Finding Pesa Sooname: Using Documentary Film to Explore Selfhood and Personhood Within the Context of Dementia at the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe

Increasingly, academics are exploring selfhood and personhood among people living with dementia with intent to inform care practices and community development efforts. Yet very little is understood about dementia in indigenous populations, and nearly no information is available regarding selfhood and personhood within the context of dementia for Native people, despite their increased risk of developing dementia. This study - conducted in partnership with the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe - utilizes Video- Based Dialogical Analysis to unpack how tribal elders living with dementia are supported in preserving selfhood and personhood. The analysis employs a dialogical research framework, which rejects the tendency to finalize participants as is typical in traditional, monological research. Rather, participants are engaged in genuine conversation that helps them chart their path of perpetual becoming, expanding complexity through generative questions instead of reducing it through fundamental truth claims. Participants described selfhood for tribal members as inextricably linked to land, family, culture, and community. Identity was so interwoven with notions of service that selfhood and personhood appeared to operate as a single construct. Tensions between Western and traditional ideologies related to these pillars of selfhood and personhood threaten the well-being of tribal elders living with dementia, yet participants believe that intentional conversation surrounding dementia will help navigate those tensions. Throughout such conversations, one phrase rings with particular resonance: "pesa sooname." Meaning "good thought" or "good think" in Northern Paiute, "pesa sooname" denotes the power of positivity and strengths-based perspectives. At Pyramid Lake, tribal members are using pesa sooname to make positive change, and hope to find pesa sooname on the other side of that important work.

Level thesis:degree_level

Master's Degree

Year dc:date.issued

2023

Author dc:creator

• Acklin, Casey Jacob

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Crosswell, Laura

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Barber, Kari
• Pain, Paromita
• Carson, Jennifer

• Dementia
• Dialogical
• Documentary
• Native
• Personhood
• Selfhood

Statement dc:rights

• Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 United States

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/11714/8468

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:scholarwolf.unr.edu:11714/8468