Subramanian Swamy Quotes

Countries under foreign command quickly forget their history, their past, their tradition, their national symbols, their way of living, often their own literary language.

India is a curious place that still preserves the past, religions, and its history. No matter how modern India becomes, it is still very much an old country.

The Trail of Tears has a great deal of meaning for every person of American Indian ancestry, whether they are Cherokee or not. For me, it has always stood for what is best and worst about the history of the United States.

This country, and the West Coast, especially, is bad at preserving any cultural legacy.

Exploitation was rampant before statehood, and various factions actively tried to eradicate the roots of Hawaiian culture in the process of converting the natives to European religious beliefs. Some of the results can never be undone. We try to honor what is left.

I don't have space to enter into the examples or the history of this, so I'm left with having to make the bold statement that culture is extinct.

This land was our land; it was taken from us illegally …. John Smith did not bring a civilization here. There was already civilization here…. We should have burned the boat and killed them. all.

… there's no axiom of history to substantiate the necessity of the people returning to country they left Nineteenth centuries before.

Have we, the first holders of this prosperous region, no longer a share in your history? Glad were your fathers to sit down upon the threshold of the long house. Had our forefathers spurned you from it, when the French were thundering at the opposite side to get a passage through, and drive you into the sea, whatever has been the fate of other Indians, the Iroquois might still have been a nation, and I, instead of pleading here for the privilege of living within your borders, I – might have had a country.

Millions of dollars have been expended to excavate and transport to museums the tools, weapons, and other artifacts of Indians--but scarcely a penny has been spent to save the living descendants of those who made them

The thesis of the book in your hands is that Native American history merits more than 9 pages.

Languages and cultures are disappearing at an enormously fast rate, and many of them are in Canada. These are extreme examples of removal of freedom of expression - to actually lose a language and the ability to express that culture.

I am honored to receive the TED Prize, but it's not about me; it's about our field - and the thousands of men and women around the world, particularly in the Middle East, who are defending and protecting sites.

Our efforts to preserve and protect the Alamo are first and foremost about preserving and protecting the story of the battle itself.

Personally, what I would like the most is to work on a project that would aid the historic rehabilitation of Havana. It's a shame - and it gives me tremendous sadness - to see the precious buildings, to see a city, which could be the most beautiful in Latin America, falling apart and with very little money for renovations.

One great feature of modern society is the institutionalized respect we give to processes designed to destroy the past.

A lot of native culture has been destroyed. So you already feel lost inside your culture. And then you add up feeling lost and insignificant inside the larger culture. So you end up feeling lost squared. And to never be recognized, to never have any power, you know, other minority communities actually have a lot of economic, cultural power.

Just as a tree without roots is dead, a people without history or cultural roots also becomes a dead people.

If we are to reclaim our culture, we cannot afford narrow definitions.

As far as Germany extends it ruins culture.

The reverence for the Scriptures is an element of civilization, for thus has the history of the world been preserved, and is preserved.

But a people unable to reform will not be able to preserve its old culture either.

For girls and women, storytelling has a double and triple importance. Because the stories of our lives have been marginalized and ignored by history, and often dismissed and treated as 'gossip' within our own cultures and families, female human beings are more likely to be discouraged from telling our stories and from listening to each other with seriousness.

If a nation loses its storytellers, it loses its childhood.

What we're losing culturally the fastest, aside from natural resources and oil and the idea of democracy and social justice, is the ability to concentrate.