Native Stuff

Introduction The purpose of this page is to help foster some understanding of native culture in North America. This will be accomplished by providing the reader with stories, personal accounts, quotes from other references, web links and a bibliography of suggested readings. You may be interested in life on the Rez. I have made up a short story about our rez. A Word of Caution I am writing this not as an authority on the subject, but as an explorer describing what I have observed, or read, or have been taught. If you have other understandings on the subjects in here, please pass on the information to me, as we all grow through learning My History I have a story to tell, as everyone has, but I will not pressure you into reading this at this time. An appropriate link will be provided at a future date in this section. I hope to also provide a diary of my parent's lives as it is much more interesting in that it gives accounts of life at the turn of the century up to now. Native People's Vision for the Future The native peoples of the Americas, from the Arctic Circle to the southern tip of South America share a similar view; that they exist as separate and distinct nations and are not subjects of any country. First Nations people are trying to live in harmony with everyone, but they want the right to govern themselves. I feel safe in saying that they want to administer their justice system, economy, schooling, and environment - on their lands. The lands that these people have been forced to live on are, in many cases, not their ancestor's lands. The ancestors were herded on to the reserves to be put out of the way. An existence was scratched out of the earth, but a horrible price was paid - most of the First Nations people died. Even with this oppression, the natives are good allies. When the wars were fought, the natives signed up for service in far greater numbers, as a percentage, than any other ethnic nationality. Even though, to join the wars our people in Canada had to give up their native rights - to never be allowed back on their lands. Fortunately this law was recently reversed, allowing my father to move back on the reserve. Land Claims Many First Nations have claims to the governments to recover some of the land they once had. The key word here is "some" of the lands. The natives didn't believe they actually own land; they just looked after the areas where they fished and hunted. In many cases these areas were not huge expanses of land as this land was once a land of plenty. However, in the more desolate areas of the continents, the people had to seasonally travel over large areas to follow their food source. As an example, the native people of northern Quebec have a rightful claim over a large area of this province where the cariboo range; an area the province wants to flood for the much debated hydro-electric power power project. Of course, people in the cities can't understand why a huge expanse of territory is needed by the natives to survive as there is always a super market around the corner in the cities. Even if these people had access to a market, there are two good reasons why they couldn't use it. One is money - many of these people don't have jobs - even fur trapping has been drastically reduced. The other compelling argument is that being nomadic is their way of life. We understand the concept of gypsies in Europe - these people are our gypsies. There are many good books written on this subject, so I won't go on further. Ashinawbe I am an Ashinawbe but our nation has been named Ojibwa by others. Many of the original people have re-named themselves. Inuit, Dene, Lakota. These reflect their heritage better than the name given them by the missionaries and explorers. Many have used a word from their language which means 'the people'. This is what the approximate translation of Ashinawbe means. As a matter of interest, some research into the name Ojibwa has came up with some odd origins. One theory is that the word is the Iroquois term for puckered skin - perhaps to reflect what the skin does when a captured Ojibwa is burned. A better interpretation is the puckering of the skins of the mocassins as they are tied in the fashion of the tribe; a distinction that many tribes used to tell each other apart...their footware. Finally, one theory indicates that the origin of the word comes from the Cree, meaning the people who talk slowly. Cree and Ashinawbe language sounds similar - the Cree language sounds a lot faster. My reserve is the Nipissing First Nation outside of North Bay Ontario, Canada. However, this is not our ancestor's original homeland. Before us, another Algonquin speaking tribe, the Nipissings, made their home here. I have attempted to write an interesting account of how we came to this area. Please refer to the following link. History of The Nipissings Where did The First Nations People Come from? Since the "modern" archeologists and anthropologists can't agree on this subject as it threatens the history they were taught in school, I will give my take on the subject. First of all, the native people believe they began here. The Hopi believe they originated at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. Many other native nations have oral histories (myths, as the learned ones call them) that indicate they started here. Its all a moot point as the ancestors have been here longer than recorded time. Anthropologists indicate that humans could not of originated here because there is no link to any other monkeys or apes on this continent. That, of course, means that you can't believe in the bible's take on the great beginning. For my viewpoint, these scientists suffer from tunnel vision, that they have a theory that man began in African and all of the evidence must prove this or it isn't allowed. If only they would use the mind game that Einstein used to come up his great theories - "What if?". What if? What if humans evolved spontaneously in a number of locales? There are many cases of this happening with other flora and fauna. What if we didn't evolve from apes? What if humans began here and moved from here. Any evidence would have been wiped out after succeeding ice ages. What if we aren't originally from earth? That may explain why we haven't been able to get a convincing link to our ape brothers. As time flies by, even these staid academics have to change their opinions. With discoveries of North American habitations dating back 20 - 40,000 years, the theory of the Bering land bridge being used by our ancestors to arrive here, has been finally thrown out of the academic circles. Ancient World-wide Trade This continent was once part of world-wide trading route. Evidence of North American items have shown up in Egyptian tombs (tobacco), Roman carvings (pineapple) and in India (potatoes). The archeologists have un-earthed two links with Europe that date back 10,000 years - two bodies. One found on the east coast and the other in Washington state( I think). Another interesting artifact is a west coast tribe who have distinct east Asian features. The Kennebeck man (one of the odd bodies found that I refered to earlier) has been found to have features very similar to the aboriginal tribes in Japan I have heard stories from some of the native elders that told of trade with the Celts. The popular Sun dance, may have originated in Europe, and through a Celtic connection came here through the trade routes. Statues of huge heads in central America have features that are definitely African. Columbus "discovered" America after buying a set of maps that showed the route of the trade winds to and from North America. I recently listened to an interesting radio program about the possiblity of ancient trade routes to North America. The one theory of ancient trade is based on the fact that the boats being used thousands of years ago were far superior to that used by Columbus. The Roman Galleys were sea going boats that routinely carried over a hundred men. The Egyptian boats were even more sophisticated and could carry a couple of hundred people. Columbus's boats could only carry 20 men. The theory goes, that the skills for boat building ( and many other skills) were lost during the dark ages. Consequently boat building was being re-discovered at the time of Columbus. Another interesting theory comes from the examination of a set of petroglyphs in eastern Ontario. One linguist suggests that these markings are a ancient African language that has since fell out of daily use and is only used by the women in one tribe in Africa today. He claims that the markings cover a large portion of words used in this old language. Oh, I love a good mystery. I find all of these ideas and theories to be interesting and thought provoking. No one will ever know for sure what the truth is. And for my point of view... who cares? These debates won't feed the people who are starving or the stop the wars. Its just fodder for idle minds.