Slowly but surely

[niankhsekhmet]

The reconstruction of our online community site, Pan Historia, is coming along very nicely. We basically got a new server and started over again from the ground up. We are a bit like a phoenix rising from the ashes. I just got Fanny Fae's home and webpage re-created. The novels for Ile de Torture and Pirates of the Caribbean: Clash of Steel have been recreated, and so has the reference book, The Mystery School. Now if we can get all the publisher's tools and staff functions to work we will be really cooking!

I went and stuck my hands in the crazy again over at pagan_skeptics. Someone had to bring up the subject of "Native American Sprituality" and "Totem Animals" in the same sentence. The whole thing is just a major annoyance. Growing up American Indian, you hear the buzz about keeping the traditions safe from the exploiters. For my own ancestors, alot of what we had is pretty much been sold out anyway. The Anayunwiya, aka the Cherokees, were one of the so-called civilized tribes. The Cherokees, especially, tried to emmulate the European settlers in almost all things. Whether it was mode of dress, religion or even having large plantations and owning African slaves, the Cherokees did everything possible to try to "get along". The gifts we got out of that were the Cherokee Alphabet, courtesy of Sequoia, and the Trail of Tears, courtesy of President Andrew Jackson.

I don't practice Cherokee "spirituality" because it is mostly Chrstianity, and although I respect that faith and those who practice it, it is not my religion. Kemetic Orthodoxy was the religion that called the most to me, and I don't regret that. I do know that there are those that are called to the Lakota way, or the Mohawk way, or the Chumash or even the Zapotec practices. Years ago, about 1993, there was the Declaration of War Against Exploiters of Lakota Spirituality. I am in full agreement with Valerie Taliman and her response article. We have 500 years of exploitation and indignity that has been suffered. People are rightfully a bit skittish, because many of us grew up hearing the horror stories, or even during the civil rights era, like when I ws growing up, it just wasn't cool to be an NDN. For many of the First Nations Indigenous people, their cultural spiritual practices are all that they have left and they get a bit testy when these things are appropriated without their being asked. It is sad, very sad, when people try to commandeer those things for their own and make a quick buck.

Please understand thatI am not at all accusing all non-Indigenous people of wanting to do this to exploit First Nations people. I do believe, in fact, I know, that there are many who want to know these things out of respect, and out of really wanting to connect to the Divine, to the Earth, to themselves and to their ancestors through finding out more. How will they learn about that part of themselves that they desperately are seeking to find peace with and connection to if the keepers of that knowlege refuse to teach them? It is frustrating all around and you have to be ever so careful when dealing with this issue because people get overly sensitive on both sides of the equation. I will say it outright, most of what passes itself off as so-called Native American Spirituality is a hodgepodge of new age beliefs overlayed with some Lakota terminology and language. A very large portion that is mass marketed at Barnes and Noble etc. is alot of bullshit that is about as "Native American" as baseball and plastic beads to make up those stupid little "headresses that people put on their rearview mirrors. They symbolize how plastic and commercial the whole thing has become. There is a great deal of emotion on both sides and both sides need to heal and move forward if we are ever going to get together and save this planet. I do believe that this is what the Creator / Netjer / God/dess intended. Only through mutually respectful dialogue can we achieve this.

Comments

[followingfeline.livejournal.com]

The Anayunwiya are also my ancestors, but I know very little of them.... How much research have you done and what can you tell me...?

hmmm

[sakura-draoi.livejournal.com]

The Lumbee are on my maternal side meself. You said that most of the new Agey stuff is lakota terminology and stuff. Since when did the lakota have the market cornered on having their culture stolen by the whites? Granted some things were shared, BUT shared only with individuals. Had the Old Ones known it would be broadcast to the world and warped into a money making machine, I doubt very highly they would have shared anything. Course the Westernization of the North American Aboriginal (just FYI "Indian" is a dirty word to most indigenous people) has caused them to lose so much in the way of culture and such. The Lumbee for example have been Westernized since the early 1700s, but still somehow holding onto their cultural identity, but obviously much was lost. But that which was lost can be regained over time.

Now on the other hand of the Aboriginal Medicine Men/Women I have spoken to, the sharing of culture is indicative of the Aborigional recognizing that they donot have a sole link to the Divine. That because of westernization (in the form of marriage to whites) there are children now who are in contact with the Elders. Speaking as one of these children, we donot have the only link, although our vision, like so many others IS based entirely upon our own perceptions. The Aboriginal must change as the world around us changes, remaining stagnant leads to nothing, whereas change leads to growth. I am talking only of Spiritual change here. I believe the White culture have changed enough of things for us, albeit mostly against our will.
To live in the past and rage against past abuses accomplishes nothing. This is similiar to many Africans who speak of 200 years of oppression at the hands of Whites and others, oppression on the scale that almost none today has ever experienced. Are the children of today to be held responsible for the indecencies of the past? I hope not. For if it were so, then we would all deserve a death sentence. The Aboriginal have quite a bit of white man's blood on our hands as well.

We must rise above the past. Not forgetting it, mind you, but not subjecting present ones to the punishment for past crimes of which they were no part of.

If some choose to share their cultural experiences, then fine. If others seek to hide in secret, then good. But I firmly believe that if we aren't involved in a culture, then we have no right to dictate to other Aboriginals how they should handle theirs. We cease being Aboriginal and become Indian (the white Indian).

Re: hmmm

[niankhsekhmet.livejournal.com]

The Lumbee are on my maternal side meself. You said that most of the new Agey stuff is lakota terminology and stuff. Since when did the lakota have the market cornered on having their culture stolen by the whites?

