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DEE L
A description of the rules, norms, traditions, and values ?
How do assumptions about cultural ânormsâ impact behavior on a day-to-day basis?
Any challenges or disadvantages related to her/his culture being outside the ânormâ?
Are there any privileges or advantages associated with assimilating to the ânormativeâ culture?
Answer
The Navajo (also Navaho) people of the southwestern United States call themselves the Diné (pronounced [dɪnÉ]), which roughly means "people". They speak the Navajo language, and many are members of the Navajo Nation, an independent government structure which manages the Navajo reservation in the Four Corners area of the United States.
The Navajo and Apache tribal groups of the American Southwest speak dialects of the language family referred to as Athabaskan. Athabaskan peoples in North America fan out from west-central Canada where some Athabaskan-speaking groups still reside. Linguistic similarities indicate the Navajo and Apache were once a single ethnic group. Archaeological and historical evidence suggests a recent entry of these people into the American Southwest, with substantial numbers not present until the early 1500s. Navajo oral traditions retain mention of this migration.
The Navajo were part of a greater group of plains Apaches Athabaskan speakers that also included the Lipan, Jicarilla, and Mescalero Apaches and other bands who probably moved into the Southwest from the Great Plains where 16th-century Spanish accounts identified them as "dog nomads". These mobile groups hunted bison, lived in tents, and used dogs to pull travois loaded with their possessions. In April 1541, while traveling on the plains east of the Pueblo region, Francisco Coronado wrote:
"After seventeen days of travel, I came upon a rancheria of the Indians who follow these cattle (bison). These natives are called Querechos. They do not cultivate the land, but eat raw meat and drink the blood of the cattle they kill. They dress in the skins of the cattle, with which all the people in this land clothe themselves, and they have very well-constructed tents, made with tanned and greased cowhides, in which they live and which they take along as they follow the cattle. They have dogs which they load to carry their tents, poles, and belongings." (Hammond and Rey)
The Spaniards described Plains dogs as very white, with black spots, and "not much larger than water spaniels". Plains dogs were slightly smaller than those used for hauling loads by modern northern Canadian peoples. Recent experiments show these dogs may have pulled loads up to fifty pounds (twenty-three kilograms) on long trips, at rates as high as two or three miles an hour (three to five kilometres an hour) (see Henderson).
Although there is some evidence that Athabaskan peoples may have visited the Southwest as early as the 13th century, most scientists believe that they arrived permanently only a few decades before the Spanish. The Athabaskan nomadic way of life complicates accurate dating, primarily because they constructed less substantial dwellings than other Southwestern groups. They also left behind a more austere set of tools and material goods. Sites where early Athabaskans may have lived are difficult to locate, and even more difficult to identify firmly as culturally Athabaskan.
Navajo woman & childTrade between the long-established Pueblo peoples and the Athabaskans become important to both groups by the mid 16th century. The Pueblos exchanged maize and woven cotton goods for bison meat, hides and material for stone tools. Coronado observed Plains people wintering near the Pueblos in established camps. In 1540, Coronado reported the modern Western Apache area as uninhabited and other Spaniards first mention Apache living west of the Rio Grande in the 1580s. So, it is likely that the Apaches moved into their current southwestern homelands in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. Athabaskans expanded their range through the 17th century, occupying areas the Pueblos peoples had abandoned during prior centuries.
The Spanish first mention the "Apachu de Nabajo" (Navaho) specifically in the 1620s, referring to the people in the Chama valley region east of the San Juan River, and north west of Santa Fe. By the 1640s, the term Navaho was applied to these same people. By the 1670s they were living in a region called Dinetah, which was about sixty miles west of the Rio Chama valley region, and by the 1780s they were migrating south west and west to the Mount Taylor and Chuska Mountain regions of New Mexico. Why they moved is a consequence of a combination of unrelenting and intermittent warfare between them and their enemies the Spanish colonist and their allies the Pueblo, Ute and Commanche Indians.
