http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/daily/local/81933.php

Published: 04.08.2008

Squaw Peak or Piestewa Peak?
Denogean: Controversy over Piestewa hopefully over

ANNE T. DENOGEAN
Tucson Citizen

In what one hopes will put a happy end, or a least an end, to an unpleasant
five-year saga, a federal board will vote Thursday on changing the name of
the third highest mountain peak in Phoenix from Squaw Peak to Piestewa
Peak.

From the start, this effort to honor Army Spc. Lori Ann Piestewa, believed
to be the first American Indian woman to die in combat as a member of the
U.S. military, has been tarnished by controversy.

Each public mention of Piestewa Peak has launched a battle of words between
those who want to recognize the young Hopi mother of two from Tuba City and
those who view the effort to remove the word "squaw" from the name of the
favored Phoenix hiking spot as another example of political correctness
being shoved down their throats.

In 2003, Gov. Janet Napolitano played political hardball when the State
Board on Geographic and Historic Names wouldn't hear a proposal to re-name
the peak because of a state policy against naming landmarks after a person
until five years after his or her death. Napolitano prevailed - the name
was changed to Piestewa on state maps and documents - but her tactics left
some Arizonans seething.

The vote Thursday in Washington, D.C., is the culmination of a separate
federal process to change names on federal maps and documents.

In the more than 300 comments submitted to the U.S. Board of Geographic
Names for this week's meeting (running 2-1 in favor of the new name), anger
at Napolitano's methods was one of the top three reasons opponents cited in
asking the board to reject the proposal.

I say, get over it. If the state process was flawed, that was then. This is
the federal process and the guidelines, including the five-year waiting
period, have been followed.

A number of commenters to the federal board also argued there's absolutely
nothing wrong with the word squaw.

There is debate over the origin of the word, which may be rooted in an
innocuous word for young woman or wife or may have come from a more vulgar
term.

But in the 1800s and 1900s, settlers used the word to demean and stereotype
American Indian women as dirty drudges, beasts of burden with no rights and
no sense of morality, said K. Tsianina Lomawaima, head of American Indian
Studies at the University of Arizona.

"I think that anyone who would argue that in 2008 that the word today
carries no negative connotation is just ridiculous," she said. "I think it
would be right up there with the n-word for African-Americans."

Tom Holm, a UA professor of American Indian Studies and Marine Corps
veteran of the Vietnam War, said he's heard the argument that squaw is part
of the state's Wild West history and naming traditions.

"They don't want to change this because they think it's part of their
culture. But part of their culture is racist," he said.

The most dismissive argument of opponents is that Piestewa was no hero,
just a hapless Beetle Bailey. One commenter to the federal board wrote,
"This Piestewa was not a hero of any kind. She simply wrecked a truck when
making a wrong turn, and that led to half her platoon getting wiped out."

Such ignorance of the facts is offensive.

On March 23, 2003, Piestewa was the driver of the last vehicle in a convoy
that took a wrong turn under a captain's direction and drove right into the
town of Nasiriyah and an ambush by Iraqi soldiers, according to a 2004
Rolling Stone account of Piestewa's life and death.

She was driving herself and other soldiers out from under the attack when
her Humvee was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade, causing the vehicle to
careen into a tractor-trailer driven by another American soldier. She died
of her injuries.

People can decide for themselves whether her actions were heroic. In my
eyes, anyone who sacrifices their life while serving our country is heroic.

She didn't have to be there. When her unit was preparing to deploy,
Piestewa was recovering from surgery for a shoulder injury. She had to
argue to be allowed to go fight a war that she could have sat out at home.

A variation of the "she's no hero" argument is the assertion by some
commenters that honoring Piestewa is an affront to all the other Arizona
warriors who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan. They ask, what makes her
special?

The answer is the renaming pays homage to all women and all American
Indians who have served in the military.

This seems appropriate in a state that has the third largest American
Indian population in the country and a legacy that includes Ira Hayes and
the Navajo and Hopi Code Talkers.

But more important, Piestewa is a symbol of all the young men and women
from Arizona - regardless of color, ethnicity or gender - who gave their
lives in Iraq and Afghanistan. In recognizing her, we also recognize those
fallen warriors.

Sadly, I suspect if she had been a white male it would be much easier for
some Arizonans to grasp that simple truth.