The History Of Navajo Culture Guide to the Correct utilization and Loss of Sacred Items of Navajo People

By Wilson Bellacoola

Centuries before Christopher Columbus landed in the Americas in 1491, Navajos were already settled in the Four Corners area of the Colorado Plateau.

From the cultural perspective, Navajos believe they came to their land by emerging through four worlds. They are currently residing in the fourth level, the "Glittering World."

Navajos are the second most populous of all Native American peoples in theUnited States, with some 300,000 individuals in the early 21st century, most of them living inNew Mexico, Arizona, and Utah.

The Navajo speak an Apachean language, which is classified in the Athabaskan language family. At some point in prehistory, the Navajo and Apache migrated to the Southwest from Canada, where most other Athabaskan-speaking peoples still live;. However, the exact timing of the relocation is unknown. It is thought to have been between 1100 and 1500CE. These early Navajo were mobile hunters and gatherers; after moving to the Southwest, however, they adopted many of the practices of the sedentary, farming Pueblo Indians near whom they settled.

In the early 21st century, many Navajo continued to live a predominantly traditional lifestyle, speaking the Navajo language, practicing religion, and organizing through conventional forms of social structure. Navajo men and women also continued the tradition of volunteering for the armed services at a high rate, perhaps as an expression of a cultural ethic that emphasizes personal competence and community.

Many Navajo continue to live in the area they settled centuries ago; in the early 21st century, their reservation and government-allotted lands in New Mexico, Arizona, and Utah totaled more than 24,000 square miles (64,000 square km). However, the region is mainly arid and generally will not support enough agriculture and livestock to provide a livelihood for all of its residents. Thousands earn their living away from the Navajo country, and appreciable numbers have settled on irrigated lands along the lower Colorado River and in such places as Los Angeles and Kansas City, Missouri.

• Language: English
• Publisher: vincenzo nappi
• Release date: Aug 16, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201779450

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

This book examines how Navajo cultural items are being misused, lost, stolen, and sold by pawnshops, Indian stores, museums, and pow-wows, to name a few, and argues that tribes should consider enacting tribal codes to prevent this cultural loss. Navajos and Non-Navajos are both victims and the perpetrators of this loss. This study draws from years of personal direct observation, and secondary and primary sources.

The first chapter reviews the history of the Navajo - United States relationship and shows how the US polices altered the Navajo people from a position of self-efficiency to one of dependency. It is important to discuss the background of this appalling native and European history because the loss of Navajo cultural systems and objects stems in large measure from this history. The United States’ policies included stripping the Navajo and other tribes of their lands, resources, and cultures. The loss of lands and resources and federal policies forced the Navajo to depend on the government and the whites for goods to survive. To provide these goods, the government sold licenses to non-Indians to establish trading posts on the Navajo reservation – a system that continues to today. This system of dependence is seen in the pawnshops located on and off the Navajo reservation, which seems to be the largest taker of Navajo culture today.

Chapter two examines the commercial routes by which Navajo sacred items leave the Navajo people. Pawnshops and Indian stores, owned by non-natives and natives, desecrate sacred items through their sale, use, and even exhibition. Museums and art galleries continue to violate sacred traditions through the display and sale of sacred images and paintings, and the recording of sacred songs is sold as commercial CDs, at pow-wows, and over the internet.

Chapter Three reviews how Navajo traditional law and western law conceive of ownership, especially the ownership of sacred items. The chapter begins with a brief review of the Western law of ownership, with its emphasis on individual ownership. Western law essentially operates according to the nine-tenths rule; that possession is nine-tenths of the law – meaning that individuals have the right to do as they will with possessions, until and if, a court proves the individual obtained the item illegally.

Navajo law, based on communal ownership, is explained through the Navajo creation story and Navajo teachings. As the two societies interacted, Navajo laws of ownership increasingly conflicted with western laws of ownership – usually resulting in the loss of Navajo land, culture, and property. As the remainder Chapter, Three illustrates, serious problems emerge when western legal concepts are applied to specific items the Navajo people consider to have spiritual nature.

Chapter Four briefly reviews existing federal and state laws designed to protect native sacred items before evaluating whether current Navajo cultural preservation programs can prevent the types of loss discussed in this thesis. As this research finds, current tribal programming does not extend to these types of losses. Tribes cannot depend upon federal or states to develop policies for the protection of all sacred items. Tribal governments are also well aware that they cannot presume that everyone will follow customary principles of tribal law. The Dine, however, has always adapted – taken the best of the new and blended it with the old. This thesis presents such an adaptation – the development of tribal legislation that will serve to protect the old ways.

Specifically, this thesis proposes a set of tribal codes designed to protect traditional forms of ownership. The adoption and implementation of this, or a similar set of principles or codes, may assist the Navajo Nation in establishing a legitimate structure that clarifies the tribe’s expectations to those intending to exploit or violate sacred items.

As stated, the purpose of my book is to provide guidance and practical solutions to the