Lawrence.com

New York-based musician and filmmaker Stacey Fox takes pride in work that is sometimes tricky to categorize. While she holds music degrees from the State University of New York Potsdam and Arizona State University, her short film "cultivating stillness" is silent and features a sound score that's adapted from the Taoist text of the same name.

"Most people think I'm pretty eclectic," Fox says. "The last critic I talked with called me 'avant-garde interdisciplinary.' If you can figure that out, you e-mail me."

Fox is in Lawrence putting together a documentary that may be a little easier to grasp and reflects an important part of local heritage. She's collecting footage for an examination of the early history of Haskell Indian Nations University. Incorporating archival stills, interviews with alumni, original music and other elements, Fox is examining how the institution's boarding school origins in the late 19th century shaped the current university and played a role in raising the awareness of American Indian culture.

A frequent visitor to Lawrence and a collaborator with folk group Uncle Dirtytoes singer Maria Anthony, Fox recalls that her interest in Haskell's development came to her indirectly.

"I've been coming to Lawrence for about 10 years now," she recalls. "I have friends in the area who are artists, and we would go to the Haskell Pow-Wows, and I heard about Haskell that way. I lived in Arizona for about seven years. I'd be working with students (Fox received her doctoral studies in solo performance from ASU) from various reservations, and the Haskell school would come up."

School days

Fox, who is partially descended from the Nanticoke tribe, will be focusing on the university's origins as a boarding school where American Indians were taken from their homes on reservations and taught how to perform trades. These students were forced to abandon their own languages for English and to take western-sounding names.

"I had heard about the boarding schools and had read about them, and heard about them on different documentaries that you see on TV," she says. "I did a little more research and stumbled upon what had been done at the boarding schools.

"It's a history that affects us all. In history, anything that was done before can be done again if you ignore it. This was a group of people that the government tried to wipe out � their languages and their culture. It started out as America's version of the Holocaust, but the Native American community was able to turn it around. (The government) was trying to 'take the Indian out of the Indian' and assimilate them into white culture. Haskell is a huge positive influence on the Native American community and a huge resource for anyone who can tap into it. It's interesting to go from that horrible tragedy that a lot of people don't know about. They would not let the students at the boarding schools speak their indigenous languages. You had to speak in English. That sort of backfired on the government because all of these students in a group ended up learning each other's languages. It really brought them together."

Environmental research

The filmmaker hasn't been merely digging over factoids and figures. She's been taking footage of this year's homecoming at Haskell, and has even attended some tailgate parties. Fox also has been looking for ways to indicate how the past, present and future of the school are intertwined.

"What's really a neat experience is to stand there at the gazebo and look at the trees and buildings and the students who are going places between classes that are there now. In my mind's eye, I can see Haskell a hundred years ago," she says.

When encountered in a local coffee shop, she has dozens of photographs laid out so that she can plan her editing. In one picture, she points out a young Jim Thorpe, who attended Haskell before becoming a gold medal Olympic decathlete in 1913 and a professional football and baseball great.

She's also thinking of how she'll score her footage.

"While I'm filming, I'm composing the sound score," Fox explains. "It will have singing and drumming, and it's going to utilize the indigenous language, telling stories. You're going to hear the steam trains in the part of the movie where you hear about the students being put on trains and being shipped out."

While she has some idea of how the film might eventually sound, she's still searching for an additional element.

"I'm looking for a voice," she says. "There's a voice inside my head that's the perfect voice for the film. I'm having a feeling this weekend somebody's going to come to me. When I hear that voice, that timbre, that will be the person who will narrate the film for me."

The filmmaker hasn't been short of help. Several alumni have agreed to talk about their experiences on camera, and the university has been cooperative. She's quick to thank president Karen Swisher and archivist Bobbi Rahder. Nonetheless, Fox believes that much of Haskell's legacy and offerings are untapped.

"With Haskell being right in Lawrence, I'm surprised more people don't utilize the campus and the archives for research," she says. "It would be really great to see more public schools and universities incorporating the Haskell history. You have this huge primary source on Native American studies and culture right there."

Fox plans on returning the favor in 2002 by putting her documentary on DVD and donating a copy of her unused footage to Haskell for future researchers.

Other worlds

The filmmaker hopes to work on a project in Japan after she finishes shooting in Lawrence. She says there's a connection between what she's discovered at Haskell and in Asian culture.

"The Native American and Taoist philosophies are similar in that you're more connected to the natural universe than what time your plane leaves. When I'm working with people from Native American cultures, the clock is not an issue. Coming from New York, where you have to be at a certain place at a certain time, it's really enjoyable to be out here and be in an atmosphere that is traditional in its structure and yet still functions in a contemporary setting," Fox says.

Her exposure to the more relaxed environment and her unusual curiosities may have altered her reaction to a difficulty during recent journey.

"I was flying out of Albany the other day, and I got on a plane," she recalls. "I always carry my camera with me when I travel. The lights went out on the plane, and it hadn't taken off yet. Everyone else was sort of panicking on the plane because of recent events. My first thought was not 'Am I going to be OK?' but 'Wow! I should get my camera out.'"