American Indians
As with most Americans, I have been exposed to Native American Indians in the literature and film I have watched since I was very young. Also like mos...
As with most Americans, I have been exposed to Native American Indians in the literature and film I have watched since I was very young. Also
like most Americans, these books and films have given me some pretty strange ideas. Our portrayal of American Indian culture is hardly a universally positive thing. Don’t get me wrong – there are some places where Native Americans come out looking very good. In some films – particularly more modern ones – they are seen as very noble people who are victims of greed and imperialism. Just as often, however, they are presented as primitive savages, there to be tamed along with the rest of the west by the “civilizing” influence of the invading culture.
It never seemed strange to me that I knew no American Indians yet have heard so much about their societies and cultures. I was genuinely interested in the history of America, and the American Indian wars and the subsequent struggles for fairness and human rights are both part of this history. It took me years to realize how segregated American Indians are from the rest of the culture, however. I was living on the lands occupied by several tribes in the past, and yet I didn’t know a single member of a single one of these tribes. That should have struck me as odd, but it didn’t.
In college, I did know some American Indians, and they exposed me a little bit more to the issues that their peoples face. I went to my first powwow with some friends, and found it to be a fascinating and entertaining time. It felt a little bit strange to go to someone else’s cultural festival when I wasn’t even particularly interested in celebrating my own culture, but once I was there I found it really interesting. It was a part of American life that I had never been exposed to before and something that I felt that everyone should learn. The dancing, the costumes, and the singing were all quite beautiful and intriguing, and the people all seemed very friendly.
Since then, I’ve been listening to Native American music, reading books written by American Indians, and in general immersing myself in their culture to whatever degree I can. I won’t claim to be a fanatic or an expert by any means, but I can appreciate their traditions in a way that I couldn’t before I was exposed to them. It is interesting to learn about the lives of the peoples who lived here before I did.