Replying to LO25035 --
However, When Ohiyesa Santee Sioux went to Dartmouth and later to Boston
Medical School he was not only cum laude but the track star and captain of
the football team. He wrote the first Boy Scout Manuals on the out of
doors but they reject him today because of the Berdache, the traditional
acceptence and role of the homosexual in most native societies. We
weren't afraid and still aren't.
I would also point out that wherever traditional native peoples have
worked in the Western context they have done just fine. When Sequoia
brought out the Cherokee 83 symbol syllabury within two years everyone in
the Cherokee nation could read and they had a newspaper. Try teaching the
far simpler English reading to non-literate Americans these days in two
years. Mohawk children would rather learn English than Iroquois because
it is easier so the Mohawks in the Canadian reserves have had to develop a
very advanced holistic pedagogy to get their children to continue to speak
Iroquois. In the old Cherokee nation the Council of Chiefs brought in the
Moravians to teach the children to speak and write English. The letters
from those missionaries to their mission boards are highly complementary
of the children and their rapid learning of anything they taught. They
added to their culture without deleting. Today they are forced to choose
one over the other.
It has not been an issue of native people's learning English, French or
anything else but the reverse. Very few non-natives speak or understand
our cultures and that problem extends to American diplomacy in foreign
nations with diplomats often not speaking the language very well. The
problem is also found in business where most believe a two week Berlitz
course will make them competant to negotiate in Japanese. We must never
forget that Romantic is a European word and concept and that culture is
holistic, layered and complex.
Ray Evans Harrell, (Oklahoma Cherokee)
artistic director
The Magic Circle Opera Repertory Ensemble, Inc.
mcore@idt.net
"Working for a resident chamber opera center in every city of America of
100,000 or more"
Sajeela M ramsey wrote:
> Stunning and beautiful. Thank you thank you.
...snip by your host...
--"Ray E. Harrell" <mcore@idt.net>
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