[edit]
Conflict with Europeans
Over the next 200 years, since the 17th century, the Navajo expanded their area of settlement, living in areas of Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. Because of increasing contact with the Pueblo Indians and the Spanish in the 1600's, the Navajo experienced a revolution in life-style and economy. During conflicts with the Spanish, many Pueblo people took refuge with Navajo bands. This allowed the Navajo to learn many of the customs of their neighbors, including weaving, pottery making, and farming. In addition, rather than simply eating sheep obtained in raids, the Navajo slowly built up their herds as a source of meat and wool for weaving clothing and blankets. The Navajos could eventually support themselves without raiding and pillaging and became known as one of the wealthiest tribes in the Southwest.
The Navajo were often raided by Mexicans looking for Navajo children for the Mexican slave trade. Navajo retaliation against Mexican communities to the south created a deadly cycle as Mexican soldiers were sent north to stop the Indian raids. During these conflicts, the Navajo left their villages and returned to the nomadic raiding life of their ancestors until the troops were gone.
Manuelito, Navajo chiefThe Navajo resisted white settlers and military groups encroaching onto their land. As the expanding United States turned its attention toward the Southwest, the Navajos sometimes attacked Anglo-American explorers and traders traveling on the Santa Fe and Gila trails. After the United States assumed ownership of the Southwest territories, Brigadier-General James H. Carleton, the new commander of the Federal District of New Mexico, initiated a series of military actions against the Navajo. He ordered Colonel Kit Carson of the New Mexico volunteer militia to lead an expedition against the Navajos under a scorched earth policy, burning Navajo fields and homes, and stealing or killing their livestock. The troops were aided by other Native American tribes with long-standing enmity toward the Navajos, chiefly the Utes. There were no pitched battles and only a few skirmishes in the Navajo campaign. During the six-month sweep, Carsonâs soldiers reportedly killed only 78 of the estimated 12,000 Navajos, experiencing few casualties themselves. Carson's militia thoroughly disrupted the Navajo way of life and rounded up and took prisoner every Navajo they could find. In January 1864, Carson led forces, including Utes auxiliaries, into Canyon de Chelly to attack the last Navajo stronghold under the leadership of Manuelito. He commanded his men to cut down all the peach trees that were growing in Canyon de Chelle, some 1,000 to 1,200 trees. Although a remnant fled the canyon, the Navajo were eventually forced to surrender due to the destruction of their livestock and food supplies.
Navajo prisoners of Kit Carson in 1864 forced on what Navajo call "the Long Walk"In the spring of 1864, over 8,000 Navajo men, women and children were forced to march over 300 miles to Fort Sumner, New Mexico. Approximately 200 Navajo died during the two month long march, known as the Long Walk of the Navajo. Approximately 9,000 Navajo were interned at the Fort in poor conditions, held jointly with several hundred Mescalero Apache. There was no firewood for cooking and water from the nearby Pecos River caused severe intestinal problems and disease. Food was also in short supply. In 1865, those Mescalero Apache strong enough to travel managed to escape to their own territory. However, the Navajo were not allowed to leave until three years later when an 1868 treaty was negotiated which established a reduced area of their homeland, where the Navajo Reservation exists today.
[edit]
Cultural characteristics
Navajo weaver with sheepThe name "Navajo" is the name given to the tribe by the Tewa Pueblo Indians, whose settlement preceded the Navajo. The word may mean "thieves" or "takers from the fields." (The names by which many Native American tribes are commonly known are derived from epithets used by their enemies.) The Navajo, who came to the Southwest millennia after the Tewa, call themselves Diné, which is often translated to mean "the people" (most Native American groups call themselves by names that mean "the people.") Nonetheless, many Navajo now acquiesce to being called "Navajo."
Historically, the structure of the Navajo society is largely a matrilocal system in which only women were allowed to own livestock and land. Once married, a Navajo man would move into his bride's dwelling and clan since daughters (or, if necessary, other female relatives) were traditionally the ones who received the generational inheritance (this is mirror-opposite to a patrilocal tradition). any children are said to belong to the mothers clan and be "born for" the fathers clan. The clan system is exagamous meaning it was and mostly still is considered a form of incest to marry or date anyone from any of a persons four grandparents clans.
