Westernizing Amerindians:
Perpetuating the myth.


A position by James Hutchison
12/98



Identifying the Problem

        Although Amerindian literature is gaining recognition in academia as true literature, there remains a fundamental problem that, as yet, needs to be reconciled. Until this is done, students will not receive the benefit of such study. This problem lies in the way in which Amerindian literature is classified. It is caused by the same fundamental and traditional problem that lays waste to most anthropological and historical positions on the Amerindians. In short, it is American amnesia. Contrary to the residual and popular image most conceive as accurate we have records that prove otherwise. In a recent survey I conducted the general consensus was that Amerindians are dark skinned, their women were subservient to men and many still hold that a mystery race or Western culture group built the mounds. This demonstrates my thesis well and can quickly be corrected.

What Does a Real Amerindian Look Like?

Amerindian Women

The "Mysterious" Mound - Builders

Categories of Amerindian Literature
        Westernization of Amerindian culture evidences itself in many ways. One of these becomes apparent in the method applied to the classification of Amerindian literature. While the standard categories used might work for Western Literature (and I have my doubts they always works there either), they will not work for all forms of Amerindian Literature. Thus, the basic question is what defines literature as Amerindian or otherwise? This logical question will likely remain a topic of no little debate for some time, or so it should.
        The current consensus in determining what qualifies as Amerindian literature includes both works by Amerindians and about Amerindians. Personally I prefer this approach, at least as a step in the right direction, but it does have a few problems.
        One of these is that of style. If the writing is written by an Amerindian in the Western tradition is it still Amerindian literature? If so, then should we not categorize all literature this way? As soon as we do the category of Western literature is dissolved. American literature is written by peoples of many cultures as is British. What then is Western? This line of logic quickly becomes complex. Another crucial factor in all this is defining an Amerindian.
        Defining an Amerindian is no simple task. Is a person an Amerindian because they simply carry a B. I. A. card that authenticates their genealogical ancestry? If yes, then we must include those people that have gained such a card through conspirital means. This is usually done through a friend on a tribal council who has authority to approve applications for these cards arbitrarily. Although the applicant may have not one ounce of Amerindian blood, they carry a card that legally makes them an Amerindian. There is a counter to this argument that likewise must be considered.
        On the other end of the spectrum there are people who can not prove any Amerindian heritage, and may have none, but are intimately familiar with Amerindian ways. They write like an Amerindian, but may not be an Amerindian. Added to these are two more factors.
        The first is the Amerindian who was raised in the Western tradition. This person may have no clue what it is to be an Amerindian culturally, but they can get a card and write in a clearly Western style. The second is the traditional Amerindian who may or may not carry a card, but is truly an Amerindian author yet may also write in a clearly Western style. But then what of the romance novels that feature Amerindians? What of the Amerindian author who, although writes as a Westerner, is recognized as a great Amerindian author?
        The list goes on and can become quite pedantic and irresolvable. Therefor, there is only one logical ledger by which to judge literature and that is by style, content and authorship. After all, is it not style that distinguishes poetry from a novel? Was Robert Burns an Englishman? Should he be listed in English literature as an English author? I think he would argue that there is a great difference betwixt the English and Scots and might take great offense at being categorized as an Englishman.
        Authorship is important for economic reasons as it is now illegal to sell something as being made by an Amerindian if it is not. This is one of the reasons many cling to their card rather than their culture. With this understood and set aside, style and content can then be used sensibly. Admittedly these factors also are burdened with grey areas, but fewer than that of the former. Therefore, the guidelines of style and content alone can suffice.
        One of the most popular areas, and that which is most often found in print, is that of Amerindian oral tradition. These stories are often considered fictitious and of little or no historical value. This is because Western academia values empirical history whereas Amerindians value the context and meaning of the history over chronological and empirical accuracy. This fact is proven beyond doubt in the work itself. As an example, consider the book Black Elk Speaks.
