change the economic system, we cannot change the social system, until the people control the land, and then we take it out of the hands of that sick minority that chooses to pervert the meaning and the intention of humanity.
John Trudell
ChangePeopleControlSickPolitical
In a personal context, I'm not in the ground, and I'm not in an institution. So I guess I'm doing pretty good.
GoodDoingPersonalGroundPretty
It's always good to go home. It's strengthening to see your past and know you have someplace to go where you're part of a people.
GoodHomePastPeopleYouKnow
Everybody interprets things differently with their own perception, and I want poetry to pull out of them their own feelings.
PoetryPerceptionFeelingsWantOut
I wanted to take the power of thought and the word, along with the power of speaking and heart, and see if we could wire what was coming out of us as humans with electric instruments.
HeartPowerThoughtSeeOutComing
The whole point is to take from our native culture and from contemporary culture without using one art form to mimic the other, so that our native identity remains the native identity, the contemporary identity remains the contemporary identity, and the mixing of these two musical identities creates a third musical identity.
ArtCultureIdentityTwoWithout
For us, it's a matter of just staying alive and getting the best deal we can now. Eventually, this will all straighten out. It may be two generations away or 10 generations away, but time is irrelevant in that sense. As long as we, as a people, stay alive, we will survive.
TimeBestPeopleSurviveLongAlive
I wasn't interested in having to live with a camera - I have a hard enough time getting along with myself. I don't need cameras around and all that action.
LiveTimeMyselfActionCameraNeed
My influences in this world have always been Crazy Horse and Malcolm X, my overall influences. But I was influenced by rock n' roll, blues, and country music. I was influenced by singers.
MusicCrazyWorldHorseCountry
I don't write as much now as I used to, but I write. The lines still come, maybe periodically, and I'll go through these little bursts of time where I write a lot of things then a long period of time where maybe I don't write anything.
TimeLongGoNowWriteAnything
All that I am is me. So I'm not really a poet or a writer or an actor or an activist; I'm me, and these are things that I do.
I AmMeActorThingsPoetWriter
I have a real interest in working with younger Native artists. I think it's a very important way for Native people to communicate the realities of our culture and remember our ancestors.
CulturePeopleThinkRememberWay
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