A hogan is the traditional Navajo home. For those who practice the Navajo religion the hogan is considered sacred. The religious song "The Blessingway" describes the first hogan as being built by Coyote with help from beavers to be a house for First Man, First Woman, and Talking God. The Beaver People gave Coyote logs and instructions on how to build the first hogan. Navajos made their hogans in the traditional fashion until the 1900s, when they started to make them in hexagonal and octagonal shapes. Today they are rarely used as actual dwellings, but are maintained primarily for ceremonial purposes.
[edit]
Arts and craftsmanship
Silversmithing is said to have been introduced to the Navajo while in captivity at Fort Sumner in Eastern New Mexico in 1864. At that time Atsidi Saani learned the silversmithing and began teaching others the craft as well. By the 1880 Navajo silversmiths were creating handmade Navajo jewelry including braclets, tobacco flasks, necklaces, bow gaurds and eventually evolved into earings, buckles, bolos, hair ornaments and pins. Turquoise had been used with jewelry by the Navajo for hundreds of years, but not inset into the silver.
Though some people say the Navajo learned the art of weaving from the Ute Tribe, the origins of Navajo weaving may never be known. The first Spaniards to visit the region wrote about seeing Navajo blankets. By the 1700s the Navajo had begun to import yarn with their favorite color, Bayeta red. (see link below to Navajo weaving website) The Navajo people created some of the finest textiles in North America. Using an upright loom the Navajos made almost exclusively utilitarian blankets. Little patterning and few colours on almost all blankets, except for the much sought after Chief's Blanket, which evolved from the 1st Phase, few wide bands, to the 2nd phase, wide bands with squares on the corners to the 3rd Phase which made more and more use of patterns and colours. Around the same time the Navajo people, who had long started traded for commercial wool, often from the uniforms of soldiers, rewove these into intricate multicolored blankets called Germantown.
Some early European settlers moved in and set up trading posts, often buying rugs by the pound and selling them back east by the bale. The quality of weaving declined. Still these traders encouaraged the locals to weave blankets and rugs into distinct styles. They included Two Gray Hills, predominately black and white, with traditional patterns, Teec Nos Pos, colourful, with very extensive patterns, Ganado founded by Don Lorenzo Hubbell, red dominated patterns with black and white, Crystal founded by J.B. Moore, oriental and Persian styles, almost always with natural dyes, Wide Ruins, Chinlee, banded geometric patterns, Klagetoh, diamond type patterns, Red Mesa, and bold diamond patterns. Mainy of these patterns exhibit a four-fold symetry which is thought by Witherspoon to embody traditional ideas about harmony or Hozhoon.
[edit]
Healing and religious practices
Most Navajo Way religious practice involves healing of some sort. The main exception to this is the Beauty Way ceremony done for girls first menstration ceremony, the Kinaalda. Others are hoghan blessing and first laugh ceremonies. The rest are held to solve a problem where the patient is seen to out of balance or harmony, not in Hozhoon ( beauty,harmony, the good). Such a patient, usually would seek out a diagnostician who through various trance methods would presribe a chant-way. The chant-way used depends on the symtoms and the causation of those symtoms. These could include breaking a taboo, contact with lightening or snakes, exposure to death, too much time beyond the four sacred mountians and contact with non Navajos, participation in war. Then a Hataali, singer or chanter, often called a medicineman by Anglos, performs the chantway. There are said to be sixty chantways or so. Most last four or more days and require that relatives and freinds attend for it to be most effective. The ritual must be done precisly in the correct manner in order to compel the Holy ones to help. Traing for a singer is very long and extensive, not unlile a priesthood, but without a governing body or hierarchy. One chant-way is the Anaaji or enemy way for those coming back from war. It is said to be very effective in preventing post traumatic stress syndrome. It is said it was first performed for Changing Womans twin sons after slaying th monsters and bringing health and Hozhoon back to the world. The patient must identify with Monsterslayer through chants, song, sandpainting, herbs and dance. Another Navajo healing is the Night Chant ceremony it is administered as a cure for most types of head ailments, including mental disturbances. The ceremony, conducted over several days, involves purification, evocation of the gods, identification between the patient and the gods, and the transformation of the patient. Each day entails the performance of certain rites and the creation of detailed sand paintings. On the ninth evening a final all-night ceremony occurs, in which the dark male thunderbird god is evoked in a song that starts by describing his home:
In Tsegihi [White House],
In the house made of the dawn,
In the house made of the evening light
(Sandner, p. 88)
The medicine man proceeds by asking the god to be present, then identifying the patient with the power of the god and describing the patient's transformation to renewed health with lines such as "Happily I recover/Happily my interior becomes cool" (Sandner, p. 90). The same dance is repeated throughout the night, usually forty eight times. Altogether the Night Chant ceremony takes about ten hours to perform, and ends at dawn.
