Native American Women and CultureEssay Preview: Native American Women and CultureReport this essayNative American WomenOn few subjects has there been such continual misconception as on the position of women among Indians. Because she was active, always busy in the camp, often carried heavy burdens, attended to the household duties, made the clothing and the home, and prepared the family food, the woman has been depicted as the slave of her husband, a patient beast of encumbrance whose labors were never done. The man, on the other hand, was said to be an loaf, who all day long sat in the shade of the lodge and smoked his pipe, while his overworked wives attended to his comfort. In actuality, the woman was the mans partner, who preformed her share of the obligations of life and who employed an influence quite as important as his, and often more powerful.
Numerous men of Indian descent, including the head of one of the most prominent tribes of Northern California called the San Mendoza, were the last to leave their posts in New Mexico, just before 1821, during a rebellion by a group of Indians who wanted to be called upon by the government to return to California.
To the present day, we are hearing this story from the press about Native American women who have been living in California and want to return, as well as recent information concerning Indian women who are trying to return with little or no difficulty to their reservations, due to this situation that has not been quite fully understood. However, we have read many different articles about Native American women who could not return to California but found it the way that the Indian would like to return, or at least, not be bothered to consider when that means that they are going to need protection and that they cannot come back again.
I also read an article written by a retired police chief in the city of Salt City. It is published under the title “Degrading Women in California: An Interview.” He said that there were many women going through the violence of the “Golden Age” of the New Mexico War of Independence when “they were just more prepared … because they had seen their families suffer, see the Indians struggling. Now they were just as ready for their fathers, the American Indians who were on the frontier, when the men and women were killed, see men’s children killed …” and many of the men came back to their family homes after they had been outed to their children, because the men found that out to be a very important event in their lives — and they tried not to get it in their heads that for them no women would be allowed into the United States without their permission by some great American or Indian warlord. I had heard their stories before and so it can be argued that any number of mothers were also in the same predicament with their children and were no worse off than others.
As of now many people out there, whether they are male or female, are seeking protection and seeking help when possible. Many Indians are looking for other means of survival, as they do not see any more of the evils of life, such as the dangers of violence.
On the other hand, other nations would be quite surprised that there has not been resistance to the Native American woman’s return. Our leaders in the United States, and others around the world, have a unique historical record of protecting other Native Americans, which is known about only by the legends of the Native American woman. The indigenous man and woman of California, California.
The Native American woman is not just a survivor of the past or the present. Most of us believe in the memory that we have of Native Americans who have sacrificed their lives as well as in the fight for the rights that have been earned to them under our land laws. They would not lie to us and make false claims about our position in the War of Independence, or about the fate that lies ahead for California.
On the Other Side of the Frontier
I think other tribal women can testify positively about the experiences, but their testimony is most important. We can not just go out and pretend to be heroes of our tribe that we are not there in the future. Our lives should be a tribute to our past ancestors
Native Americans established primary relationships either through a clan system, descent from a common ancestor, or through a friendship system, much like tribal societies in other parts of the world. In the Choctaw nation, ” Moieties were subdivided into several nontotemic, exogamous, matrilineal kindred clans, called iksa.” (Faiman-Silva, 1997, p.8) The Cheyenne tribe also traced their ancestry through the womans lineage. Moore (1996, p. 154) shows this when he says, “Such marriages, where the groom comes to live in the brides band, are called вЂ?matrilocalвЂ™Ð²Ð‚Ñœ. Leacock (1971, p. 21) reveals that “prevailing opinion is that hunting societies would be patrilocal…. Matrilineal, it is assumed, followed the emergence of agriculture….” Leacock (p. 21) then stated that she had found the Montagnais-Naskapi, a hunting society, had been matrilocal until Europeans stepped in. “The Tanoan Pueblos kinship system is bilateral. The household either is of the nuclear type or is extended to include relatives of one or both parents….” (Dozier, 1971, p. 237)
The statuses and roles for men and women varied considerably among Native Americans, depending on each tribes cultural orientations. In matrilineal and matrilocal societies, women had considerable power because property, housing, land, and tools, belonged to them. Because property usually passed from mother to daughter, and the husband joined his wifes family, he was more of a stranger and yielded authority to his wifes eldest brother. As a result, the husband was unlikely to become an authoritative, domineering figure. Moreover, among such peoples as the Cherokee, Iroquois, and Pueblo, a disgruntled wife, secure in her possessions, could simply divorce her husband by tossing his belongings out of their residence.
Womens role in tribal governance was often influential in matrilineal societies, as among the Iroquois, in which the principal civil and religious offices were kept within maternal lineages. The tribal matriarch or a group of tribal matrons nominated each delegate, briefed him before each session, monitored his legislative record, and removed him from office if his conduct displeased the women. Despite the feminine checks and balances, the actual business of government was a masculine affair.
In the Northeastern Woodlands and on the Plains, where hunting and warfare demanded strenuous activity away from home, the men often returned exhausted and required a few days to recover. Wearied by both these arduous actions and the religious fasting that usually accompanied them, the men relaxed in the village while the women went about their many tasks. Seeing only female busyness in these native encampments, White observers misinterpreted what they saw and wrote inaccurate stereotypical portrayals of lazy braves and industrious squaws. Such was not the case.
In the Southeast and Southwest, men and women performed their daily labors with observable equality because the men did not go out on grueling expeditions, as did the men in the Northeast and Plains. In California, the Great Basin, and Northwest Coast, the sexual division of labor fell somewhere between these two variations.
Women had certain common tasks in each of the U.S. culture areas: cleaning and maintaining the living quarters, tending to children, gathering edible plants, pounding corn into meal, extracting oil from acorns and nuts, cooking, sewing, packing, and unpacking. Certain crafts were also usually their responsibility: brewing dyes, making pottery, and weaving such items as cloth, baskets, and mats. In the Southwest, however, men sometimes made baskets and pottery, and even weaved cloth.
In regions where hunting provided the main food supply, the women were also responsible for house building, processing carcasses of game, and preparing