![Picture](/uploads/3/9/0/7/39074923/633874_orig.jpg)
Native American Philosophy has been stated to be primitive in thought and understanding; which gives credence to the Western civilization methods of philosophy. However, it is the Westerner's Christian beliefs which results in their dualistic (this or that) approach to epistemology, that has blocked them from understanding a rich culture which feeds itself on the experience it receives from their relationship with the world surrounding it. The authors contributing to the work American Indian Thought by Anne Waters, work together to share their identity and the metaphysical or philosophy which influences and shapes their identity. Contributing author Gregory Cajete in the article “Philosophy in Native Science” says Native Science can,
“include metaphysics and philosophy, art and architecture, practical technologies, and agriculture, as well as ritual and ceremony practised by Indigenous peoples past and present. More specifically, Native Science encompases such areas as astronomy, farming, plant domestication, plant medicine, animal husbandry, hunting, fishing, metallurgy, geology- studies related to plants, animals, and natural phenomena, yet may extend to include spirituality, community, creativity, and technologies which sustain environments and support essential aspects of human life. It may even include exploration of such questions as the nature of language, thought, and perception, the movement of time and space, the nature of human knowing and feeling, the nature of the human relationship to the cosmos- questions related to natural reality. The collective heritage of human experience with the natural world, Native science is a map of natural reality drawn from the experience of thousands of human generation.”
Thus it is their experience from their relationship with their natural surroundings which give them their Identity; therefore First Nation people are unique in their Identity and do not fit the ‘this or that’ dualistic approach of Western civilization.
Contributing author Brian Yazzie Burkhart in his article “ What Coyote and Thales Can Teach Us” writes about the “principle of relatedness”, reminding us of the things around us and our relation with that surrounding is a “way of being”; it is through that way of being that gives an individual experience. Experience has many important parts in shaping our identity, the influence it has on knowledge is a big factor in Burkhart’s article. He explains the difference between the Western view and the American Indian thought concerning the definitions of knowledge. While Westerners believe that knowledge is highly influenced by justification, and if you can justify the reason then it is knowledge; American Indian thought is very different from this perspective for it contributes knowledge to the experience of an individual. Burkhart writes,
“Knowledge is not a thing in the world that we can discover. Knowledge is not such that if we just peer into the world long enough or just sit and think long enough, it will come to us in all of its unabated glory. Knowledge is shaped and guided by human action, endeavors, desires and goals. Knowledge is what we put to use. Knowledge can never be divorced from human action and experience.”
For this reason it is important to note that American Indian thought is a result of their experiences and may look different today than it did 500 years ago, because circumstance and experience has been different. Vine Deloria Jr. in his article “Philosophy of the Tribal Peoples” makes reference to “what might have been or might become”. Thus it can be understood, there are differences in experiences of what was and what is now happening.
Thus in Anne Waters article “Language Matters: Nondiscrete Nonbinary Dualism” she writes about the history of colonization and the experience of losing a part of their culture. Specifically she mentions how imposing Western thought upon the First Nation tribes, closed a communication link between the inside of First Nation culture and the Western world. She writes, “Imposing a closed binary ontology on to Indigenous ideas obstructs communication/ meaning systems, to such an extent that, for good reason, Indigenous ideas and vision have largely remained closed to outsiders”; because the experience of language is so important in culture, the forced expunging of their language has led to the stealing of sacred knowledge and a painful loss yet to be healed in many individuals.
By the increased effects of Colonization, we see the Westerner’s ‘this or that’ attitude pushing First Nation people to conform into their theories, a forced change of identity; but it was the First Nations identity of experience within their natural surroundings which helped settlers survive their first winters upon the American Continent. The refusal in Western philosophy to accept any other thought other than their own, caused a link between two nations to be obliterated, severing the communications between two cultures. The Westerners believe in their knowledge of justification and could have learned so much from the idea ‘knowledge as experience’, but because of the severation in communication, the metaphysical and scientific world will need to wait for the communication barrier to be lifted.