The Navajo (also Navaho) people of the southwestern United States call themselves the Diné (pronounced [dɪnÉ]), which roughly means "people". They speak the Navajo language, and many are members of the Navajo Nation, an independent government structure which manages the Navajo reservation in the Four Corners area of the United States.
The Navajo and Apache tribal groups of the American Southwest speak dialects of the language family referred to as Athabaskan. Athabaskan peoples in North America fan out from west-central Canada where some Athabaskan-speaking groups still reside. Linguistic similarities indicate the Navajo and Apache were once a single ethnic group. Archaeological and historical evidence suggests a recent entry of these people into the American Southwest, with substantial numbers not present until the early 1500s. Navajo oral traditions retain mention of this migration.
The Navajo were part of a greater group of plains Apaches Athabaskan speakers that also included the Lipan, Jicarilla, and Mescalero Apaches and other bands who probably moved into the Southwest from the Great Plains where 16th-century Spanish accounts identified them as "dog nomads". These mobile groups hunted bison, lived in tents, and used dogs to pull travois loaded with their possessions. In April 1541, while traveling on the plains east of the Pueblo region, Francisco Coronado wrote:
"After seventeen days of travel, I came upon a rancheria of the Indians who follow these cattle (bison). These natives are called Querechos. They do not cultivate the land, but eat raw meat and drink the blood of the cattle they kill. They dress in the skins of the cattle, with which all the people in this land clothe themselves, and they have very well-constructed tents, made with tanned and greased cowhides, in which they live and which they take along as they follow the cattle. They have dogs which they load to carry their tents, poles, and belongings." (Hammond and Rey)
The Spaniards described Plains dogs as very white, with black spots, and "not much larger than water spaniels". Plains dogs were slightly smaller than those used for hauling loads by modern northern Canadian peoples. Recent experiments show these dogs may have pulled loads up to fifty pounds (twenty-three kilograms) on long trips, at rates as high as two or three miles an hour (three to five kilometres an hour) (see Henderson).
Although there is some evidence that Athabaskan peoples may have visited the Southwest as early as the 13th century, most scientists believe that they arrived permanently only a few decades before the Spanish. The Athabaskan nomadic way of life complicates accurate dating, primarily because they constructed less substantial dwellings than other Southwestern groups. They also left behind a more austere set of tools and material goods. Sites where early Athabaskans may have lived are difficult to locate, and even more difficult to identify firmly as culturally Athabaskan.
Navajo woman & childTrade between the long-established Pueblo peoples and the Athabaskans become important to both groups by the mid 16th century. The Pueblos exchanged maize and woven cotton goods for bison meat, hides and material for stone tools. Coronado observed Plains people wintering near the Pueblos in established camps. In 1540, Coronado reported the modern Western Apache area as uninhabited and other Spaniards first mention Apache living west of the Rio Grande in the 1580s. So, it is likely that the Apaches moved into their current southwestern homelands in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. Athabaskans expanded their range through the 17th century, occupying areas the Pueblos peoples had abandoned during prior centuries.
The Spanish first mention the "Apachu de Nabajo" (Navaho) specifically in the 1620s, referring to the people in the Chama valley region east of the San Juan River, and north west of Santa Fe. By the 1640s, the term Navaho was applied to these same people. By the 1670s they were living in a region called Dinetah, which was about sixty miles west of the Rio Chama valley region, and by the 1780s they were migrating south west and west to the Mount Taylor and Chuska Mountain regions of New Mexico. Why they moved is a consequence of a combination of unrelenting and intermittent warfare between them and their enemies the Spanish colonist and their allies the Pueblo, Ute and Commanche Indians.
