[GCFL-discuss] FW: [GCFL.net] Lesson in Marketing

[Discussion of the Good, Clean Funnies List]

On Tue, 30 Oct 2007 23:22:45 -0700 "Discussion of the Good, Clean Funnies
List" <gcfl-discuss at gcfl.net> writes:
We have read a lot about the Apache.  They were raiders.
NA culture was lost when they found fire water.
Jeanene
I beg to differ. Somewhat. There was a relatively short period when the
Apache were raiders. Like the Kiowa, the Nerm (Commanche),* and the
plains tribes farther north, they were impoverished hunters and gatherers
on foot until horses were introduced by the Spanish. Then, for a period
of perhaps a century or so, they all became raiders. They became expert
horsemen, but this was a very different culture than existed before the
horse arrived. So which was "genuine" and "authentic" Native American
culture? Then, some branches of the Apache lived in settled communities
with extensive orchards -- it was destruction of their orchards and
seizure of their flocks that gave the U.S. cavalry a chance to subjugate
them. Yes, whiskey didn't help, but it wasn't enough by itself.

Siarlys

* Nerm means "The People" -- which in their own language is what most
Native Americans called themselves. Commanche, in the language of one of
their neighboring peoples, means "people who always want to fight me."
The Tonkawa, who enlisted in large numbers as scouts for the Americans,
had an ancient tradition of eating captured Commanche. Therefore, the
Nerm referred to the Tonkawa as Nermateka (People Eaters), just as the
Penateka Commanche were the "honey eaters."

This leads me to another observation from Africa. What is today called
"authentic African culture" was frozen in time at the moment of European
colonization. Left to develop on its own, any African culture would have
changed, evolved, developed, over two, three, four centuries, just as,
for example, European culture and politics in 1600 were very different
from 1900 or 2000. Certainly African culture was very different in 1700
than it was in 1300, which was very different from 900. But, whatever
indigenous practice was in effect when Europeans took over administration
and started reorganizing the "natives" into European auxiliaries, is now
considered to be the "authentic African" way of doing things. Some of
that happened in understanding "Native American" culture also.
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