The sky was gray on Monday, but on a strip of West 26th Street, colors were everywhere as the Indigenous Alliance Without Borders welcomed communities from Southern Arizona and Northern Mexico to celebrate Indigenous Peoples’ Day in South Tucson with the theme “Planting Seeds of Change.”
Indigenous Peoples’ Day was first recognized federally in 2021 by then-president Joe Biden and is widely known as a counter-celebration to Columbus Day, which falls on the same day.
Before this year’s observance, President Donald Trump rejected federal recognition of Indigenous Peoples’ Day, proclaiming Christopher Columbus to be “the original American hero.”
Tribes such as the Tohono O’odham, however, have history in Tucson going back at least 3,500 years, when they stewarded the agricultural land at the base of Sentinel Peak and called it, in O’odham, Cuk Ṣon. It wasn’t until the late 1700s that the Spanish name Tucsón was introduced by settlers.
Lourdes Escalante, a member of the Pascua Yaqui tribe, is the executive director of the Indigenous Alliance Without Borders, or Alianza Indigena Sin Fronteras.
“We’re always going to be honoring the people of the land, which is the Tohono O’odham Nation, and then honoring the people who are also contemporarily here, which would be Pascua Yaqui and other Indigenous peoples, or even rural Indians that are here,” she said.
The Pascua Yaqui descend from the people of the Yaqui River valley in Sonora, Mexico and became a sovereign nation in 1978.
Escalante said she grew up crossing the Arizona-Mexico border regularly, and was raised speaking English, Spanish and a little bit of Yaqui, which is an endangered language.
“I’m privileged in that sense. I have that strong root. I know my place, I know my culture, I know how to also uplift people,” Escalante said.
This year was Derrick Espadas’ first time at Alianza’s celebration. While spending the day volunteering, he aimed to build connections with the local Indigenous community in what he called “fun resistance.”
“I tell people that happiness is a form of protest right now. So just getting together, enjoying life, connecting with others in the community. I think it’s really important, and you know, claiming this day as ours,” he said.
Espadas comes from a Yaqui background. He said the tribe, who call themselves Yoeme, has always carried a stubborn spirit.
Espadas is involved with local activists and is running for a spot on the Arizona Corporation Commission. “I’ve just let the groups I work with know that they may not be culturally Yaqui by bloodline, but by spirit they are,” he said.
For Alianza program manager JS Torres, who has Tohono O’odham heritage, it was a day of raising awareness.
“There are a lot of places, not just outside of the United States but in the United States, that are teaching their youth that we are extinct and do not exist. So it’s really important to show up and show everyone that we are here and we’re alive," she said."Our culture is still going on.”