[edit]
Conflict with Europeans
Over the next 200 years, since the 17th century, the Navajo expanded their area of settlement, living in areas of Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. Because of increasing contact with the Pueblo Indians and the Spanish in the 1600's, the Navajo experienced a revolution in life-style and economy. During conflicts with the Spanish, many Pueblo people took refuge with Navajo bands. This allowed the Navajo to learn many of the customs of their neighbors, including weaving, pottery making, and farming. In addition, rather than simply eating sheep obtained in raids, the Navajo slowly built up their herds as a source of meat and wool for weaving clothing and blankets. The Navajos could eventually support themselves without raiding and pillaging and became known as one of the wealthiest tribes in the Southwest.
The Navajo were often raided by Mexicans looking for Navajo children for the Mexican slave trade. Navajo retaliation against Mexican communities to the south created a deadly cycle as Mexican soldiers were sent north to stop the Indian raids. During these conflicts, the Navajo left their villages and returned to the nomadic raiding life of their ancestors until the troops were gone.
Manuelito, Navajo chiefThe Navajo resisted white settlers and military groups encroaching onto their land. As the expanding United States turned its attention toward the Southwest, the Navajos sometimes attacked Anglo-American explorers and traders traveling on the Santa Fe and Gila trails. After the United States assumed ownership of the Southwest territories, Brigadier-General James H. Carleton, the new commander of the Federal District of New Mexico, initiated a series of military actions against the Navajo. He ordered Colonel Kit Carson of the New Mexico volunteer militia to lead an expedition against the Navajos under a scorched earth policy, burning Navajo fields and homes, and stealing or killing their livestock. The troops were aided by other Native American tribes with long-standing enmity toward the Navajos, chiefly the Utes. There were no pitched battles and only a few skirmishes in the Navajo campaign. During the six-month sweep, Carsonâs soldiers reportedly killed only 78 of the estimated 12,000 Navajos, experiencing few casualties themselves. Carson's militia thoroughly disrupted the Navajo way of life and rounded up and took prisoner every Navajo they could find. In January 1864, Carson led forces, including Utes auxiliaries, into Canyon de Chelly to attack the last Navajo stronghold under the leadership of Manuelito. He commanded his men to cut down all the peach trees that were growing in Canyon de Chelle, some 1,000 to 1,200 trees. Although a remnant fled the canyon, the Navajo were eventually forced to surrender due to the destruction of their livestock and food supplies.
Navajo prisoners of Kit Carson in 1864 forced on what Navajo call "the Long Walk"In the spring of 1864, over 8,000 Navajo men, women and children were forced to march over 300 miles to Fort Sumner, New Mexico. Approximately 200 Navajo died during the two month long march, known as the Long Walk of the Navajo. Approximately 9,000 Navajo were interned at the Fort in poor conditions, held jointly with several hundred Mescalero Apache. There was no firewood for cooking and water from the nearby Pecos River caused severe intestinal problems and disease. Food was also in short supply. In 1865, those Mescalero Apache strong enough to travel managed to escape to their own territory. However, the Navajo were not allowed to leave until three years later when an 1868 treaty was negotiated which established a reduced area of their homeland, where the Navajo Reservation exists today.
[edit]
Cultural characteristics
Navajo weaver with sheepThe name "Navajo" is the name given to the tribe by the Tewa Pueblo Indians, whose settlement preceded the Navajo. The word may mean "thieves" or "takers from the fields." (The names by which many Native American tribes are commonly known are derived from epithets used by their enemies.) The Navajo, who came to the Southwest millennia after the Tewa, call themselves Diné, which is often translated to mean "the people" (most Native American groups call themselves by names that mean "the people.") Nonetheless, many Navajo now acquiesce to being called "Navajo."
Historically, the structure of the Navajo society is largely a matrilocal system in which only women were allowed to own livestock and land. Once married, a Navajo man would move into his bride's dwelling and clan since daughters (or, if necessary, other female relatives) were traditionally the ones who received the generational inheritance (this is mirror-opposite to a patrilocal tradition). any children are said to belong to the mothers clan and be "born for" the fathers clan. The clan system is exagamous meaning it was and mostly still is considered a form of incest to marry or date anyone from any of a persons four grandparents clans.
