Post-Thanksgiving brings chance to recognize Native Americans
By Alonzo Weston
Most of you know this post-holiday weekend for all the Christmas shopping bargains to be had. It’s ironic to me because all the consumerism comes just after we give thanks for all we have.
Yes, Thanksgiving is mostly celebrated with gluttony and football instead of truly giving thanks, but we’re grateful to be able to enjoy those things as such.
We have images in our minds of the supposedly first Thanksgiving with Native Americans and Pilgrims breaking bread on that day. That’s nice, nostalgic imagery but is it historically accurate? It’s certainly not “cowboys and Indians.”
Nov. 29 is National Native American Heritage Day, which recognizes the culture, traditions, contributions and heritages of Native Americans, not Indians. The Native American Heritage Day was enacted by Congress and signed into being by President George W. Bush in 2008.
These people were called “Indians” only because Columbus thought he landed in India in 1492. For too many years we thought of them as such and through our movies and stories made them the enemy. In Westerns, they were always the bad guys for merely wanting and fighting for what was once their own. Imagine some foreign country like Russia or North Korea coming here and trying to take away our land and way of life. Do you get it now?
It’s a day to understand those we once deemed the enemy in our homeland and show our respect and understanding.
There are currently 574 federally recognized tribes in the United States. These tribes live on reservations or sections of land reserved for them before relinquishing everything else to the government.
As a news reporter, I visited a thriving Native American reservation and school in Horton, Kansas.
I saw a community still keeping its heritage alive by teaching its language in schools and with annual traditional celebrations. A reservation is not like a series of teepees as you might think but a residential area similar to Deer Park or Stonecrest.
You celebrate by reading stories or watching movies and documentaries about Native Americans like “Run Woman Run” by Zoe Leigh Hopkins and “Rez Metal” by Ashkan Soltani.
You also can eat the foods from Native American culture such as frybread, wild rice and succotash, which is a mix of corn squash and beans and dates back to the 17th century. It, frybread and wild rice are staple foods for Native Americans.
Learn about notable Native Americans such as musician Lila Downs, a Grammy Award-winning jazz singer, and Master Sgt. Woodrow W. Keeble, who became the first full-blooded Sioux to receive the Medal of Honor.
Yes, this weekend is a chance to relax your tummy and rest after shopping but also to observe the impact of the people who also made a difference in the growth of our country.
