From: anchor.esd.sgi.com!lyn (Lyn Dearborn)
Subject: Re: Question of Nativity
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 1993 22:00:46 GMT

Original-Sender: anchor.esd.sgi.com!lyn (Lyn Dearborn)

Chris Hoover, after echoeing what many of us feel about the "origin" of us
Native peoples, full blood, mixed bloods, or whatever, went on to state

>Also, not being particularly worried about Political Correctness, I don't care
>to get so hung up on labels.  I tend to use Indian and Native American
>interchangably, depending on the context:  if I'm mostly around native people,
>I refer to my Ioway ancestry as "Indian," since most of the people I'm around
>at the time would.  When I'm around more White people, I'm likelier to use
>"Native American," mostly because of the risk that some of them might be PCs,
>and admonish me for calling people "Indians" when my skin is so white, but also

O.K.  I'd like to partially echo what Chris is saying here ... but pointing
out that I notice this among MANY of my "darker Indian" friends, and vertually
all my mixed-blood friends ... although many of them will refer to their
viewpoints or whatever by specific Tribal group name rather than just Native
American ... if many ways, this is done to say "it may not be true for all
Native Americans, but it has definitely been true for the particular group I
am associated with.  Also, there is a tendency when talking to non-Indians
about something to make sure they realize your reference is in regards to
OUR culture and not that of the indigenous members of an equally enthnocentric
group across the bay who "like math and spicey food" ... the people from the
country known as India.  It's hard to believe that in our current "over-
eucated (Ha!) society of "politically correct 'nerds'" that anyone could
misunderstand, but they do .... its embarassing when it happens to me, as
much as anything because that means I did a very poor job of getting my point
across, if they even have a speck of doubt about which distinctly different
group of Indians I am referring to.

As for the land bridge theory, Floyd Westerman, about 15 years ago, at a
CIEA conference said he was getting really sick of these "self educated"
anthros and elementary school teachers get beyond the "theories" and deal
with evidence to the contrary.....  or as Floyd put it "who's to say which
ways those mocassin tracks went?  In 1986, while in a tiny hospital in Norway
getting some Norwegian granite removed from my knee, the doctor was noticing
a "basketry medallion" necklace I was wearing and enquired about it.  When I
told him what is was, and why I wear it, he asked if I was going to attend
the "conference" in Iceland that a "bunch of international anthropoligists"
were holding ... that's all the info he had.  Then the following day, I was
at the National Museum at Bigdoy (spelling?) outside Oslo, and the Curator
of the Textile collection asked if I was going to "the Conference" in Iceland..
Later that day when I enquired about this "conference" that I clearly should
know something about, I was told that anthropologists/archaelogists from all
over the world were meeting in Iceland to discuss "recent" evidence found that
led them to believe that the things that have been "found" on the other side
of the Bering Straits which clearly came from North America, are dated as being
older than evidence found here that has come from the other side ..... I hope
I'm not confusing anyone needlessly.  Bottom line:  "Stuff" from the US found
across the sea is older than the "Stuff" from Siberia/Mongolia or whatever
you want to call it, that we have found here.  This would tend to support
the other theory, which states that the Indians HERE travelled across the
land bridge to the Mongolian side....  I believe the basis for the "accepted
theory" .... we came from Asia ... is because there wasn't evidence of
large animal life here to support a stone age culture, or whatever .... but
the mounds found since 1970 show otherwise ....  I'm not even going to pretend
to be a qualified anthro or archaeologist, and the information given to me
regarding this meeting in Iceland was very convincing ... unfortunately, I
didn't have the financial resources to follow through myself.

And like Chris says, It really would be rediculous to refer to America's first
human inhabitants as "Immigrants"  ... this could end up with taking on the
Catholic Church as to the original location of the birth of man ....  which
would make virtually everyone the offspring of imigrants at some point in time.
I suggest we focus our energies on not letting OUR country be divided up any
further by ANY further groups.... and write to your congressman.  Give us your
tired, your poor, your whatever .... the country can't afford this policy any
longer, and we ALL pay the price... not just the NATIVE AMERICANS who are
crapped on by everyone big enough to wield a pen to sign bills, checks, etc.


lyn

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"We did not weave the web of life.  We   | Lyn Dearborn
are merely a strand in it.  Whatever     | Naturalist/Person
we do to the web, we do to ourselves"    | dearborn@anchor.esd.sgi.com
		Chief Seattle 1854	 | 415/ 321-1075
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