1. Introduction : A people with the right to protest 3
2. Historical summary : Struggle for survival 3
3 Main theme :
3.1 The way to the rediscovery of the traditional
culture
7
3.3 Protests and political movements 11
4. Conclusion : View of the future 12
3
Most of the native American Indians have a really good reason to protest ; In that great and rich continent ‚ they are the minority group in the worst position.There are nearly one million Indians in north America . They are the original native Americans . Most of them live in the mid-west and the west coast states . Economically, socially and educationally they are less privileged than any other minority in the United States as well as in Canada1 . How did it come tothis condition of development?
Nobody would believe that after 1492 , when Christopher Columbus the first European to set foot upon the islands in front of Americas , a very dark chapter of history started .In time when whole nations and cultures ,were exterminated , and in which human beings were enslaved and treated like animals .The "New world" was discovered . New for Europeans ‚ but not for all the native tribes in America . These people can look back at their own thousand year old traditions and they can be considered an important culture with a huge number of beliefs of their own, as the Maya ‚ the Apache ‚ the Cheyenne and as the Cherokee ‚ toname a few2.
The
enormous number of native tribes can be seen
in the next picture
from David Murray‘s book, The Modem Indians 3:
4
The white’s found the "New Land" and the "New World" but this was the destruction of most of the native peoples . The biggest mistake of these ignorant people was that they welcomed the white conquerors as friends and sometimes they even trusted their "New Gods". The name for the native people, so called Indians , comes from a mistake of Columbus who thought that he had arrived in India , as he was searching for a new commercial route from Europe to the Near-east . They brought the inspiration and Christianity to the natives on the one hand ‚ but on the other , complete submission . The Indians got a lot of new diseases which they had never known before like syphilis , influenza ‚ plague ‚ cholera and so on4. Furthermore murder and manslaughter was to be an everyday part of life.
At first the white men just did a really cheap trade with the natives They offered a lot of worthless goods for the Indians valuable , jewellery , precious metals and art like statues ‚ crowns and icons . Later the situation aggravated more and more . Indian art was smelted into gold ingots and the whites started to behave like animals themselves . They took Indian women by force ‚ violated and raped them . Indian men were forced to work in mines as slaves and to convey gold and silver . Finally the "white conquerors" lost all reserve because of this reason the Indians started to doubt and to defend themselves5.
It came to the
first armed conflicts at the end of
the 15th century in each part of the land where white people set their
feet on , like in the tablelands of the Antilles . But the Indians are
almost always the losers because of the poor and antiquated defence
equipment
, and because , the Europeans receive more and more supplies .Another
big
problem that weakens the native forces are the new diseases . They are
decimated by illness ‚ as their immune systems are not strong
enough
tocombat
the new problems .The Indians working in the mines are dying from being
overworked after four years at the latest . The reason are the
poisonous
fumes which originate from processing the raw materials and which cause
loss of hair and teeth . These gases contaminate the whole human body
and
lead to an early death6 .
5
Through the boom of the " Triangle-trade " the businessmen and slave-drivers ‚ who arc mainly Europeans ‚ morepeople are encouraged to settle in the " New World" . Thousands of people stream in to the new land in the belief of escaping the poverty in Europe and with the hope to found a new life in wealth . This leads to a total war between the settlers and the native tribes during many centuries . The Indians are forced to retreat in to the deep west while losing the biggest part of their land7.
6
The number of the native population shrinks as fast as the size of the land belonging to the Indians ‚ like for example in a village of the Notka on an island where from the number of 650 inhabitants just 31 survived till today9.Expropriations of Indian land trough the BIA10 are continuing until today. The Bureau of Indian Affairs was founded in 1824 as a department of the war ministry. It was an instrument to subject all the native tribes in the whole United States ‚ but it is still running today. Out of this reason the traditional Indians are demanding the abolition of it. Not with steps as enormous as in the last century ‚ but they did not stop expropriating Indian lands yet, even if a lot of people ‚ white as well as red protested against it .
The next picture shows the situation of todays Indian lands :
As it can be seen today the Indians have less then 5% of their old land under their own control . All the territory the whites left to the native tribes are lonely deserts and reservations far away from the huge Cities and the white culture.
