"We", meaning both indigenous and "white" people, think of the US and Canada as extensions of the British empire, but don't think much about the nature of Britain itself. Firstly, it is forgotten that the islands were once the high points of a land that eventually drowned, at about the same time as Beringia -- from the same causes. No one speaks of a "land bridge" there, but in that ancient time it was possible to walk where there is ocean now.
One of the earliest skeletons found in Britain was "Cheddar Man", not because he was made of cheese, but because the cheese also comes from Cheddar, a place. It would be quite a nice place to visit, but Cheddar Man caused a stir because when they found enough DNA to reconstruct what that implied in terms of appearance, they discovered that the Brits of the time, when humans were moving from hunter/gatherers to farming, were dark-skinned, blue eyed, and curly haired!
In fact, Brits were almost completely replaced twice in prehistory, first by the farmers, and then by the Bell-Beaker Culture, which made mugs with no handles and round bottoms. No one knows why, but they swept across Europe.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=14&v=yZIqmEPp00w
When I think about whites on the North American continent, I see that the colonizers were England, Spain, Portugal and France. I wondered why there were no Germans in the equation, since their culture and genes now dominate America: neatness, control, propriety. The clue is that they were part of the Holy Roman Empire, which was coming apart in the foreign empire years, and the Protestant defiant separation (due to corruption in the Catholic establishment) caused so much blood and chaos that they were in no shape to stake out other lands far away.
"The two parts of the Holy Roman Empire clashed in the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648), which was ruinous to the twenty million civilians living in both parts. The Thirty Years' War brought tremendous destruction to Germany; more than 1/4 of the population and 1/2 of the male population in the German states were killed by the catastrophic war. . .
"Around 1350, Germany and almost the whole of Europe were ravaged by the Black Death. Jews were persecuted on religious and economic grounds; many fled to Poland. The Black Death is estimated to have killed 30–60 percent of Europe's population in the 14th century. . .
This was while smallpox began decimating America.
"From 1438 the Habsburgs, who controlled most of the southeast of the Empire (more or less modern-day Austria and Slovenia, and Bohemia and Moravia after the death of King Louis II in 1526), maintained a constant grip on the position of the Holy Roman Emperor until 1806 (with the exception of the years between 1742 and 1745). This situation, however, gave rise to increased disunity among the Holy Roman Empire's territorial rulers and prevented sections of the country from coming together to form nations in the manner of France and England. . . .
"From 1618 to 1648 the Thirty Years' War raged in the Holy Roman Empire. Its causes were the conflicts between Catholics and Protestants, the efforts by the various states within the Empire to increase their power, and the Catholic Emperor's attempt to achieve the religious and political unity of the Empire."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Germany#Prehistory
Looked at this way, events suggest that Germany had to wrestle with the similar forces on the same terms as those invading America, but the timing was different. Perhaps the world wars were their too-late attempt at making an empire, since they were fighting among themselves too hard to separate from Rome, the way the States separated from Britain. There's also something worthy of exploration here about why Germans love the American indigenous people so much in spite of having tried so hard to rub out all dark people in the Holocaust. Something is here about the "natural", loving the forest and all that.
In the United States the split among white people over the indigenous people is the same as the usual split over "dark" people -- on the one hand that they are fiendish killers who must be attacked and on the other hand the innocent and noble children of nature to be admired. This is still not reconciled, and persists as stigma and a kind of burden of virtue, simultaneous and irreconcilable. Wes Studi can play both sides. This splitting, which is a psychological phenomenon that plays out in other contexts as well (gender identity, wealth, power) plays out in the reservation system, even after the white administrators were ruled out by "Indian Preference".
And it is reciprocated in the Native American mirror image of whites, who can seem monsters or saviors. The stereotypical white person has endless resources (people back east who supply money) and a demonic need to fuck red women. (No consequences.) The idea is that whites should be imitated if wealth is your "thing," but they just don't have the values of an autochthonous person. The whole "Hall of MIrrors" is that the tribal people -- who want to be authentic in a separate valid life that responds to history -- are missing much of the oral literature. Using written records means resorting to things collected by white academics and religious figures, who were controlled by their own ideas of what the world is about. Attempts to pull out ceremonies and stories get limited by that.
Piegan Institute, when Darrell Kipp was guiding it, got access to many old wax cylinders and other early sound recordings. They put a lot of effort into moving them to computer records and translating them into modern English. Shirley Crowshoe was vital to this. There are probably neglected caches of material still unfound.
White people did this recording and never thought of including the People themselves in their knowledge of it. Part of the reason was that the whites were acting in the context of white institutions, often the providers of money, and all the people who belonged to these institutions were Back East friendship networks, often connected by academic institutions. This is still true. Piegan Institute was a native organization responding to a Harvard graduate who belonged to the tribe -- that was Darrell. As the tribes have created institutions across the States and around the world, they have gained power. They also become more like whites.
White people did this recording and never thought of including the People themselves in their knowledge of it. Part of the reason was that the whites were acting in the context of white institutions, often the providers of money, and all the people who belonged to these institutions were Back East friendship networks, often connected by academic institutions. This is still true. Piegan Institute was a native organization responding to a Harvard graduate who belonged to the tribe -- that was Darrell. As the tribes have created institutions across the States and around the world, they have gained power. They also become more like whites.
No comments:
Post a Comment