What I've learned so far

I think that the main idea that has stood out to me all along is the realization of how little I really know. (If that makes any sense...)

By learning so much about a culture that is geographically so close to mine, I realize how very much I am in the dark about them. This class has brought to light not only my unintentional racism (I had no idea they did not like being called "Native Americans"), but also it has served to round out my knowledge of their world views and cultural practices as well. I feel like being exposed to a wide range of literature, from colorful trickster tales to more cut-and-dry accounts of their unjust treatments has served to give me a much broader understanding of what the American Indian experience entails.

I think without this class I never could have imagined the complexity that comes with talking about American Indians. The politics of a displaced people, the longing to cling to the past while needing the ability to remain relevant to the present, the drama of living confined as a nation unto itself on land that was not their home to begin with, and the real human face to a people often too ignored.

Photo of a Cherokee Indian from our local region

Another thing that has stood out to me in my experience in this class is just how much I can relate to a people and an experience that I have had no previous interaction with. The humor found inside the trickster tales is not lost, (especially when we performed them out loud in pantomime). The blending of the spiritual with the graphic humor of the body and human interactions, is an art form that I find extremely relevant to modern people!

Another striking familiarity was the silencing beauty of the ancient cave paintings in their immediacy. Even from only seeing them on film, I could easily throw myself back to the "cave man days", imagining my hand casting shadows on the rocky walls, while rendering the animals so important to my daily life. This place was clearly spiritual to the people who used it, and the fact that the spirituality was so tangible 30,000 years later is astounding.