Native Americans were the first people who ever lived in North America. Native Americans have a special connection to this land, and when they were driven out, they were upset that they had to leave their homes, land, culture, religion, each other, and so much more. As my last project, I wanted to do something on culture, and nothing would be better than understanding more of my own Native American roots. For this project, I will be sharing some things I've learned about the Native American culture and how the critical synthesis comes to play.
English
Native American folklore is a very important part of their culture. There are many myths and stories that talk about the creation of the Earth and love between one another. I analyzed different stories I read and took notes. Many of the creation stories were similar to those of the biblical stories mentioned in the Bible. The love stories were also quite unique because they would synthesize different kinds of people from various tribes, and connect them to where it seems they've known each other for ever. I decided to write a love folklore about a Cherokee Chief and a woman from the rival Shawnee tribe who end up in love. In the story, it started off with Cherokee Chief who is strong, brave, wise, and intelligent. His name was Adahy, meaning lives in the woods, wanted a wife so that he and his partner could govern over his tribe and to lead them into becoming a strong community. Adahy ventures off and goes to a village where his traditional enemy, the Shawnee tribe, is hving a celebration and he spots a woman who is beautiful as ever. Adahy meets up with the woman while she's alone and they start to introudce each other. Her names was Miakoda, meaning power of the moon, and she loves he they connect compared to the people from her own village. They then end up going to Miakoda's father, the Chief of the Shawnee tribe. His name was Chief Elu, meaning full of grace, was skeptical about Chief Adahy. Chief Elu gave Adahy a trial by telling him to find ingredients to create a stew. Once Adahy created the stew he passed the trail to marry Miakoda and they eventual got married with traditions of the Cherokee tribe.
I also translated some words and states from the English language to Native American language. For example, Connecticut is derived from the word Quinnehtukqut, meaning “long river”, which is what the Mohegan tribe called the longest river in New England. Another is Kansas which derives from Kansa, which refers to the Kansa tribe. The name means “south” and is a shortened form of the tribe’s full name, People of the South Wind. Some foodsI translated were, Barbecue: (from the Taino word barbacoa), Chocolate: (from the Nahuatl word chocolatl), Avocado: (from the Nahuatl word ahuácatl), etc.
Being my last English project, I think this one of my favorites because I was able to be creative with these two characters who didn't know each other and were from enemy tribes, but had a strong connection like they knew each other their whole life. The myths and stories I researched helped me understand my Native American folklore, allowing me to create one that brings out the best in these two characters. I'm proud of the work I created and I'm excited to help others learn about Native American culture.
History
There was a lot of research involved in my history project. I started off by taking notes about the land Native American used to have and how it was taken away from them by the federal government of the United States. With that, I researched a few tribes like the Cherokee tribe, Apache tribe, Iroquois tribe, Cheyenne tribe, Navajo tribe, Sioux tribe, Paiute, and so much more because I wanted to see how much of an impact the federal government had over these natives. I researched legislations like the Indian Citizenship act of 1924 that granted citizenship to all Native Americans born in the U.S. The right to vote, however, was governed by state law; until 1957, some states barred Native Americans from voting. Another would be the Indian Removal Act, which was signed into law on May 28, 1830, by United States President Andrew Jackson. The law authorized the president to negotiate with southern Native American tribes for their removal to federal territory west of the Mississippi River in exchange for white settlement of their ancestral lands. The federal government had treaties with the Native Americans, but the federal government and other governments would always betray those treaties, even if they would enforce harm to the Native American who had to desert their land.
After a lot of extensive research, I started planing how I wanted my final history product to look like, but first, i needed to figure out how to create a law. A law is created when a bill is voted on the House of representatives and in the Senate. If both Chambers vote for the bill to become a law, the bill is sent to the President of the United to be verified and signed. If the president decides to sign the bill, it becomes a law. If the president doesn’t sign the bill and vetos it, the bill is sent back to the House of Representatives to vote again. If the bill receives the majority of the vote, it’s sent to the Senate to be voted on. If the Senate gives the bill a majority still, the bill becomes law. I created two laws with one being called Connect the Land Act which allows Native Americans to be able to go back to their sacred land and create private areas where they could live and connect with their ancestors once again without the federal government interfering with their traditions of their way of life. That includes, education, religious freedom, first amendment rights, etc. This bill also prohibits those not welcomed into the restricted and sacred land must leave or pay a fine for trespassing. The other is called Brothers in Arms Act that allows Native American run programs to introduce their culture and traditions to the people of America. This gives them access to their own land and that is not run by federal government, allows them to teach their religious beliefs to their people and others if they so chose by not being convicted of a crime, educate the people within the programs through Native American education and not Europeanized education, allows fundraisers to promote the programs and teach Native Americans how to manage money and become apart of the economic society. This would allow Native American run businesses to begin and allow their race to get out of poverty.
The summary of research was that Native Americans were living peacefully in their land before the white man came to America to settle and create their own nation. Native Americans are connected to the land and territories of where they resigned because they have such a deep and spiritual connection between themselves, nature, animals, and their creators. The white Americans, headed by the federal government, were envious of what the Native people had were perceived the bad guys when they would cheat Indians out of their land and resources. All Native Americans wanted to do was simply maintain their traditions and way of life which was full of harmony than deal with the capitalism of white America.
