Talk:Mary Two-Axe Earley

Mohawk or Canadian
since you are the most recent editor, could you clarify why both the infobox and the lead say she is Mohawk and not Canadian? I feel like I don't understand some sort of policy on this since I've seen things like this recently on other articles about indigenous peoples, but shouldn't it say something along the lines of "Mary Two-Axe Earley was a Canadian women's rights activist from the Mohawk reserve of Kahnawake." instead of saying she was Mohawk who just happened to live in Canada? (By the way, I know you didn't originally put that but I still am wondering if you know why it says that) Sixula (talk) 19:09, 20 September 2020 (UTC)
 * that's a good question. I don't think Wikipedia has any clear policy around this, so I can only give you my own reasoning: my current assumption is that we can't assume Two-Axe Earley identified herself as Canadian -- or that she had Canadian citizenship. I'm not Indigenous, but I know First Nations people have had a long, complex relationship with Canada and "citizenship" as a whole. Up until the 1960s, First Nations people were not allowed to vote in elections unless they gave up their Indian status. I've also read that some Indigenous people (on both sides of the Canada/U.S. border) have historically chosen to forego official Canadian/American identities and instead identify themselves primarily though their Indigenous community (e.g. Mohawk). This is why I chose not to replace "Mohawk" with "Canadian". Your question does make me want to find better confirmation, however, so I'll try to do some more research -- I may reach out to WP Indigenous peoples of North America for guidance on this one. Alanna the Brave (talk) 19:54, 20 September 2020 (UTC)
 * Great. Nationality and citizenship is generally a very touchy subject; my person preference is something like Mohawk-Canadian for the lead and Canadian for the nationality in the infobox, but I think WP Indigenous peoples of North America will be a much better defining choice. Maybe they could open an RfC because this subject keeps on coming up with these type of people (Catalan politicans come to mind) and the only (fairly) defining point is an RfC which concretely sets out the policy. Sixula (talk) 21:45, 20 September 2020 (UTC)
 * For anyone interested in my subsequent query on this topic at WikiProject Indigenous peoples of North America, I'm linking to the discussion here. Alanna the Brave (talk) 13:18, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

not all
she still wouldn't be allowed to live in Kahnawake with her non-Kahnawake husband. By Kahnawake rule, not fed gov. --2607:FEA8:D5DF:1AF0:5550:8798:C27E:2C8 (talk) 11:45, 28 June 2021 (UTC)