Exhibiting Native American Cultures: Points of Contact Museum Studies Special Topics, A460/560

1. An Overview of American Indian Diversity Exhibiting Native American Cultures: Points of Contact Museum Studies Special Topics, A460/560 Larry J. Zimmerman, Ph.D., RPAIndiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis

2. The functional prerequisites of culture People Language Territory/Technology Social Organization Ideology (belief systems)

3. The People

4. America's native population in 1492 • Most people lived south of the Rio Grande River with total hemispheric populations as high as 75,000,000 • North America—lower populations • Henry Dobyns —18,000,000 • Ubelaker & Thornton —1,800,000 • Thornton—7,000,000 • Most now accept that on the eve of European Contact populations was less than 10,000,000

5. Huge depopulation impact from diseases Diseases in ‘New World’ and ‘Old World’ Endemic: TB, dysentery, staph and strep Epidemic: smallpox, measles, diphtheria, typus, typhoid, bubonic plague, malaria 1815-1816: Smallpox killed 4,000 out of 10,000 Comanche Early 1830s: Pawnee lost half of their population of 20,000, Mandan, Arikara, Hidatsa from 35,000 to under 2,000 Smallpox – an ancient ‘childhood disease’ 1700s: 10-15% deaths in Western Europe 80% of deaths under the age of 10 70% under the age of 2 Impact: 90-95% Mortality What were the effects and repercussions of epidemic devastation? Major shifts in social life, family life, economy, politics, religion, psychology

6. What were the effects and repercussions of epidemic devastation? Major shifts in social life, family life, economy, politics, religion, psychology Many long-term traditions lost See ‘Timeline of European Disease Epidemics Among American Indians’ Images Both from Jaune Quick-to-See Smith Top: Paper Dolls for a Post-Columbian World with Ensembles Contributed by the U.S. Government, in the Eiteljorg Museum Bottom: Famous Names

7. Who gets counted as being Indian? • Self-Identification • Card-carrying Indians and tribal rolls • Blood quantum • DNA US Census: Person having origins in any of the original peoples of North, Central and South America and who maintain tribal affiliation or community attachment. Includes people who self-reported ‘American Indian and Alaska Native’ or wrote their principal or enrolled tribe

8. Race on the 2000 census is by self-identification

9. Examples of group identity criteria • Enrollment requirements • Santa Clara Pueblo v. Martinez, 1977 Supreme Court ruled that no federal agency or any entity except an Indian tribe could determine who its people are. For even longer, the Sup. Ct. has held that Indian nationhood & tribal citizenry are political, not racial matters • An exercise of Tribal SOVEREIGNTY • Blood Quantum – Navajo 1/4 • Lineage • Social/Cultural – connection to the community? Speak the language? Have a name from the tribe? • Cherokee: • Eastern Band: 1/16 Blood quantum • Oklahoma bands: lineage • Tribes didn’t always have BQ enrollment requirements: • Used to adopt other members from other tribes or non-Indians • Kinship rather than blood • Enrollment evolved to provide fair distribution of benefits: land, resources, voting, compensation, etc.

10. Contemporary Populations

13. The 10 Largest American Indian tribal groupings in the US • Total Reporting: 2,475,956 100% • Cherokee 281,069 11.4% • Navajo 269,202 10.9 • Sioux 108,272 4.4 • Chippewa 105,907 4.3 • Choctaw 87,349 3.5 • Pueblo 59,533 2.4 • Apache 57,060 2.3 • Lumbee 51,913 2.1 • Iroquois 45,212 1.8 • All other tribal groupings 753,406 24% • More than 1 tribe rptd 52,425 2.1 • No tribal affiliation rptd 511,960 20.7

14. Physical Variation • Stereotypic—Red-brown skin, dark brown eyes, prominent cheek bones, straight black hair, and scantiness of beard—but huge variation • Skin color—Very light in some tribes, as the Cheyenne, to almost black in others, as the Caddo and Tarimari. In a few tribes, as the Flatheads, the skin has a distinct yellowish cast. • Hair—varies dramatically in amount, texture & color • Eyes—Generally dark • Body shape—great variation in height, weight, physique • Blood type—generally O • Other features—shove-shaped incisors, Inca bones, but these are variable

15. Languages

16. Distribution of Native American Languages

17. Language Variation For such a small population, Indian languages are extremely diverse. 57 families grouped into 9 macro-families or phyla 300 distinct languages 2000 dialects California—at least 20 families West of Rockies—17 more Rest of the continent—20 more Today English is the most commonly spoken language, and many native languages are gone or will soon be so.

18. Territory and Technology

19. Indian Views of Land • Stereotypes abound regarding Indian views of land. • Generally: • Land could not be individually owned • Land could be controlled by family units, such as clans • The operating principle was usufruct • The earth was sacred and to be cared for, but it could be used, albeit carefully. Mother Earth seems a common concept, but it has been called into question. • Sacred places were a key; sacredness can be difficult to understand

20. From Chief Seattle’s speech 1854 * ‘Every part of this soil is sacred in the estimation of my people. Every hillside, every valley, every plain and grove, has been hallowed by some sad or happy event in days long vanished. Even the rocks, which seem to be dumb and dead as the swelter in the sun along the silent shore, thrill with memories of stirring events connected with the lives of my people, and the very dust upon which you now stand responds more lovingly to their footsteps than yours, because it is rich with the blood of our ancestors, and our bare feet are conscious of the sympathetic touch.’ Suquamish Chief Seattle *For complete text of the speech see http://www.halcyon.com/arborhts/chiefsea.html. Do be aware that there is controversy about this speech. See About the Chief Seattle Speech.

