I grabbed the first website that has caught my eye from the on line resources from module one .The six nations the oldest living democracy on earth.  http://www.ratical.org/many_worlds/6Nations/

This site is owned by John Kahianhe fadden. The website talks about how the Iroquois and the democracy they had before there was even an America .This is a very intriguing website, because it gives a more accurate view of history. I have always been a fan of the founding fathers and this website taught me that we have more founding fathers to learn of. The website reviews a lot about the Iroquois democratic history, but the review of a book entitled Exemplar of liberty, Native America and the evolution of Democracy. The book exemplar of liberty goes on to explain that our fore father like Ben Franklin and Washington learned about the Native American political system two generations before while under the British rule .The influence the natives had on the colonist can be seen when the Iroquois suggested that the colonist make a confederation like the six native nations did to help unit against the constant threat of the French Presence in the thirteen colonies. The French and Indian war brought Ben franklin into the mix when they had a meeting about the French coming to close to the colonies and asked the Iroquois to come to Lancaster Pennsylvania to a ‘’league of friend ship’’. The Iroquois representative was a shaman named Canassatego .Ben franklin would go on to publish much of what this shaman taught the colonial league of friendship. The website tells a lot of Native American people that was very important to the founding of this country. 

My thoughts on the websites that we had been given to review and was used in this course was to give us the Native American view of history not the dominate culture’s view of America. You do not learn just from one view point on the world .I have always tried to learn from other people and their cultures. The only way for this world we live in can survive is if we take a little of each culture and learn how to blend them together yet not losing our distinct culture we belong too. We live on a small planet and what one country does effects another. What is right and works in one culture does not always work in another.  Growing up in a large family of six children I have used this to learn from what my older siblings have done wrong or right and tried to apply it to my life. I think this course tries to show us that other cultures have stories we can all learn from and even tell our children about .I do not want native Americans to be assimilated into our white American culture but I want to be the pupil in the native way of thinking. 

 

        I have always thought of the reservation was a place for Native Americans to be able to practice their culture and beliefs in peace. The video that we were given to watch entitled ‘”The First Secret Agent’ ’and the story told by Sitting Bulls great grandson was very interesting to me. The story he tells was of his grandmother sitting bull’s wife riding in a horse drawn wagon with her adult children. They were along to visit relatives nearby and a rider on a horse comes by them his name Henry Oscar one Bull. This rider was an informant for the head of Indian Affairs at the time. The grand mother did not want to even lay eyes on this man that is why she hides herself in her shawl. The story reminds me of the Jews in the ghettos in Germany during Hitler’s reign of terror. Hitler would use one Jew to inform on all the other Jews and what they were doing.  The two stories show me how cruel one human being can be to another. The view of mine that has changed was I always thought of the reservation as being the last refuge for Native American culture too some point. I now know how controlling and manipulative the white can be towards people who are slightly different from them. 

Native American Month

           I was surprised to learn there was Native American months in the USA.I have always said that there should be one. I think that goes to show how little native culture is seen in popular culture. If you compare Native American month to Black history month which is in February you get a clear view of what Black Americans have done toward the development of this country... Black history month is promoted a lot on the History channel and other cable station.  I have learned that of native contributions to the forming of the country mainly from the readings in this course not from the history channel. It is time to tell the true American history from more than the white perspective. The speaker Bryan Murphy showed me that Native Americans do not know what it means to be members of a tribe say a Seneca Indian or Hopi. The natives today have lost their cultural awareness and think being a native is about getting a check in the mail. The speaker that did the visual presentation about children’s books compared two books one written and illustrated by a nonnative person and the second by Native American. The presentation showed me that there is a very big gap between how one culture sees a ceremony and another one. The speakers were asked why we need a Native American month. I answer that question  with the fact that Native American are very unrepresented in our schools that teach history and when they are portrayed it is with a stereo type of a native as being someone needs to be taken care of in  negative way.