        In this work, on pages 1-5, Black Elk relates a cursory story of how the Sioux received the gift of the sacred pipe. If this story were printed separate it would fall under the auspices of fiction, or at best, folklore. At the end he comments, “This they tell, and whether it happened so or not I do not know; but if you think about it, you can see that it is true.”(Neihardt, 5) It is clear that to Black Elk, as to many Amerindians including myself, the actual event is not as important as what was gained by the teaching of the story. This type of literature should be moved from the category of fiction and the sub-category of mythology to a new category of contextual legend. This indicating that the story probably has some relation to an actual event, but has been fantasized based on the Amerindian values afore mentioned. Another type of story that would fit into this category is that of complete fiction. This kind of story is represented by Louise Erdrich’s Tracks. This story is completely fiction, but the characters and character of the story have symbolic meaning that holds critical context for the Amerindian. For example; just prior to an encounter with a bear during the birth of a child the narrator says:
But it wasn’t until the afternoon of that second day that the stillness finally broke, and then, it was as if the Manitous all through the woods spoke through Fluer, loose, arguing. I recognized them. Turtle’s quavering scratch, the Eagle’s high shriek, Loon’s crazy bitterness, Otter, the howl of Wolf, Bear’s low rasp. Perhaps the bear heard Fluer calling and answered.(Erdrich, 59)
Then, after the bear had been shot, the teller of the tale continues, “It barreled past me, crashed through the brush into the woods, and was not seen after. It left no trail either, so it could have been a spirit bear.”(Erdrich, 60)
        It is significant that the bear is often associated with the guarding of spirits, and a birth is an appropriate setting for such an appearance. A comprehensive list of analogy is far beyond the scope of this paper. Suffice it to say that the book is replete with symbolism of this kind. In short, this story too meets the prescribed determinate in that it is the context and teaching that is the priority, the story serving as the conveyance.
        A second form of Amerindian literature should be placed in a separate category of historical oral tradition. This is because there is little or no fantasy involved, but rather the account is considered a non-legendary account of the peoples past. Although symbolisms may be present in this type of account, they are limited to the same association as any descriptive name or term. Secondly, the emphasis is on the accounting of the event rather than context, much as Western history, but is a non-written record. A prime example of this form is demonstrated in the Lenape migration account.
        In this account the Lenape migrated South, along the Mississippi River until they came to the confluence of the Ohio River. There they ran into the fortified towns of a people, who through a series of events, became hostile toward the Lenape. In the mean time the Lenape say they became allied with the Iroquois, but that failed too. The Lenape wound up trapped on the Western bank of the Mississippi, but some managed to escape to the East where, after slipping between their two new foes, they established themselves along the Hudson River as the Alagonquin peoples. The remainder were likewise split into two groups who sired Western and Mid-Western groups (Hitakonanu’laxk, 4-10).
        The above example is confirmed by the oral traditions of the Iraquois who also recount the coming of the Lenape and tell of their struggle with the Lenape. The only difference being that the confluence where the event took place was the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers(Rogers, 43). The settlements encountered were those of the Cherokee (Mooney, 14). Based on preliminary research I have done, this would date the event between 1200 to 1400 A. D. and at the Cahokia site.
        In my own experience I have heard a story told by Eastern Cherokee tribal elders of a time when “The People Who Sang Up the Sun” came to live with them. This story was also repeated by a Cherokee at the Koster site in Illinois in 1981 (Odyssey, 1981). Is it just coincidence that the Natchez refugees, who were of the Mississippian Platform Mound culture, had been living with the Cherokee in the latter quarter of the 18th century (Hudson, 122)? Without citing further evidence it is clear the Lenape account is an actual event and thus justifies it’s place as historical oral tradition.
        Another area that needs attention is that literature about Amerindians. The fact is most literature of this nature is not written by Amerindians. These are considered ethnological literature and should be viewed as such. However, there are works of this nature written by Amerindians that would be another form of Amerindian literature. Whatever the case, works of this nature should always be read keeping in mind the author. Is the author describing another people or their own? This is not to say these works are removed from the study of Amerindian literature. On the contrary, they should be included as they will help the student of the material better understand the nuances of the cultures from which the literature they study comes. This is crucial to understanding the literature itself.
        Based on my experiences as a student, being an instructor at East Central College where I teach Amerindian philosophy and history, coupled with field research I have conducted for the Missouri Historical Society, it is safe to say that the Western perception of the Amerindian is largely a romanticized fiction. This can only be corrected if, when studying the Amerindian, it is understood who they are beyond the simplistic and misleading name. Treatment of the literature by many members of academia and most authors who critique it indicate this is not the case. One only need look at the back or inside cover of Tracks to see this. After finally recognizing Amerindian literature, the critiques have forced a western context onto a decidedly non-western literature. Barry O’Connell supports my thesis when he writes of Columbus:

The difficulties begin in Columbus’s misnomer for the many diverse peoples of the Americas. His was no simple mistake. His misnaming assumed and articulated a profound set of needs, projections, and ideologies Europeans recurrently brought to the Americas and with which, in fact, they constructed an insistent version of the realities they needed the Americans to be. Collecting Native American cultures-material and verbal artifacts, lifeways, belief systems-began with the first European foragers and conquistadors [sic] in the fifteenth century. The many kinds of collecting are not only inseparable from European acts of conquest, they also remain integral to the process by which Europeans and Euro-Americans construct their own identities.(O’Connell, 18)

        If these works could finally be recognized for what they are meant by their writers to be, then perhaps students, some of whom will be future teachers, will begin to associate a new and more accurate identity to the Amerindian. An important step should begin in the library where the works are cataloged and classified and continue into the classroom. It takes only a few minutes to make the Western student aware that a very different world has been entered when studying Amerindian literature.
Sources Cited

Catlin, George. North American Indians. Compiled by Peter Matthiessen. New York,         New York: Penguin Books, 1989.

Eastman, Charles Alexander. The Soul of the Indian in Masterpieces of American Indian Literature. Willis G. Regier ed. New York: University of Nebraska, 1993.

Erdrich, Louise. Tracks. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1988.

Hudson, Charles. The Southeastern Indians. 7th ed. The University of Tennesser Press,         1994. First printing 1974.

Hitakonanu’laxk. The Grandfathers Speak: Native American Folk Tales of the Lenape         People. Brooklyn: Interlink Books, 1994.

McGee, Jon R. and Richard L. Warms. Anthropological Theory. London, Toronto, and         Mountain View, CA: Mayfield Publishing Company, 1996.

Mooney, James. Myths of the Cherokee and Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees. 19th and         7th annual reports from the Bureau of American Ethnology, Smithsonian         Institute, 1903. Nashville, Tenn.: Charles and Randy Elder-Booksellers         Publishers, 1982.

Neihardt, John G. Black Elk Speaks. Lincoln and London: University of Nebraska         Press, 1988. Reprint from 1932.

O’Connell, Barry. Forward in Song of the Sky. Brian Swann. Amherst: University of         Massachusetts Press, 1993.

Odyssey - The Mound Builders. Alton: VHS, Public Broadcasting Association,         Cahokia Mounds Learning Center, 1981.

Ortner, Sherry B. “Is Female to Male as Nature is to Culture?” 1974. In R. Jon McGee         and Richard L. Warms, Anthropological Theory. London, Toronto, and Mountain         View, CA: Mayfield Publishing Company, 1996.

Ried, John P. A Law of Blood: Primitive Law of the Cherokee Nation. New York: New         York         University Press, 1970.

Smith, John. History of Virginia. Date unknown. See March of America series.

Swann, Brian. Song of the Sky. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1993.

Thomas, Cyrus. Report on the Mound Explorations of the Bureau of Ethnology.         Washington D. C.: Smithsonian Institute, 1894. Washington D. C.: Smithsonian         Institution Press, 1985.

Vega, The Inca Garcilaso de la. The Florida of the Inca. Madrid, 1590. Translated by         Varner, John Grier, and Jeanette Johnson Varner. Austin, Texas: University of         Texas Press, 1962.

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