A hogan is the traditional Navajo home. For those who practice the Navajo religion the hogan is considered sacred. The religious song "The Blessingway" describes the first hogan as being built by Coyote with help from beavers to be a house for First Man, First Woman, and Talking God. The Beaver People gave Coyote logs and instructions on how to build the first hogan. Navajos made their hogans in the traditional fashion until the 1900s, when they started to make them in hexagonal and octagonal shapes. Today they are rarely used as actual dwellings, but are maintained primarily for ceremonial purposes.
[edit]
Arts and craftsmanship
Silversmithing is said to have been introduced to the Navajo while in captivity at Fort Sumner in Eastern New Mexico in 1864. At that time Atsidi Saani learned the silversmithing and began teaching others the craft as well. By the 1880 Navajo silversmiths were creating handmade Navajo jewelry including braclets, tobacco flasks, necklaces, bow gaurds and eventually evolved into earings, buckles, bolos, hair ornaments and pins. Turquoise had been used with jewelry by the Navajo for hundreds of years, but not inset into the silver.
Though some people say the Navajo learned the art of weaving from the Ute Tribe, the origins of Navajo weaving may never be known. The first Spaniards to visit the region wrote about seeing Navajo blankets. By the 1700s the Navajo had begun to import yarn with their favorite color, Bayeta red. (see link below to Navajo weaving website) The Navajo people created some of the finest textiles in North America. Using an upright loom the Navajos made almost exclusively utilitarian blankets. Little patterning and few colours on almost all blankets, except for the much sought after Chief's Blanket, which evolved from the 1st Phase, few wide bands, to the 2nd phase, wide bands with squares on the corners to the 3rd Phase which made more and more use of patterns and colours. Around the same time the Navajo people, who had long started traded for commercial wool, often from the uniforms of soldiers, rewove these into intricate multicolored blankets called Germantown.
Some early European settlers moved in and set up trading posts, often buying rugs by the pound and selling them back east by the bale. The quality of weaving declined. Still these traders encouaraged the locals to weave blankets and rugs into distinct styles. They included Two Gray Hills, predominately black and white, with traditional patterns, Teec Nos Pos, colourful, with very extensive patterns, Ganado founded by Don Lorenzo Hubbell, red dominated patterns with black and white, Crystal founded by J.B. Moore, oriental and Persian styles, almost always with natural dyes, Wide Ruins, Chinlee, banded geometric patterns, Klagetoh, diamond type patterns, Red Mesa, and bold diamond patterns. Mainy of these patterns exhibit a four-fold symetry which is thought by Witherspoon to embody traditional ideas about harmony or Hozhoon.
[edit]
Healing and religious practices
Most Navajo Way religious practice involves healing of some sort. The main exception to this is the Beauty Way ceremony done for girls first menstration ceremony, the Kinaalda. Others are hoghan blessing and first laugh ceremonies. The rest are held to solve a problem where the patient is seen to out of balance or harmony, not in Hozhoon ( beauty,harmony, the good). Such a patient, usually would seek out a diagnostician who through various trance methods would presribe a chant-way. The chant-way used depends on the symtoms and the causation of those symtoms. These could include breaking a taboo, contact with lightening or snakes, exposure to death, too much time beyond the four sacred mountians and contact with non Navajos, participation in war. Then a Hataali, singer or chanter, often called a medicineman by Anglos, performs the chantway. There are said to be sixty chantways or so. Most last four or more days and require that relatives and freinds attend for it to be most effective. The ritual must be done precisly in the correct manner in order to compel the Holy ones to help. Traing for a singer is very long and extensive, not unlile a priesthood, but without a governing body or hierarchy. One chant-way is the Anaaji or enemy way for those coming back from war. It is said to be very effective in preventing post traumatic stress syndrome. It is said it was first performed for Changing Womans twin sons after slaying th monsters and bringing health and Hozhoon back to the world. The patient must identify with Monsterslayer through chants, song, sandpainting, herbs and dance. Another Navajo healing is the Night Chant ceremony it is administered as a cure for most types of head ailments, including mental disturbances. The ceremony, conducted over several days, involves purification, evocation of the gods, identification between the patient and the gods, and the transformation of the patient. Each day entails the performance of certain rites and the creation of detailed sand paintings. On the ninth evening a final all-night ceremony occurs, in which the dark male thunderbird god is evoked in a song that starts by describing his home:
In Tsegihi [White House],
In the house made of the dawn,
In the house made of the evening light
(Sandner, p. 88)
The medicine man proceeds by asking the god to be present, then identifying the patient with the power of the god and describing the patient's transformation to renewed health with lines such as "Happily I recover/Happily my interior becomes cool" (Sandner, p. 90). The same dance is repeated throughout the night, usually forty eight times. Altogether the Night Chant ceremony takes about ten hours to perform, and ends at dawn.