7
3. 1.The way to the rediscovery of the traditional culture :
When the white settlers came ‚ the Indians lost their rich land, and most of their customs and beliefs ‚ but before the white men’s invasion they lived in harmony with nature . The native tribes lived in tents or in wooden houses . They shared everything with each other and each single person had his or her own task for everyday life . In contrast to the white they took just so much from nature as they could personally use . They had an ecological fuse-protected self-supporter-system, without currency ‚ profit drive ‚ retirement ‚ bankruptcy and without unemployment . However the Europeans overlooked in their arrogance the meaning of the Indian culture and pushed their own culture through . With the belief that they would civilise the " Wild people " they started the erasing of an old simple culture ‚ till it nearly disappeared13
Now the
Indians are desperately trying to keep their
cultural character and independence . Like at most colleges in the West
there are studies on the Indian tribes , because the regional Indian
organisations
want American history to be thought of with more stress on the Indian
culture
. On most reservations ‚ which are far away from the white
housing
developments
‚ as shown on the 3rd picture, there is a new word flying around
which
is called "Rediscovery". A lot of tribes want to discover their old
traditions
‚ like the TSOUKE-nation on Vancouver-Island . But this
is not
easy
at all14.
Today‘ s American natives have to use English language if they
want
to transfer their knowledge and wisdom to others . One of the biggest
problems
while translating Indian languages is the understanding of the
imagination
of the Indians use of the power and spirit of the universe . If the Lakota
talk
about "Wakan Tanka" ‚ or the Iroquois about
"Sakoitiasan"
‚ the Hopi from "Taiowa" and the Ojibway about
"Kitche
Manitou" they mean an incomprehensible totalitarian force, which
has
been all the time and which will be all the time .
The usage today of terms like God , Creator or Big-spirit are not adequate for the meant terms and thoughts of the old medicine-men15.A further obstacle is also that a lot of today‘s Indian families are living the same way as any other American family . They live in stone houses with garages, some of them even have cars or motor-boats . These people belong to a minority within some Indian tribes ‚ who work hard and can save some money because of the reason that they do not have to pay any taxes as long as they live on a reservation .
8
Until now the
traditional arts and skills of the
former high cultures were just shown at tourist centres and province
museums.
Also some of the public buildings decorated their front yards with old
Indian motives ‚ though the politicians deny to give back any
soil to
the
Indians ‚ like in Victoria in the capital of Vancouver Island .
But
thanks
to the ambitious nostalgic program called "Rediscovery" the old
traditions
‚ skills and arts are brushed up again . Like at the TSOUKE-nation
the
construction of a "Longhouse". A so-called house was a wooden community
building where the oldest of the tribe could meet and confer with each
other. It a1so served for weddings and other celebrations for the many
different families .
These movements can be seen at other tribes
throughout
America too . The young SIOUX are learning again how to make a
boat
from a single huge tree trunk of really good quality . Most of the
teachers
are quite old men , but nevertheless there are meetings of this kind
‚
where old people show the youth how to act .They arc very popular and
appreciated
among the young Indians . In this case it does not matter if
half-breed,
quarter-breed or full blooded ‚ everybody holds together . Not
only the
youngsters but also the older people deal with the age-old arts like
making
sculptures and paintings . A living example for the representation of
400
years old Haida-arts is Bill Rid . He is a sculptor a painter
and
a poet in the same way as are many of his fellow
Tribesmen . On one hand he is an acknowledged
rediscoverer
of these native skills ‚ which arc re-born in the form of
pictures and
figures . But he is also painting protest posters‚ as a support
for his
people wanting to save nature and wanting to their old rights back .The
numerous exhibitions in the museums which caused the rediscovery of the
old skills are making sure that the Indian culture won‘t
disappear on
the
whole .What is a cultural pleasure for the whites ‚ means a late
recognition
of their own long disregarded culture for the Indian16 .
The picture shows on old SIOUX instructing youngsters in using a bow and arrows17.
