Navajo Fair season and turquoise adornment.

Photo by Venaya Yazzie
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

My Navajo/ Pueblo cultural Indigenous jewelry is a vital part of my identity. Turquoise and silver jewelry adornment items such as earrings and rings, are how I choose to perpetuate my Indigenous way of life and existence.

This season is the season of Indigenous Adornment for many on the reservations of the southwest. In September the Navajo Nation began its ceremonial participation in the annual tribal fairs across the reservations in Arizona, New Mexico and Utah.

I was able to kick off the celebrations last weekend in Window Rock, Arizona last weekend. I was delighted to see much cultural Navajo adornment being practiced by a mix of people including tiny babies to beautiful Navajo elders, all dressed in their finest Navajo garb and turquoise and silver jewelry adornments.

The life of a Navajo person concerns cultural adornment, it is what has been talked to us through our Navajo oral history.

Granmother's hands are my strength.

Photo by Venaya Yazzie
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

strength.
may masaani's beauty-ful hands full of wisdom.
she is jane werito yazzie.
we are a family rooted at huerfano, nm.
eastern navajo land.

Bizhi ba, warrior girl

Bizhi ba, warrior gir

born into the neck
of the full harvest,
Bizhi ba
took deep breath -
autumn's early chill filled
her lungs.

ripened green melons scattereed
horizon west. corn
stalk leaves
motioned the dawning sun
to rise,
rise, rise.

baby girl at first cry
held  her matriarch's hand
strong fingers full of
ancient
winters.

strong grip
that praised the day the brown
glistening infant girl
crossed the hold desert lands
to this
fifth world.

poem by Venaya Yazzie
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Hand and Ring

photo by Venaya Yazzie

Photograph of my hand adorned with vintage Navajo turquoise and silver ring. This was taken in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Heirloom Navajo Pins

my hand adorned in heirloom pins
photo by Venaya Yazzie

These Navajo silver and turquoise pins are heirloom pieces, some belong to me and some to my grandmother. The turquoise is varied.

Coins and Velveteen and Navajo

Navajo woman adorned circa 1930s
Web photo

Here is a fine example of a Navajo women in full adornment. This southwestern Indigenous adornment was perpetuated by Navajo women of the 1930s and 40s era on the Navajo reservation.

My grandmother has many photographs such as this one. The woman pictured here is wearing a velveteen shirt adorned with silver dimes, or currency. Instead of fashioning silver into buttons, many women chose to use the shiny coins to decorate their clothing. Sometimes they would also use quarters, and later some Navajo women used the coins given by Anglo traders on the reservation.

After the U.S. government learned of such practices they announces that the Navajo could not longer "deface" American property, so this type of fashion faded out.

I adore this photograph.

respect the stone.

my turquoise collection
photo by Venaya Yazzie

.dootłízhi.

turquoise for the Diné is meant to perpetuate hózhó. a good life. it us a stone that was gifted to us humble beings by the holy ones. it has a specific purpose in cultural ways of being (indigenous sw epistemology)& thereforeshould be respected. its not meant to promote the social ills of american pop culture....i.e. crudeness, violence, sexuality, drugs, etc. For if u'adorn' yourself w/ turquoise you are receiving blessings from Creator. please don't use it without prayer and reflection : it is an important element in cultural sw pueblo/diné dogma.

this *insight: frm masani is vital.always

Adorn yourself. Its medicine.

Wearing cultural jewelry is not merely an act of tangible adornment. Wearing Indigenous, southwestern jewelry, is an act of cultural sovereignty. Our turquoise is our survival, it is our prayers.

Bless yourself: wear your dootlizhi.