Old Inuit tribes before the explorers?
Hannah Art
I'm doing this project about going thougrh the inuit reigon before the white man cames and i don't know which towns where their before them does anybody know a good link to find the very old tribes and towns? or any information about it at all?
Answer
Inuit Culture, Traditions, and History
Traditional Inuit way of life was influenced by the harsh climate and stark landscapes of the Arctic tundra â from beliefs inspired by stories of the aurora to practicalities like homes made of snow. Inuit invented tools, gear, and methods to help them survive in this environment. Read on to learn more about traditional Inuit ways of life, and how Inuit culture has been changed over the past century.
Geography
Inuit communities are found in the Arctic, in the Northwest Territories, Labrador and Quebec in Canada, above tree line in Alaska (where people are called the Inupiat and Yupik), and in Russia (where people are called the Yupik people). In some areas, Inuit people are called âEskimosâ however many Inuit find this term offensive. The word âInuitâ means âthe peopleâ in the Inuktitut language.
Inuit Homes
In the tundra, where Inuit communities are found, there are not many building materials. No trees grow in the tundra so houses can not be made from wood unless it is transported from elsewhere. However, during a large part of the year, the cold part, there is a lot of snow in the tundra. And it turns out that snow can be a very good construction material. In the winter, Inuit lived in round houses made from blocks of snow called "igloos". In the summer, when the snow melted, Inuit lived in tent-like huts made of animal skins stretched over a frame. Although most Inuit people today live in the same community year-round, and live in homes built of other construction materials that have to be imported, in the past Inuit would migrate between a summer and winter camp which was shared by several families.
Getting Around
To travel from one place to another, Inuit used sleds made of animal bones and skins pulled over the snow and ice by dogs. Strong dogs with thick fur like huskies, bred by Inuit, were used. On the waters of the Arctic Ocean, small boats called âkayaksâ were used for hunting while larger boats called âumiaqâ transported people, dogs, and supplies.
Finding Food
Because Inuit live in places where most plants cannot grow, the traditional diet consisted of almost entirely meat. Inuit fished and hunted to get their food. Whales, walruses, seals, fish were staples of their diet.
Clothing for Staying Warm
Traditional Inuit clothing was made from animal skins and fur. Boots were also made from animal skins. Large, thick coats with big hoods called âparkasâ were worn as an outer layer. Today the parka style of coat is worn in other places in the world and it is made of many other materials.
Traditions
Although Inuit life has changed significantly over the past century, many traditions continue. Traditional storytelling, mythology, and dancing remain important parts of the culture. Family and community are very important. The Inuktitut language is still spoken in many areas of the Arctic and is common on radio and in television programming.
Changes to Inuit Life during the 20th Century
Inuit a century ago lived very differently than Inuit today. Before the 1940s, Inuit had minimal contact with Europeans. Europeans passed through on their way to hunt whales or trade furs but very few of them had any interest in settling down on the frozen land of the Arctic. So the Inuit had the place to themselves. They moved between summer and winter camps to always be living where there were animals to hunt. In winter camps they lived in snow shelters called igloos. In summer camps they lived in tents made of animal skins and bones.