21. Dawes Severalty Act. (1887) "The common field is the seat of barbarism, while the separate farm is the door to civilization. Sen. Henry Dawes, Massachusetts He also noted that selfishness was the root of advanced civilization, and he could not understand why the Indians were not motivated to possess and achieve more than their neighbors Congress sought to break up Indian communal lands by giving Indian families 160 acres of land, backed by a 25-year tax-free trust from the government. At the end of the term, Indians could either keep the land or sell it. In 1887, the tribes had owned about 138 million acres; by 1900 the total acreage in Indian hands had fallen to 78 million Henry Dawes See the precise language of the law at http://www.law.du.edu/russell/lh/alh/docs/dawesact.html

24. Assorted land images… For information about Indian views of land and environment, see Native Americans and the Environment.

25. The Culture Area Concept

26. Cultures Areas or Food Areas?

27. The Problem with Culture Areas Actually, these categories have entered into the popular culture in a big way. They are now the main descriptors of Indian groups. One needs to question whether it is still a useful concept: It may be that it locks Indian groups in time, using descriptions of groups at the time of Contact. Pan-Indian cultural activities and massive influences of media have "blended" lots of cultural traits.--Plains and Southwest stereotypes are dominant Doesn't account for the ability of groups to adjust to white and other Indian influence.

28. Social Organization

29. Kinship was the social organization core for most Indian nations Small scale societies • Initially after first habitation, small populations of hunters and gatherers were the norm. • Most were nomadic, with small populations of +/- 200 • Major unit was extended family, usually patricentric • Microband/macroband seasonality • Groups were nearly acehpalous (without a head), but leaders developed with achieved status • Mostly egalitarian, with rule by consensus • These patterns survived until well past European Contact especially in marginal areas or those with minimal contact.

30. Hunting and Gathering Life

31. Settled village life Greater emphasis on gathering and use of cultivars caused changes circa 7,000 years ago • Cultivars and intensive gathering allowed small surpluses • Surpluses allowed larger surpluses and more settled life • In the rich eastern woodlands, Primary Forest Efficiency allowed substantially larger populations (+/- 1000) • Beginnings of social stratification • Still kinship based and some use of micro/macroband in marginal areas • Kin based, clan structured organization still mostly patricentric

32. Horticulture has a 3000 year history in Indian Country

33. Horticulture brought major changes • After 3000 BP, emphasis on domesticated plants allowed greater surpluses • With surpluses came dramatic population growth (1000-30,000) in villages and “cities” • Gardening shifts cultural emphasis to matricentric • Large populations keep clan structures, but often added a layer of social control at chiefdom level • Social stratification became substantial • A shift toward urban life • Emergence of “pre-state” structures

34. Courses toward urban life

35. At Contact, there was immense diversity • A very wide range of social organizations and political ideologies at European Contact • Social organization ranged from nomadic, patricentric, egalitarian hunters and gatherers with completely kin-based systems to nearly urban, socially stratified, matricentric horticulturalists with both kin and non-kin-based systems. • Much of this broke down during the next 500 years. • Social organization is still in flux.

36. Changes in Social Structure since Contact • Detribalization, migration, and urbanization • Reservation and social structure • Kinship and the family • Political resurgence - reservations as a power base • Contemporary political organization - tribal and urban

37. The Indian Wars: Resistance was futile

38. The Reservation Period

39. Churches attacked both family structure and belief systems

40. Boarding Schools attacked family structure Boarding School Blues1Words and Music by Floyd Red Crow WestermanYou put me in your boarding schoolfilled me with your White man’s rulesBe a foolay hey hey hey heyaYou put me in Chicago onecold and windy dayRelocationExterminationay hey hey hey heyaYou took me from my home, my friendThink I’ll go back there againWounded KneeWant to be freeay hey hey hey heya2.

41. The Depression and the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934

42. Indians as U.S. citizens, 1924 President Calvin Coolidge with four Osage Indians after Coolidge signed the granting Indians full U.S. citizenship

43. The impact of World War II

44. Getting something back: The Indian Claims Commission US—1946 Canada—1991 but with earlier versions since 1927

45. Termination and Relocation

46. Activism and the resurgence of tribal power

47. 1970s Activism

48. Casinos and economic resurgence

49. Ideology

50. Pre-contact belief systems • Animatism: belief in a supernatural power not part of supernatural beings • Animism: belief that natural objects are animated by spirits • the spirits are thought of as having identifiable personalities and other characteristics such as gender • Everything in nature has a unique spirit or all are animated by the same spirit or force • Both present in some societies • For Native Americans, animism dominates • We see some evidence in material remains, but most information comes from post-Contact ethnography