9
Today‘s
life
Indians can expect to live till they
are 44 ‚ everybody else in the United States can expect to live
till
they
are 64 . Their average annual income is below poverty level . An Indian
baby is three times more likely to die than any other. Indians have the
highest rate of alcoholism , the lowest standard of education ‚
the
poorest
health conditions and the worst housing18 . "There are no
differences
between white and red statistically ‚ but there are a lot of
problems ‚
because the Indians are not always getting their fair share ... "
reports
a white fisherman Pat Mac Lorry understandingly19 .These
facts
are the results of the depressive condition in which the Indians live .
It is about the changed and destroyed situation of a once blooming
culture
through the modern society of the white man , it has to do with the "
Culture
Shock". Already the consumption pattern of the natives has changed .
They
buy the products of the whites like Coca Cola , Sprite ‚ Pepsi
instead
of drinking spring water .
Maybe it is because of comfort or because of the
immense environmental damage which does not allow drinking out of the
springs
and streams . They have to feed their families in any case ,
from
the supermarket, since they are not permitted to fish and to hunt . For
this reason they buy tons of the white Men‘s groceries ‚
for which they
have neither the jobs nor the money and as a result they turn into
social
benefit receivers .They take those few dollars they are getting from
the
state to the white‘s consumer temples . "Terms like mass fishing
from
the
fishing industry are for us unknown , because our religion says it
destroys
thc environment and threatens the fish stocks..." a young NOTKA tells
us . Not getting a job is also an outcome of the low standard of
education
Indians have .
The situation is made worse because the natives
can‘t get along with the stress of modern industrial society
‚ thus
they
have to look on while whites take their livelihood away20 .
Attempts to integrate the Indians into white society have run up to
present
times ‚ but not at all in a fair way. As for example the
Eisenhower
administration
from 1953 to 1961 ‚ when the central government tried to force
the
natives
to integrate . By giving less money to the reservations the hungry
Indians
came to the cities just as the government wanted21.
10
But there are
also a lot of positive efforts of the
government to note . Millions of dollars are given to those poor
Indians
living all the time on reservations supporting better housing ‚
better
education , health conditions and employment creating measures22.Just
a tiny number of tribes succeeded in winning prosperity Like for
example
the Comanches who built a casino on reservation ground . As
there
is no tax for anyone who is living on a reservation they could keep all
the profit for themselves . The IQWA also succeeded by using
their
ability to climb and took work on high building sites and
ontower
blocks for good wages .
Unfortunately most of the Indians are not able
tocope
with the industrial society and became alcoholics or drug addicts . The
alcohol dependence ruined them so much that they aren‘t even able
to
work
‚ to fish , or to hunt . An other problem is that the distances
to the
white‘s factories from the reservations are too long and any
approach
without
a car is impossible . The result of this is a very high number of the
unemployed
and alcoholic . From week to week they are waiting for the social
benefits
and take most of it in to cheap pubs . After two or three
glasses
of whiskey they are lying totally drunk in the sun all day, since they
lack those enzymes processing the alcohol in their blood .While lying
on
the ground they are singing about the glorious past as wild hunter in
their
own wide land23.
Hey-uh ... Hey-uh ... Hey-uh-uh-uh-uh
...
Hey-uh ... Hey-uh ... Hey-uh-uh-uh-uh
...
Hey-uh ... Hey-uh ... Hey-uh-uh-uh-uh
...
Hey-uh...Hey-uh...Hey-uh-uh-uh-uh...24"*
11
Things are
moving ‚ but not fast enough for the radicals
. 20 years ago the activists of the American Indian Movement* threatened
the sheriff and all the other representatives of white bureaucratic
power
with their guns at Wounded Knee in South Dakota to enforce their
demands
. They besieged the town for 73 days ‚ till they were knocked
down by
the
army and the police On this occasion two Indians died and many members
of the AIM movement were sent to prisons all over the country or had
togo
underground . The tragedy of this is a two faced one. In the year 1890
troops of the US.-army massacred 250 Lakota men , women and
children
at exactly the same place .
Since this time the Indians have gone on a
pilgrimage
every year and there mourned their countless fallen brothers25
.
