Native American Culture & Some History

[Swordsaint]

[SIZE=1][SIZE=1]I didn't realize it till I got to college and the professors pointed it out, but I've found there's really a lot left out from the history books about Native Americans (Indians) I've even begun to notice that a good number of people are under the impression that the Native American Tribes are extinct.

Seriously, Not making that one up. I've met a few people who were surprised to find I'm nearly half native American (About a 1/3 all together). Heck, even I'm willing to admit I was largely ignorant about that part of my ethnical background, now then...to the point of this discussion:

I'm curious to see what everyone here knows/beleives about native american tribes and history, and I 'd like to try to help enlighten people about the tribe in my area and help put to rest some stereotypes.
This is not to say I am Indian Knowledge God, I've just been able to see another version of the historical acocunts, ones not commonly seen in the history books.

For example, The battle at wounded knee: I don't really remember this being talked about much in the history books I had in High school only a few years ago. I thad maybe a brief sentence or two, not really describing it at all.
When I got into college, we ended up discussing Wounded Knee at length in a Native American History class. According to historical accounts gathered/passed from elders (long dead by now) It wasn't really much of a Battle at all. The indian people in the camp were performing a sort of prayer called the "Ghost Dance." The native people were praying for their ancestors/the creator to make the land well again and to bring back the buffalo so they could survive.
The U.S. soldiers "mistook" it to be a war dance and opened fire with their cannons, shelling a native american camp of a few hundred people made up mainly of Elders, women and children. Very few young men were in the camp and all of them had already been disarmed by the U.S. soldiers.

The unit in charge of this camp was the 7th calvalry. The 7th calvary suffered a major defeat at the battle of the Little Big Horn, Armstrong Custers famous "Last stand".
I can't recall the exact figures, but nearly all of the refugees at the camp were killed and the U.S. government awarded 15-17 Congressional Medals of Honor, the single largest number of medals awarded for any battle.

your thoughts, beleifs, opinions, questions about tribes?[/SIZE]

[Guest DecemberWolf]

[COLOR=DarkSlateGray][SIZE=2]Yeah, I was talking about the drunken cruelty that goes on against young woman in most indian reserves on my site, and people in britain and elsewhere beleive that the reserves were extinct atleast, but im not sure about them thinking aborigionals themselves being extinct.

I imagine its a sore subject for Americans cause its embarrasing but from what I learned in American history class was the american soldiers were startled by a gun shot sound...but whatever I guess, apparently americans were even able to shoot aborigionals on sight with no reprocusions.

I live in Canada, and the stereotypes are rather real. They get free money from the government, and they dont live in mainstream society and when they come into town they just wonder around living on the streets like hobos cause they like it, and they drink and vandolize. Plus, theres the massive Indian Posse gang that targets white people who today were not appart of the english/french invasion, and it really pisses me off...alot. My best friend was nearly beaten to death by them and they are cowerdly hopeless people. I hate to come off as racist, but they dont TRY! They get paid to go to school and they skip, and sell drugs. Its lame. They just need to eliminate reserves, and try to make them fit in the best they can with the rest of the world, and stop giving them handicaps.[/SIZE][/COLOR] :o

[Swordsaint]

I can understand that. There are a lot of Drunk indians here on the reservation that don't try, they skip school and get money from the government as well. However, that stigma doesn't apply to all native americans and to lable all as such is more than a little short sighted.
I live on a reservation and have gotten to know the history depicted by both the federal government and the local resevation officials, who did try in school so they could reclaim their culture, and have gotten to see different view points.
A problem I see, besides the fact that many native americans do take advantage of the handicaps the government gives, is the fact that many of the young native people here have grown up listening to their grandparents stories as to what the Native boarding schools were like and how horribly they were treated there, by people hired by the government to "civilize" the "savage" Indians.

Unfortunately, yes there are many out there who use this as an excuse for their behaviour. But they are seen most often because they make the biggest mess. The ones that actually try to better themselves aren't really likely to make the news like the ones who beat your friend. I am actually quite sorry to hear that because of this one event, you beleive the native peoples to be cowardly, hopless people when there actually are many out there that take hope and stand firm despite the ill actions of other people.

These are exactly the kind of misleading stigmas and steretypes that I hope I can lay to rest, or at least alleviate by answering peoples questions. As I said be for, I am not the be all that ends all fountain of information on native peoples, I simply have been able to look at both versions of the history and have found differing view points and historical accounts.

[Albert Flasher]

[COLOR=Sienna]I have a lot of respect for the First Nations people, mostly because of how they (Specifically, the Algonkians and Iroqouis culture-tribes) were instrumental in Canada's defeat of the invading Americans during the War of 1812 (Tecumseh, specifically, at the battle of Queenston Heights... saved our ***** he did!), and the Native trappers were pretty well the only reason that a colony was ever established here in the first place.

Although I do feel that their affinity with nature is rather overblown... the only reason that more damage wasn't done to their environment is because, A, they had such a small population in comparison to their environment, and, B, they were limited to stone axes and tools for the most part. The Iroqouis, for example, were a sedentary people who lived in the St. Lawrence lowland; what they'd do is, as soon as their current habitat had been farmed to exhaustion, they would go off into the woods with a pot full of a coals and star a big-*** forest fire to clear away enough land to set up a new camp, with little regard to what they were killing or disturbing. Little things like that seem to slip most people's minds when they think of the First Nations' people.

And let's not forget some of the things that went on down in South America... the Anasazi who overharvested their forests and forced themselves to abandon their homes, or the Inca and Maya peoples who had to abandon great stone cities because of the damage that they had done to the environment around them (Although I will concede that many of these abandonments were because of plagues introduced by the Europeans).

I'm quite fond of the Natives in general, but I'd hardly say that they were perfect in any respect, or that they were universally the victims in the Wave of Exploration.[/COLOR]

[visualkei]

[QUOTE=Swordsaint]
Unfortunately, yes there are many out there who use this as an excuse for their behaviour. But they are seen most often because they make the biggest mess. The ones that actually try to better themselves aren't really likely to make the news like the ones who beat your friend. I am actually quite sorry to hear that because of this one event, you beleive the native peoples to be cowardly, hopless people when there actually are many out there that take hope and stand firm despite the ill actions of other people.[/QUOTE]

Well put, [B]Swordsaint[/B]. I don't live in Canada, so I don't exactly know what's the impression white Canadians have about the natives there, except when I studied them for about a week in a college class. I've heard about the reservations over there, and the native's customs. It's hard living together when you have people from different cultures, and it takes a lot of time for both groups to adjust to each other, and things to level out.

I'm a minority in the US, and whenever I see someone with the same ethnicity as mine doing something stupid, I think to myself, "Dammit, this is going to reflect on my ethnic group!" Like Swordsaint said, when you're a minority, the people who get the most attention, are the ones that make the biggest messes. =/