Women are constantly seen as objects of their outward beauty. Countless societies have labeled women as incompetent, naive, or simply worthless for nothing but standing there and looking pretty. There are only a few cultures in the past that have undeniably supported women for something other than their sexuality or their ability to reproduce. The Native American culture is one of them. In the midst of a sexist world during the 16-17th centuries, Native American women were treated with honor and dignity by their people. The gender roles of men and women in the ancient tribes drastically differed from the roles that most other women experienced throughout history. Sadly, the original role that women formerly obtained in their tribes has slowly diminished as time progresses and is now being replaced with an entirely different and typically demining way of life. Many native American woman are now subject to frequent sexual, physical, and mental abuse. It was not just land that the Native Americans lost when the white settlers took over. A great deal of their empowering culture and precious values were also taken away from them as they were forced to conform to a new European way of life. Modern day women across America are at war against society; breaking down glass ceilings and conquering stereotypes at a rate more expeditious than even before. But, according to Amnesty International, Native American women are still the most abused and underrepresented minority in America. Why are these strong women still so oppressed and forgotten in a mainly progressive society? There is so much to learn about the importance of the female role from the historical Native American tribes. Why is this valuable information so easily overlooked? Is there anyone out there that has stood up for these women? Or, better yet, given them the courage to stand up for themselves?
If Native American tribes are remembered for only a few things, let their unmatched respect and love for nature and tradition be one of them. There are some people who believe that the history of America began at the time that Christopher Columbus sailed to America in 1942, this uneducated idea couldn’t be more wrong. The north American land was home to Native Americans for thousands of years before Europeans arrived and settled. In fact, according to The Native population of the Americas in 1942, around 54 million native Americans lived in the Americas before the settlers even arrived. The native American tribes had very unique ways of living that were specialized differently to each tribe. One of these traits was the way that they treated the women. Most all historians agree that native American women had more power within their tribes than European women had in their communities. When speaking of Native American tribes and their cultures, it is important to not generalize too broadly because each tribe had unique politics, traditions, and beliefs that differed from each other. This being said, most of the tribes share similar baseline characteristics that promote mirroring lifestyles. One of the largest and most well-known Native American tribes is the Cherokee tribe. According to the Encyclopedia of Britannica, the Cherokee tribe consisted of around 22,500 people in 1650 and controlled around 40,000 square miles of land that is now known as Tennessee, South Carolina, and many other states that make up the south of the United States. Because the Cherokee tribe was so substantially powerful when the Europeans came to America, there are many records from both Native Americans and settlers of how the tribe was run from a day-to-day basis. These records include insightful information of Cherokee tribe’s gender roles and how they differed from those of the European white man around the 17th century.
A common theme among the Cherokee tribe was the importance of consent, kinship, and loyalty. These ways of life, among other standards of living, are what made this tribe so dominant throughout history. It also contributed to the higher quality of life that women received and experienced. Because the tribes believed in balance and fairness in all aspects of their lives, it left little room for oppression against women. Men in the tribes were responsible for protecting their clans, fishing and hunting, governing their clans, and communicating with outsiders. Although men withheld a larger portion of power in the tribe, it did not make the women and their roles any less important and respected.
Because women did not frequently go out and hunt, they owned all of the homes and land. Women were responsible for all of the farming and gathering along with keeping everyone at home in line. All political decisions that were made from the men had to be cleared through the women first. This is a system that was almost never practiced in the European colonies. Women in the tribes were protected under the exact same rights that the men were. The Cherokee tribe had a matrilineal system, which means that tribe individuals were seen to only be related to their mother’s side of the family. A child’s relatives were traced on his mother’s side of the family. Multiple generations of one family would live together in the same home that the woman of the house owned. If the wife and husband no longer got along, the wife had the power to divorce her husband. This would mean that the husband would have to leave and go live with his mother or sister and his divorced wife would own the house on her own. Because women were in charge of all of the farming, they had all of the burden of producing a successful crop. This burden, in return, gave the women significant economic and societal status that the European women never had.
An important aspect of native American tribes is their spirituality. The Cherokee tribe had a complex religion that played a significant part in every aspect of their lives. According to Cherokee mythology, Selu is a goddess who is known for being the “Corn Mother”. She was killed by her twin sons because they thought she was a witch. In the process of her dying, she taught them how to plant corn every year. It is she that many Native American tribes give thanks to for each harvest. Native Americans had daily religious ceremonies that both women and men took a part in. Women were seen as spiritual beings with the power to give and take away life. The Native American religion gives insight into how highly esteemed the women of the tribes truly were.