However most of the demonstrations are of more moderate kind . The
Indians reclaim the land ‚ which once was theirs in all parts of
North-America
. They demand to rule themselves ‚ because for them the
civilisation of
the white man has no future in to due to the threatening
destruction
of the environment . Mockingly they say : " The white people are ,
after
only two thousand years ecologically on the brink of disaster ‚
whereas
we have been living on this planet for thirty-thousand years without
ever
having been a menace to it ". On the protest marches they carry banners
, which show their opinions of the white conquerors as e.g. : "Cook
died
for your sins in Hawaii !" or "Captain Cook had syphilis ! " and "Cook
the crook!" With this they want to express their anger at the
whites
who brought them a lot of new diseases , robbery , murder and
colonialism
.They say : "We had everything before the conquerors came , we had our
own nation with our own laws and most important of all we had peace
everywhere
. The white took this all away from us ‚ we have no right
to
fish
‚ to hunt and we have no human rights in general26".
With campaigns like these the natives want to call
public attention to themselves . They want to tell everybody how they
are
treated and how they feel .
* Thc AIM was founded 1968 in Minneapolis \ St. Paul and is one of the most important orgamsations of the Indian resistance . After the occupation of Wounded Knee the organisation set foot in the most of the reservations.
12
The native tribes of America want back their laws and their own identity ‚ as until today the government dictates ‚ what they are allowed to do and where their limits are.There are no real rights for us says an old woman from the Notka tribe at a demonstration in Pat-Alberg , "The white people cut down our forests ... she complains ‚ ‚. ... and they only leave some tiny wildlife reserves along die highways for the tourists .‚ but these are like the fingers of a chopped hand27 . And indeed the forestry industry is still taking away land , that they had been promised 50 years ago , from the Indians . The distraction of the old native culture is still going on‚ villages even graveyards ‚ and sacred places are ruined . The conflict between fishing industry and the Indian people is going on as well . Merely on another level . Nowadays the Indians arc forced by laws and regulations in the name of the United States or of Canada to give up their property and land .
Everywhere the
Indians are trying to defend themselves
‚ in their own peaceful way. Especially the natives of Vancouver
Island
are in the news at this time ‚ since they play their Haida*
drums
every morning asking their God to listen to them and to save their
environment
. The soft protest is sounding kilometres along the ocean each morning
. They arm demonstrating against the destruction of 30km² of
wooded
lands with trees of which, some are more than 1000 years old . One of
the
Indian people‘s last bases of living is supposed to be cut down
.Do they have to use their weapons again before anybody will listen to
them ? They want things to be changed now and not later ! If
they
do not get them now by peaceful means ‚ they start to think and
to feel
that they have the right to do it by force . At a result a lot of new
blood
would have to run again .Out of these reasons all people white as well
as red should hold together to solve the problems and to prevent any
other
escalation in hostilities .
Jean Meyer:
Sklavenhandel ‚
Ravensburger® Verlag , Ravensburg © 1990
Ronald Wright:
Geraubtes Land,
Westermann® Verlag, Braunschweig, © 1992
Harvey Arden and Steve Wall:
Hüter der Erde,
Frederking & Thaler® ‚ München *
©
1992
Peter Baumann und Martin
Schießler:
Amerikas Indianische Seele
‚
ECON® Verlag ‚Düsseldorf, ©1987
David Murray: Modern Indians, U.S. Government Printing
Office, Washington ‚ ©1981
Wilcomb E. Washburn:
The Indian in America, Harper
& Row ‚ © 1975
Brain M. Fagan:
Die ersten Indianer, Verlag
C.H. Beck®, N4ünchen, © 1990
Hans-Gerd Wiegand:
Die Inseln von Vancouver,
TV-Dokumentation in der Produktion des Südwestfunks
‚ Baden-Baden ‚ © 1993
Denerle:
A peope with the right to protest, Informationsblatt der
ARSRegensburg,©
1993
Langenscheidt:
Lan gen scheidts Schitl
wörterbuch Fngli sch ‚ Langenscheidt KG®.
München ‚ ©
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