“Class Order Family Tribe” is a 26-minute experimental documentary about my my Native American [Ute, Apache, Pueblo] family’s shifting strategies for survival after leaving the reservation and moving to Central California in the 1950s. Moreover it is a look at heterosexuality, machismo and binary gender roles as strategies for survival and how in my new native generation queerness and gender fluidity are new forms of survival. This silent film is told exclusively through 8mm film shot by my native family in the 1950s, 60s and 70s. I insert myself into the film as a textual narrator creating a link between my ancestors and my own life with campy, melodramatic, surreal overtones. The 8mm footage in this film is rare and needs to be preserved and seen. Traditionally 8mm film of this era documenting Native Americans is shot from a white American / European / Canadian perspective, as such Mi Familia 2 stands as a striking contrast as self-authored native representation and de-colonial/post-colonial gesture.
