Native American

beliefs: The end

of something
special?
Rowan Strathmann, Thomas
Clark, Samuel Roy, Eliana
Patt
Driving Question

Question: How have Native American beliefs

fused with or been altered by those of their
colonizers and other non-natives?
Thesis
Thesis: Much of Native American culture has deteriorated over time and while
much of it has been due to loss of life or “naturally”, a lot of this loss has
been due to outside influence. One of the biggest hits to this loss of life has
been the decay of indigenous belief systems. Many indigenous beliefs today
have either faded or now hold similarities to European beliefs and now, many
native peoples can’t worship like they used to. Based on this information it is
plausible to say that among other things, Native American beliefs have fused
with or been altered by those of their colonizers and non-natives primarily
through early religious persecution and conversion, through American laws on
religious practices, and through assimilation into modern culture.
Reasons
● Early Religious Persecution

and Conversion

● American laws on religious

practices

● Assimilation/loss of culture
Research Method
● At first, we began with trying to research:
Original myths, Native myths about
colonizers, colonizer myths about natives,
and the ghost dance to answer the
question: How has Native American
mythology fused with or been altered by
those of their colonists?
● We then had to change this question
though to “beliefs” instead of “mythology”
and also, not research myths about
colonizers or myths about natives as they
weren’t relative
● Finally, we just researched the original
beliefs of natives as well as how they have
changed, their beliefs today, and the
continuous loss of the original native
beliefs.
● This final method worked best but if we
could have done differently, we would
have investigated the source in person
Why We Chose The Topic
The concept of Europeans mangling Native concepts by the refusal to take
their word for things is not new. What brought it to the forefront of our minds
was a TED talk by Wade Davis that talked about how Europeans refuse to
acknowledge the ideas and wisdom that native peoples have had for millenia
and how they take credit for the “discovery” of certain things when native
peoples have known about these things for centuries.
Just A Few Early Belief EXAMPLES
● Coyote: Key figure in many native religions
● For the Navajos, plays role as creator/deity
● Stories have changed over time due to
migration and also after Pueblo Revolt
● Wrongly associated with witchcraft(Cooper)
● Wolves of Yellowstone and Creator Myth: wolf
as benevolent creator in certain native
cultures
● Wolf vs Coyote debate brings up
overpopulation concept(Pierotti)
Important to note that these are just
examples as there has been a vast variety of
native beliefs over time and it is very complex
Early Persecution and Conversion
● Early Spanish missionaries tried forceful Catholic conversion
● American Indian Boarding Schools made natives learn white
ways to become “civilized”(Morel)
● The Mormons diplomatically converted many Shoshone in the
19th century-Many Shoshone wanted to learn Mormonism for
Salvation actually(G. David)
● Many refer to this as cultural genocide(Swanson)
● Fun Fact: Some Zunis maintained their customs through
singing spirituals while working as slaves during Spanish
rule(Morel)
It is plain to see that many approaches were taken to convert
Native Americans and whether peacefully or forcefully, the
effects are visible today
American laws
Drugs Used for Religious Practices
● Alcohol and many other psychoactives have been key to many
sacred rituals dating back to the Pre-Columbian era(French)
● Strict prohibitions on certain psychedelics have hurt native
religious practices(French)
● Peyote was legalized finally by Bill Clinton on native
reservations(French)
● Peyote is a theme in many southwestern tribes and is key to
rituals of groups like the Zuni and Hopi(Garoutte)
While not promoting drug use, it is still important to note that
these practices were normal for many native tribes and now
are prohibited. There is also no evidence that these
psychedelics were ever abused by natives.
Whites Forcefully Prohibiting Certain Practices
Ghost Dance(Wovoka)
● Was a response to white encroachment/buffalo loss
● Whites felt threatened by the ceremony-outlawed it(Shermer)
● United States used force-Wounded Knee Massacre resulted
Assimilation/General Loss of Culture
● A Hopi prophecy stated that a white brother would come and
cause cultural collusion(Swanson)
● In Southwest there are elements of-Aboriginal
religion(original), Christianity, and a new religion that is a mix
of both(Garoutte)
● In a study comparing two unnamed southwestern tribes
today-75-82 percent of people rated Christianity as very
important to them and between 95-99 percent of people in this
study rated both Aboriginal and Christian beliefs as at least
somewhat important(Garoutte)
● Continuous loss of language threatens loss of beliefs among
native tribes which then causes a loss of cultural identity-Zunis
(Morel)
While these facts are very southwest-centric, they still apply to
every tribe still existing today as languages die and more natives
become westernized.
Audience
Our audience for our poem was the Kick Butt! Coffee cafe which was
good as it was a free, open-mic opportunity for us to easily convey our
ideas and beliefs to people as most times, people that are spending time
at poetry night are the kinds of people who are interested in arts and
cultural variety which is what our poem was about. And it was a success!
 Product
● Seeing how America’s indigenous population have and continue to
advocate for themselves and their culture, we wanted to pay tribute to
this in a matching lyrical, poetic form, so we made a poem that was
tailored to our audience as it was in the fun and bouncy style of slam
poetry which made it more enjoyable
● Our poem highlights significant native individuals under a unifying theme
in a manner not unlike the narrititization used in some indigenous
legends, connecting to our thesis
So What?
So, why is this all important? Why should we care?
The main issue here is cultural death. It can be intentional (think native
peoples being ripped from their cultures via boarding schools and other
forced assimilation, or even just plain death) or unintentional (commercial
clothes instead of traditional, not learning native languages), but the matter
is the same: native languages are disappearing, native cultures are fading
into the ether, and while beliefs like religion, mythology, and folklore make
up cultural identity, they are going fading rapidly.
And, well: it’s sad.
Your Part In Helping
● Because you are not native
Americans(probably), you really
can’t preserve the language or their
beliefs directly
● What you can do however is
recognize and appreciate the variety
and differences that you see today
● Many native tribes have vanished
along with their beliefs
● The ones that are still around are
holding on tight and we must
encourage them to keep on
WORKS CITED
Cooper, Guy. “Coyote in Navajo Religion and Cosmology”. Canadian Journal
of Native Studies. Published 1987. Accessed via EBSCO. Accessed Jan 29
2019.
French, Laurence. “Psychoactive Agents and Native American Spirituality.”
Contemporary Justice Review. Published Jun 2008. Accessed via EBSCO.
Accessed Jan 29 2019.
Garroutte, Eva et al. “Religiosity and Spiritual Engagement in Two American
Indian Populations” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion.
Published Sept 2007. Accessed via EBSCO. Accessed Jan 30 2019.
Morel, Virginia. “The Zuni Way.” Smithsonian. Published Apr 2007. Accessed
via EBSCO. Accessed Jan 29 2019.
WORKS CITED, CONT.
Perry, Mae. “Chapter Two - The Northwestern Shoshone” Utah History To Go. Published
Oct 15, 2000.
https://historytogo.utah.gov/people/ethnic_cultures/the_history_of_utahs_ameri
can_indians/chapter2.html. Accessed Jan 16 2019.
Pierotti, Raymond. “The Role of Myth in Understanding Nature.” Ethnobiology Letters,
Jun 19 2016. https://ojs.ethnobiology.org/index.php/ebl/article/view/729/444.
Accessed Jan 29 2019.
Shermer, Michael. “God and the Ghost Dance” Skeptic. Published 1997. Accessed via
EBSCO. Accessed Jan 28 2019.
Swanson, Tod. “Through family eyes: Towards a More Adequate Perspective For
Viewing Native American Religious Life.” American Indian Quarterly. Published
1997. Accessed via EBSCO. Accessed Jan 30 2019.