For contributing author Leslie Nawagesic he shares how experience in relation to his natural surroundings shaped and changed his identity through his personal article “Phenomenology of a Mugwump Type of Life”. He relates how at a very young age, he was taken off to boarding school and during the physical examination was found to have Tuberculosis. He then spent the next couple of years in a Hospital; it was within these natural surroundings where he learned English, and the only distinction of group he had was that of a patient compared to a nurse. He writes, “strangely, I did not necessarily feel I belonged to any one group other than being a patient”. Therefore at an early age, this became his identity; the only family contact he had was with a paternal aunt who occasionally visited him. Upon returning home, his identity began to change slightly as he began to pick up his Native language, notice the passive mannerisms of the Elders in their relations with the white people, and he began to “internalize the community ethos, mores, social practices, and customs, many of them transmitted to [him] by [his] parents”. For the second time, he was taken from his home to enter the residential school; while many things such as white sheets were familiar to him because of the hospital sojourn, however the influence from experience within his tribe caused a caution to arise in him. He shows through his experience in his natural surrounding, that his surroundings influenced his identity; but he was not only influenced in that moment, but rather for the duration of his life. He writes, “over the next five years I would experience many things that have left some important or poignant memory in my life...These early memories were to remain with me for many years to come.”
Anne Waters also talks briefly of her own experience and how identity cannot be a fixed notion but is a reaction to experience in her article “Ontology of Identity and Interstitial Being”. Experience is a different notion for each individual and has influence in many things, Waters writes about the “Being” in many different contexts and as we understand our experience in each of those contexts we can see our identify more. It thus shows that the idea of having a ‘this or that’ approach to identity cannot exist because it does not allow for true expression of Identity. This is best seen through Waters example of an American Asian student who shows his Asian part on the outside because of his looks, and then feels he must keep his American self inside. This type of thinking does not allow the American Asian student to fully embrace his identity and share it with his surroundings, it doesn’t allow him to embrace his experience and thus gain knowledge.
Waters also uses the example of carded First Nation members and that a card does not always make oneself a part of the group; she contributes the need to experience and participate in the group in order to establish oneself within the group an important part of Identifying onself as First Nations. This is similar to Thurman Lee Hester Jr.’s article “On Philosophical Discourse: Some Intercultural Musings” where he talks about a Creek Elder’s view of being Creek. Hester learned the necessary thing to identify oneself as being Creek was experience. The Elder stated, “If you come to the stomp ground for four year, take the medicines and dance the dances, then you are Creek”. The orthopraxy here demonstrates identity’s need for experience and its knowledge gained, orthodoxy would not allow for people to fully comprehend and understand because it is based upon rules; even rules cannot be understood if not practiced.
Contributing author David Martinez helps us understand the difference between rules and practice, in his article “Along the Horizon a World Appears: George Morrison and the Pursuit of an American Indian Esthetic”; he shows how First Nation artist George Morrison embraces the orthopraxy of his identity as he embraces the chaos field and brings it into order for his viewers. However, because he does not follow the rules of what Westerners call an Orthodox Indian, for his drawings/paintings are not traditional First Nation scenes, he is not considered to be an Indian Artist. It is important to note, that his identity is found in the art he makes, where he follows a relationship he has with his natural surroundings, so that he sees himself as “an artist who happened to be Indian” instead of an “Indian artist” who follows the Western thought of art. Martinez writes, “George Morrison has succeeded in bringing his own dream to fruition...to maintain the Ojibwa tradition as a dynamic force in the modern world, ultimately resisting the forces of assimilation that otherwise characterize the Ojibwas’ relation to the Western tradition”.
In conclusion, it is our experience in our natural surroundings and our relationship which we allow to form from those surroundings which gives us our Identity. The Western idea of dualism places great restriction on the ability to grow individually or to have separate experiences. When their idea states that you must either be this or you are that it tries to define you into a small box. Waters talks about the concept of the Spanish thinking, where either they had souls are not, and whichever idea you chose required either conversion or slavery. This is the narrow mindedness of Western Civilization, they fail to recognize the individuality, the uniqueness and difference between God’s children (to use their own reasoning). However, it is that very difference of natural surroundings that allows us all to be different and express ourselves in different ways. We cannot expect for example, people in India to give up riding elephants or people in Cairo to stop riding camels so they can ride horses like us; but rather we recognize that their natural surroundings have a greater impact on their identity because they have used their relationship with the natural surrounding to create their identity and culture. Thus our identity is a reaction to the relationship we have with our natural surroundings.
Bibliography
Waters, Anne, ed. American Indian Thought: Philosophical Essays. Malden, MA: Blackwell Pub., 2004.