Native Roots of American Identity

US Culture and the Iroquois

Founding Fathers: Choosing to be Romans

• Regular ongoing contact between Haudenosaunee and Colonists (Grinde)– Protecting Private Property was Founding

Father’s big concern• Two antithetical strands of American

culture (Venables):– 1)Emphasis on private, rather than communal,

property– 2)Liberty became identified with the noble

image of the Indian

Concept of Liberty

• Covenant Chain– Agreement between

Iroquois and Colonist• “We the People” not a

hierarchical concept• American Revolution

destroyed connection

Americans as Indians

• Benjamin Franklin wrote extensively about the Haudenosaunee Longhouse system

• Mohawk “Kings” in England• “Sons of Liberty” dumped tea in Boston

Harbor dressed as Mohawks

Cultural Conflict

• ”Given the conflicting impulses of life and liberty on the one hand and property on the other, it is not surprising that at one moment the Founding Fathers could extol the virtues of the savage state--life and liberty--and at the next moment move to establish an executive branch; checks; balances; and separations of powers which would insure the survival of property--prosperity.”(93)

• Quotes pp 98-99

Freedom

• Indian woman on top of the capital

• Boston Tea Party– Dressing as Mohawks

Freedom at the US Capitol

Museum of the American Indian

Columbus Landing

DeSoto Discovers Florida

Baptism of Pocahontas

Pilgrims Embarking to America

http://www.aoc.gov/cc/art/rotunda/frieze/index.cfm

Old Supreme Court

Women as the Center of Community Life

Iroquois influence on the Women’s movement in the US

Iroquois Influence on Women’s Movement in the US

• Matilda Joslyn Gage (1826-1898)– With Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B.

Anthony, Gage forms the “triumvirate” of leaders– Author with Anthony of History of Woman

Suffrage– Forgotten by the end of the 19th century• Why?

Women and Property• First Women’s

Convention in Seneca Falls, NY 1848– Iroquois territory

• Women, African Americans and Indians as Property– Women’s suffering

tied to property– Blackstone’s Code

Gage’s Activism

• Wrote on Iroquois, matrilineal clan, misdeeds of white, etc.

• Women’s liberty based in liberty of all people

• Mother-in-law of L. Frank Baum

Sally Roesch Wagner

• "It comes as no surprise then, that when reformers like Matilda Joslyn Gage looked outside of their culture for a model upon which to base their vision of an egalitarian world, they quickly found their well-known Indian neighbors."[121]

• Gage Foundation in Fayetteville, NY– http://www.pinn.net/~sunshine/gage/mjg.html – New vision of feminism– Sisters In Spirit

Women Providers

• Haudenosaunee women were farmers– Scandalous for Europeans– Tilled all crops in “slash & burn” fields– Extensive knowledge of plants, wild and domestic

Three Sisters

• Corn, Beans and Squash• Hilled agriculture

(Mesoamerican)• Nitrogen exchange

between corn and beans• Deep hoe techniques

came with Europeans

Communal Property

• Longhouse originally a clan residence– Overseen (“owned”)

by Clan Mother– Fields tended by clan

women

Mary Jemison

• 1750’s “abducted” by the Seneca

• Lived with them for the rest of her life

• Died a clan mother• “Captivity Narratives”

Balance of Life

• Women responsible for life “in” the earth (agriculture)

• Men responsible for life “on” the earth (hunting)

• Connected to sexual roles• Allotment Act (1870’s) shifted balance to

women in the home and men in the fields

Succotash

• Corn Soup• Mixture of corn, beans and venison (now “salt

pork”)• Washed corn, white corn, flint corn, Indian

corn– Cooked several days in wood ash

Haudenosaunee Women and Politics

• Clan Mothers choose male clan “chiefs”– Iroquois word is “good mind”– Chiefs are “horned” given deer antler “gustoweh,”

head-dress– If they misbehave they can be “dehorned” by the

clan mother

Role of Haudenosaunee Women

• Direct the men from behind• Chiefs council with clan mothers• All decisions are made only by consensus• Women make the decision to go to war– They are responsible for children who will suffer

Clan Chiefs & Mothers

Oversee ceremoniesIn Longhouse no distinction between

“religious” “political” “economic” “familial”Make certain the cycles of life continue to the

Seventh GenerationDecisions made now effect people long into the future

European Fiction of Control

• Men in control of their homes used force (rape and violence)– Legacy of a patrilineal system of inheritance and property

rights

• Men in clan house had to behave, used force in hunting and diplomacy– Legacy of matrilineal system of communal property

• Distinctive “religious” views of Mother

What is Haudenousaunee “religion?”

• Connection and exchanges with a living earth• Duties and responsibilities of women and men

to Creation• Continuing the ceremonial cycle of

Thanksgivings

Haudenosaunee and the US

Sullivan-Clinton Campaign

Washington to Major General John Sullivan, 31 May 1779

“The expedition you are appointed to command is to be directed against the hostile tribes of the Six Nations of Indians [i.e., the Haudenosaunee] with their associates and adherents. The immediate objects are total destruction and devastation of their settlements and the capture of as many prisoners of every sex and age as possible. It will be essential to ruin their crops in the ground and prevent their planting more.”

U.S. Attack of Iroquois

Consequences of the Sullivan Campaign

• Land laid to waste• 160,000 bushels of corn destroyed• 43 Haudenosaunee towns burned• Winter of 1779-80 was very hard – Starvation and homelessness

• Honnahdahguyuss– ”Destroyer of Villages”

Onondaga Return Home

• Hear a voice in the woods• 17 year locust– First appearance– Gift of Creator

• Onondaga the only people of the Haudenosaunee to eat Locust– Tell story of the Sullivan Campaign to their

children

17 Year Locust

13th Hierophany of Locust

Contentious Views of Creation

• Haudenosaunee– Immanence of the

Sacred– Earth as an animate

being– People co-habit with

other beings– Emphasis on Creation

• Americans– Transcendence of the

Sacred (otiosus)– Earth as an inanimate

thing– People alone are above

other beings– Emphasis on the End of

Time

GEORGE WASHINGTON’SWAMPUM BELT AND THE CANANDAIGUA

TREATY

11 November 1794Commemorated every year on

November 11

George Washington Wampum Belt

Haudenosaunee in Washington D.C.28 February 2012

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EFxf8cKWqU&list=UUwBBPL-YamTkGjvpR4NtBBw&index=1&feature=plcp