The newest accessory for your already perfect nursery? A tipi of course! Eagle-eyed readers Andrea, Laura, and Mieko spotted these "adorable" tipi's all over tumblr last week. Most of the pictures are from Design Chic, and here's how the author sets up a slew of tipi-pics:
Grown-up or child, we all need a little bit of space that is all ours. Last week, I was looking for the perfect gift for my nephew's two-year-old birthday. I wanted to give him a cute tent to put in the yard, but Mom suggested a teepee instead. What a perfect gift! He loves it, learned a great, new, easy-to-pronounce vocabulary word, and, most important, it looks adorable in the house but can go outside at any time. Definitely a winning combination. These teepees are not only the perfect place for a child's imagination to run wild, but also add a whimsical design touch to the room (or yard). We hope you love them as much as we do!
Um, yeah. I laughed out loud at Julia's commentary on her tumblr (she blogs at A'allure Garconniere as well), and I really don't think I can say it any better:
Teepees are great because they are whimsical! (as opposed to tents, those are just boring) teepees are great because it’s a new, simple, easy to pronounce vocabulary word for a two year old! (because “tent” is just so overly complicated). teepees are great, because as a rich white privileged person, they allow me to relegate western plains native people to this archaic, whimsical, historical vestige of the past, instead of confronting my nation’s history of colonization and acknowledging native people’s lives and ways of living as complex and multifaceted. this new teepee trend is just so great, because now expensive design companies can make a buck by selling western plains native iconography as playtime places for kids in the suburbs!
Love it! Whenever I post about tipi's, like when I talked about the Glastonbury music festival in the UK last year, I tend to get push back. "It's just a tent!" people say. "We're not allowed to appreciate Native technology?" they protest. My problem is that the tipis I see and the discussions around them always seem to involve some level of fantasy play, you're not just hanging out in a tent that looks like a tipi. At the music festival it was adding to the whole free-rugged-in-nature-wild-thing athestic, these kid-tipis are encouraging "playing Indian" in the most literal way possible. I don't know if you can have an innocent usage, because I feel like no matter what there's a fetishization of "how Indians lived before"--and it continues the stereotypes that we all live/lived in tipis. I don't know. I'll ruminate as we look at a bazillion more pictures:
I’m so happy incorporating teepees into my home decor allow my child the opportunity to erase my nation’s history of violence and cultural genocide by encouraging his imagination run wild about the ways he, too, can be cultural appropriative when he grows up.
All of these are from Design Chic, and there are more on the post, if you need them. So what do you think? Cultural appropriation? Cringe-worthy? Should we just be glad the benevolent design bloggers have deemed us cool for a minute? Should I fly into a uncontrollable rage? NATIVE HULK TEEPEE SMASH!!
(Thanks Andrea, Laura, Meiko, and Julia!)