The gender roles of men and women throughout the European colonies in the 16th and 17th century have very little in common with the gender roles of the Native American Tribes. Many of the settlers, both male and female, were shocked when they discovered the importance of the female role to the Native Americans. Although, once again, it is important to not generalize every household of colonial America, it is acceptable to admit that men usually withheld almost all power over women in society. Men were educated, made up all of the government, owned the property, held all social power, and provided for their families entirely on their own. When asked about his role as a male in society, a man in 1712 once said to the Spectator magazine: “I am perpetually taken up giving out orders, in prescribing duties, in hearing parties [disputes], in administering justice, and in distributing rewards and punishments…In short, I look upon my family as a patriarchal sovereign, in which I am myself both king and priest.”
Colonial women became accustomed to their gender roles at a very early age. Their only purposes were to tend the home, have children, take care of the children, and please their husbands. Women were rarely educated. If they were educated, it was mainly in complete secrecy. A women’s identity belonged to the men in her life. Women would often be forced to marry young and most would die from childbirth. In the 18th century, a lady named Mrs. David Simmons once said, “Let your Dress, your Conversation and the whole Business of your life be to please your husband and make him happy.” Although this quote may seem appalling now, it was a reality for almost every woman in colonial America. There were religious groups like the Quakers were known for being more progressive than others, pushing for even the simplest women’s rights. But, although there were the few women who stood up against the patriarchal society of the Unites States, it took hundreds of years before women had even a fraction of the rights that Native American women had obtained thousands of years prior.
Many historians blame the white man for the immense cultural changes that can be seen throughout the Native American tribes. When the settlers arrived, they quickly realized how different the Native Americans lifestyles were from their own. The settlers immediately seized freedom away from the indigenous people who had been living in peace with the American land for so long. Sadly, life for Native American people hasn’t gotten much better. This is especially true for Native American women. Data from the US Department of Justice states that “Native American and Alaska Native women are more than 2.5 times more likely to be raped or sexually abused than women in the USA in general”. How did the Native American Culture change from one that used to promote such high equality between men and women to a culture that would now allow women to be treated so exceptionally awful. One of the most shocking things about the abuse that Native American women endure is that 86% of the cases reported were said to be done by non-native men. This leads one to believe that the problem is not what the Native American culture has done to itself, but what other cultures have done and continue to do to the indigenous people.
There are strong woman who recognize the unbounded problems within the lives of present day Native Americans and have committed their entire lives to seek justice. Wilma Mankiller is one of these women. Wilma is an inspiration to Native American men and women across America. She proves to them that they are capable of so much more than what the world is telling them. Wilma went from growing up so poor on a reservation that she didn’t even have electricity or running water to being the first female Principle Chief of the Cherokee Nation in 1985-1995. While Wilma was chief, she worked endlessly towards bettering the everyday lives of Native Americans through improving their education, health care, tribal government, and countless other important systems. Wilma was inspired by her work when she realized that “A lot of young girls have looked to their career paths and have said they’d like to be chief. There’s been a change in the limits people see”. It is woman like Wilma that have inspired Native American females to take a stand against the abuse that has overtaken their communities. Especially the abuse from people who have already taken away so much from them and their ancestors simply because of differing cultures.
As a society, America is slowly beginning to realize that sexism is a very real and prevalent problem. Dishearteningly, the realization that Native American women are the ones who experience some of the worst of this sexism is not as broadly accepted. Native American culture used to be a culture that promoted the equality of men and woman. But, over time, the Native American culture has been torn apart and replaced with a society filled of rape, poverty, and an overall low quality of life for many people. Wilma Mankiller once said that “everybody is sitting around saying, ‘Well, jeez, we need somebody to solve this problem of bias.’ That somebody is us. We all have to try and figure out a better way to get along.” America, and all of its beautifully diverse cultures, must come together and find a way to mend the brokenness of Native American history. Furthermore, it is imperative that the abuse Native American woman receive in this country, simply because of their sex and heritage, comes to an end. Women have been objectified for centuries, but the Native American culture stood as a pillar of equality for the females of their tribes. Colonial woman could only dream of having some of the rights that the Native American woman had. Contrarily, Native American woman now feel as though a life without poverty, mental, and physical abuse can only be found in their past. This life of oppression, due to one’s gender or culture, should never be accepted. Regretfully, it is impossible to fix the sexist treatment of women and the racist treatment of Native Americans in the past. But, what the United States can do, is put its differences and prejudices aside in order to create a better life for the brilliant Native American woman of