But that changed. As World War II ended and the Cold War began, the Arctic became a place where countries that didnât get along were close to each other. The Arctic had always been seen as inaccessible, but the invention of airplanes made it easier for non-Arctic dwellers to get there. Permanent settlements were created in the Arctic around new airbases and radar stations built to watch out for rival nations. Schools and health care centers were built in these permanent settlements. In many places, Inuit children were required to attend schools that emphasized non-native traditions. With better health care, the Inuit population grew larger, too large to sustain itself solely by hunting. Many Inuit from smaller camps moved into permanent settlements because there was access to jobs and food. In many areas Inuit were required to live in towns by the 1960s.
Inuit Culture, Traditions, and History
Traditional Inuit way of life was influenced by the harsh climate and stark landscapes of the Arctic tundra â from beliefs inspired by stories of the aurora to practicalities like homes made of snow. Inuit invented tools, gear, and methods to help them survive in this environment. Read on to learn more about traditional Inuit ways of life, and how Inuit culture has been changed over the past century.
Geography
Inuit communities are found in the Arctic, in the Northwest Territories, Labrador and Quebec in Canada, above tree line in Alaska (where people are called the Inupiat and Yupik), and in Russia (where people are called the Yupik people). In some areas, Inuit people are called âEskimosâ however many Inuit find this term offensive. The word âInuitâ means âthe peopleâ in the Inuktitut language.
Inuit Homes
In the tundra, where Inuit communities are found, there are not many building materials. No trees grow in the tundra so houses can not be made from wood unless it is transported from elsewhere. However, during a large part of the year, the cold part, there is a lot of snow in the tundra. And it turns out that snow can be a very good construction material. In the winter, Inuit lived in round houses made from blocks of snow called "igloos". In the summer, when the snow melted, Inuit lived in tent-like huts made of animal skins stretched over a frame. Although most Inuit people today live in the same community year-round, and live in homes built of other construction materials that have to be imported, in the past Inuit would migrate between a summer and winter camp which was shared by several families.
Getting Around
To travel from one place to another, Inuit used sleds made of animal bones and skins pulled over the snow and ice by dogs. Strong dogs with thick fur like huskies, bred by Inuit, were used. On the waters of the Arctic Ocean, small boats called âkayaksâ were used for hunting while larger boats called âumiaqâ transported people, dogs, and supplies.
Finding Food
Because Inuit live in places where most plants cannot grow, the traditional diet consisted of almost entirely meat. Inuit fished and hunted to get their food. Whales, walruses, seals, fish were staples of their diet.
Clothing for Staying Warm
Traditional Inuit clothing was made from animal skins and fur. Boots were also made from animal skins. Large, thick coats with big hoods called âparkasâ were worn as an outer layer. Today the parka style of coat is worn in other places in the world and it is made of many other materials.
Traditions
Although Inuit life has changed significantly over the past century, many traditions continue. Traditional storytelling, mythology, and dancing remain important parts of the culture. Family and community are very important. The Inuktitut language is still spoken in many areas of the Arctic and is common on radio and in television programming.
Changes to Inuit Life during the 20th Century
Inuit a century ago lived very differently than Inuit today. Before the 1940s, Inuit had minimal contact with Europeans. Europeans passed through on their way to hunt whales or trade furs but very few of them had any interest in settling down on the frozen land of the Arctic. So the Inuit had the place to themselves. They moved between summer and winter camps to always be living where there were animals to hunt. In winter camps they lived in snow shelters called igloos. In summer camps they lived in tents made of animal skins and bones.
But that changed. As World War II ended and the Cold War began, the Arctic became a place where countries that didnât get along were close to each other. The Arctic had always been seen as inaccessible, but the invention of airplanes made it easier for non-Arctic dwellers to get there. Permanent settlements were created in the Arctic around new airbases and radar stations built to watch out for rival nations. Schools and health care centers were built in these permanent settlements. In many places, Inuit children were required to attend schools that emphasized non-native traditions. With better health care, the Inuit population grew larger, too large to sustain itself solely by hunting. Many Inuit from smaller camps moved into permanent settlements because there was access to jobs and food. In many areas Inuit were required to live in towns by the 1960s.
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