Native American Culture

So, I think it is safe to say that no one has a richer or more storied culture than Native Americans. It is rich is struggle, strife and triumph. There are many things of their culture that we actually take for granted, like moccasins, tee pees, peace pipes, and totem poles.

Animals were considered spirits in their culture. Although they were hunted and killed, their skins were made from clothing and drums and their meat was never wasted and their spirits lived on in the minds of those in the tribe. Spirituality is a huge part of Native culture, but they do not consider is just a part of them or a practice, more of who they are as a being and it's included in their every day life.

Another thing that we have seen through the years are dream catchers. We see them hanging on walls, windows of cars, and many other places. They are based on an old legend told by the Lakota tribe. It symbolizes holding onto the good things in life, while the holes in the catcher are there to filter out the bad thoughts and feelings. I remember having a dream catcher above my bed in hopes it would keep away bad dreams. I would even take it on trips with me. They have always kind of been a big thing in my family without me even realizing it was the ONE thing that kept us connected with our Native American heritage until now. That's kind of cool to think about.

Cherokee Indians:::The Tribe

My great great grandmother was in the Cherokee tribe. When people ask what I am, I proudly say "Cherokee Indian." With doing this, I've actually met a ton of people from the same tribe. Though we know nothing about it, it's always cool to find out.

Cherokee, or spelled "Tsalagi" is Creek, meaning "people with another language." There are still 22,000 people who speak it today and 350,000 Cherokee still alive in the world today. Most of them are in North Carolina and Oklahoma though. The point is, they still exist, just not very many of them compared to before. The government starting in the fifties actually started to remove the Cherokee children from their Tsalagi-speaking homes, deteriorating the number of children being raised bilingual from 75% to less than 5%. Really? Was that necessary?

Sadly, they were forced to relocate quite earlier in their time from the southeast to Oklahoma. They were rounded up, made to relocate without any of their processions or shoes for that matter and sent on a 800 mile journey. Many died of exposure, starvation, disease, and exhaustion.

OH, and despite the myth of indians living in tee pee's, Cherokee's actually lived in log houses. I'd like to think my people were bad ass.

Native American History

I've doing a lot of research of Native Americans. I've got a little bit of their blood in me and it's always made me a bit curious as to what the history of them were and what they endured to survive in America with all of the other countries invading their space.

Native Americans have always been here. There were about 10 million inhabiting America during the the time of European arrivals. They were here before any other man had set foot on the land for many many years. Also the name "Indian" was given to them by Christopher Columbus which mistakenly thought he had landed himself in the Indies.

Through their beliefs that have always respected the land and the gifts it has to offer in return. They used the land to their advantage by learning and becoming extremely skilled hunters, fisherman, they built homes with any available recourses, and farmed their own crops.

When the colonists and explorers came over, they brought many sicknesses with them, such as; measles, smallpox, cholera, yellow fever and many more. This alone began to wipe out a mass amount of Native Americans.

Kind of stinks they were being wiped out so easily. They seemed pretty eco-friendly.