That wasnt what I meant by that. Most of the mass-marketed "Native American" stuff out there peppers alot of what they put out there with Lakota words. How many times have we heard the phrase "Mitake Oyasin" and have the seven sacred ceremonies referred to? This is really something that is central to Lakota belief system, and yet new agers and neopagans tend to just lob these words around as if the Lakota way was the official spiritual practice of all Indigenous folks. We both know that isn't true. Every single Nation has had bits and pieces of their culture appropriated, exploited for whatever the dominant culture wanted of it. The Lakota mearely took it upon themselves to declare war upon the plastic shamen et al. Even the word "Shaman" is a Siberian word that is specific to their holy persons. Somehow that word seems to have become the catchall for every other Indigenous culture, too. I understand about loan words from one culture to another work, but the last time I heard, every Indigenous culture, whether they be from here or from Europe or even Africa seemed to their own specific words to indicate their medicine people, spiritual teachers and holypersons. Yes? I think that those are the things that I find most objectionable: that somehow in this homegenizing of "Native" culture and spiritual practices, the individual Nations and their traditions are neutered of their identity. I find that as sad as I find the fact that daily we lose more and more of our Indigenous languages. In the dominant culture's quest for a Global Village, many of the beautiful and rich parts of individual cultures and traditions are being lost.

(just FYI "Indian" is a dirty word to most indigenous people) has caused them to lose so much in the way of culture and such.

That is still being debated. Some of the people I am around absolutely detest the term "Native American", because everyone who has been born here in the last 100 years can claim to be "Native American". A Seneca brother explained it to me thusly, the Indigenous folks were called "Indios" not because Columbus was lost and thought he had landed in India, but rather he had thought that he had found one of the lost tribes of Israel and called them "In Dios", which meant "Connected to, or In With God". I have heard that said many times. I mean, it is the American Indian Movement (AIM) not the "Native American Movement", afterall. Russ Means' article on the subject really opened my eyes, as well as talking to various members of AIM over the years. I think it's like any other thing in our society, the opininos vary. Most, Indigenous Americans prefer to be called by the name of their Nation, or First Nations Peoples.

I would also agree that raging against the past, and living in the past accomplishes nothing. It is I think important to try to stave off the ongoing cultural genocide, but let's face it - most folks are of mixed ancestry.

If some choose to share their cultural experiences, then fine. If others seek to hide in secret, then good. But I firmly believe that if we aren't involved in a culture, then we have no right to dictate to other Aboriginals how they should handle theirs. We cease being Aboriginal and become Indian (the white Indian).

I think you are absolutely right. We cannot assume to tell others how to share or not share parts of the culture. Even in growing up around it and in a particular culture, we cannot then go to another culture and say something like, "Whoah! You Lumbee are really messed up for letting that white guy participate in your ceremonies!" That is extremely arrogant. We all, regardless of heritage, have this desire to connect with our ancestors. American culture by its very nature is a self-proclaimed melting pot. Sometimes that melting process isn't always a good thing. Sometimes we find it very difficult to ascertain what the individual ingredients are that make up who we are.

Re: hmmm

[sakura-draoi.livejournal.com]

"Most of the mass-marketed "Native American" stuff out there peppers alot of what they put out there with Lakota words. How many times have we heard the phrase "Mitake Oyasin" and have the seven sacred ceremonies referred to? This is really something that is central to Lakota belief system, and yet new agers and neopagans tend to just lob these words around as if the Lakota way was the official spiritual practice of all Indigenous folks."

Never heard of those terms. Of Course if i do ready any books on Native Spirituality, I do a background check on the authors I'm interested in. If it turns out they are psychologists of any kind, I donot purchase the book. I feel that Native Medicine has little to do with psychology, at least white Psych education.

Around here there is a fairly large "pagan" organization. The term "Totem animals" is used quite frequently. Personally Iobject to this term as I was under the impression a totem is a reference to the haida Aboriginals of Oregon and Washington State. It's has been "borrowed" and grafted onto Neo-Pagan paths. The proper term for a a Spirit who sometimes appears as an animal would be "Spirit Guide", whereas Totem is indigenous to the haida and the poles that they construct signifying family strengths and characteristics. Most totem poles have various animals over the course of years, whereas some have only one.

I feel that alot of the "hodgepodge" and grafting is two fold. First it's an attempt by many whites to heal the injuries of the past, to connect with the First nations Peoples in a way that their forefathers never did. They are attempting, thru religion, to understand a people that are often misunderstood. Personally, i donot think this can be done thru a book. One must learn it directly from a teacher, be it human or otherwise. Books are merely others opinions. I recall a medicine man saying that each experience is unique, not all Medicine Men see the same way, but they all know the same things, they simply take different spiritula paths to get there.

The second is like you said. It's all about making a buck.

Irish NDNs and other horrors

[stardragonca.livejournal.com]

In this part of the world(southern Alberta,Canada)the greatest compliment you can receive is to be introduced to someone with the words"This is so-and-so.S/he doesn't want to be an Indian,"a phrase I first heard-um-thirty years ago.Yup,this sort of cultural appropriation would start to get on my nerves after the first couple of -DECADES!Sheesh!
The use of the word 'totem' is definitely one of my run-screaming-away-from-the-screen words.In a complete error of judgment,I once attempted to explain to someone on an e-list why their use of the term was factually inaccurate(I wasn't even *trying* for culturally inappropriate)and was the recipient of the electronic equivalent of blank stares from all around.Then the prattle resumed unabated.Fume.
My other makes-me-swear word is of course 'Shaman'*whimper*,as in;King Arthur was one of us,you know.He was a shaman.(Must...not...kill...)