In the end, my final history product was spectacular and came out just like I envisioned. I hope the United States federal government and Native Americans can work on ways to bring unity with each other to heal old wounds to help make our country better and less divisive.
Art
Making food was my idea for the art portion because it's something I love to do, especially when it involves cooking another cultures dishes. I decided to research different dishes and cuisines from Native American all around North America. For example, the essential staple foods of the Indigenous peoples of the Eastern Woodlands have traditionally been corn (also known as maize), beans, and squash, known as "The Three Sisters" because they were planted interdependently: the beans grew up the tall stalks of the corn, while the squash spread out at the base of the three plants and provided protection and support for the root systems. They would incorporate maple syrup, been corn (maize), beans, and squash with their foods. Another example is the Southeastern Native American Cuisine. "From Southeastern Native American culture came one of the main staples of the Southern diet: corn (maize), either ground into meal or limed with an alkaline salt to make hominy, using a Native American technique known as nixtamalization. Corn is used to make all kinds of dishes from the familiar cornbread and grits to liquors such as whiskey, which has been an important trade item, historically. Though a less important staple, potatoes were also adopted from Native American cuisine and have been used in many ways similar to corn."
Once I did research about the cuisines, I started examining recipes from different Native American tribes. With the Cherokee tribe, I listed food like the Cherokee Chicken, Cherokee Style Succotash, Kanuchi (Cherokee Pureed Nut Soup, Cherokee Fry Bread, Fried Hominy, Cherokee Eggs and Wild Onions, Roasted Wild Turkey, Cherokee Black Bean Soup, Tsalagi Stew, etc. With the Apache tribe, I researched Apache Wild Goose, Fry Bread, Apache Sunflower Cakes, Apache Green Chili, Apache Cheese Bread, Apache Indian Bread, Apache Fried Rabbit, Steve’s Apache Sunset Stew, Apache Fries, etc. To make things short here's a list of different tribes I looked at: Navajo tribe, Sioux tribe, Lakota people, Crow people, Shoshone, Pawnee people, Ute people, Ho-Chunk, Omaha people, Ponca tribe, Miwok, Hidatsa, Tulalip tribe, Manda, Nex Perce people, Chumash, Cahuilla, and Zuni tribe.
Once I did research about the cuisines, I started examining recipes from different Native American tribes. With the Cherokee tribe, I listed food like the Cherokee Chicken, Cherokee Style Succotash, Kanuchi (Cherokee Pureed Nut Soup, Cherokee Fry Bread, Fried Hominy, Cherokee Eggs and Wild Onions, Roasted Wild Turkey, Cherokee Black Bean Soup, Tsalagi Stew, etc. With the Apache tribe, I researched Apache Wild Goose, Fry Bread, Apache Sunflower Cakes, Apache Green Chili, Apache Cheese Bread, Apache Indian Bread, Apache Fried Rabbit, Steve’s Apache Sunset Stew, Apache Fries, etc. To make things short here's a list of different tribes I looked at: Navajo tribe, Sioux tribe, Lakota people, Crow people, Shoshone, Pawnee people, Ute people, Ho-Chunk, Omaha people, Ponca tribe, Miwok, Hidatsa, Tulalip tribe, Manda, Nex Perce people, Chumash, Cahuilla, and Zuni tribe.
I created a Vegan stew, similar to one in my folklore story by synthesizing different ingredients from various tribes and putting it into one stew. It has flavors from the Cherokee tribe, Nex Perce people, Miowak people, Apache tribe, and Zuni tribe. All the flavors of the stew came together and to form my vegan stew that was colorful and vibrant. All of the ingredients in the stew come from plants, roots, peppers, mushrooms, onions, garlic, and nuts. I noticed the flavors in the vegan stew are hot, but can have a sweet after taste once the spicy taste left my mouth. Overall, I thought the vegan stew was excellent, even without the meat that I wanted to put in it so badly. I give a five star rating!
Synthesis
Synthesis is the combination of ideas to form a theory or system. During the whole project, I used synthesis as a critical thinking skill to understand the relationship between the federal government of the Untied States and the Native Americans. For centuries, these two groups have been fighting and little progress has been made. My project helped figure out ways to synthesize some solutions like making treaties that are fair to Native Americans. Native Americans are a people who are usually in the poverty level and are uneducated because the treatment of the federal government. If these two groups can work together, that's one step forward to progression. Another way i used synthesis was reading folklore and making the story that had two enemy tribe members falling in love with one another. They faced some challenges, and of course, differences along the way, but they got through it because of the strong connection we had. The last way I used synthesis was when I combined various ingredients from different tribes and made one vegan stew out of it. The vegan stew was full of endless flavors that when placed together make a wonderful stew. I hope you enjoyed my last Apollo project and that it helps you get a better understanding about the Native American culture, but also a understanding of what can happen when people step out of their own way and make solutions to problems by working together.
Here is a Webpage
Here is my Annotated bibliography