Female leader question

[Eagles]

It's been years, so I don't really remember the answer I'm seeking. I was told that a couple tribes had women as chiefs in the past. Can anyone tell me what those tribes were? I'm having an argument with an idiot who I went to school with years ago who claim's he's a card carrying Cherokee. However, he's talking disrespectful of the women. He's trying to say that women were naked all the time while doing dishes & knew their proper place. If you were tired of your wife, you sent her out to pasture & found a new one to marry. I've NEVER heard anyone of Native American decent, in all my years of research on my daughter & son's heritage where this was true. He's demanding proof & names of the tribes & the female chiefs. I know I've heard of this in the past talked about by elders. Does anyone know? I'm tired of this idiot claiming to be one of the people & talking crap about my children's heritage!

[wanjica_the_one]

It's been years, so I don't really remember the answer I'm seeking. I was told that a couple tribes had women as chiefs in the past. Can anyone tell me what those tribes were? I'm having an argument with an idiot who I went to school with years ago who claim's he's a card carrying Cherokee. However, he's talking disrespectful of the women. He's trying to say that women were naked all the time while doing dishes & knew their proper place. If you were tired of your wife, you sent her out to pasture & found a new one to marry. I've NEVER heard anyone of Native American decent, in all my years of research on my daughter & son's heritage where this was true. He's demanding proof & names of the tribes & the female chiefs. I know I've heard of this in the past talked about by elders. Does anyone know? I'm tired of this idiot claiming to be one of the people & talking crap about my children's heritage!

Wilma Mankiller.

[OLChemist]

Historic leaders, patriots who fought for their people, and heroes, who happened to be women:

Toypurina, Kizh, an organizer of the revolt against the San Gabriel Mission;

Buffalo Calf Road, Cheyenne, fought for her people at Little Bighorn;

The Other Magpie, Crow, fought to protect her people;;

Weetamoo, Pocasset Wampanoag leader;

Moving Robe Woman (Mary Crawler), Hunkpapa, fought for her people at Little Bighorn;

One Who Walks with the Stars, Oglala, fought for her people at Little Bighorn;

Nanyehi (Nancy Ward), Cherokee leader;

Minnie Hollow Wood, Lakota married into the Cheyenne, fought for her people at Little Bighorn;

Awashonks, Sakonnet leader;

Gouyen, Chiricahua Apache, fought to protect her people;

Yellow-Haired Woman, Cheyenne, fought to protect her people;

Pine Leaf, Crow, fought to protect her people;

Lozen, Chiricahua Apache, fought to protect her people;

Dahteste, Chiricahua Apache, fought to protect her people;

Wild Hemp, Cherokee, fought to protect her people;

Running Eagle, Piegan, fought to protect her people....

[OLChemist]

It is the dominant culture that devalues the domestic sphere. To dominant culture eyes my people's culture is a mans' world; historical observers call our woman "drudges." These observers were blinkered by a culture in which high status woman didn't dirty their hands or minds. A culture that valued only the work of men. They were unbalanced and uncivilized. Don't let their conditioning make you ignore the contributions to our cultures of those women who weren't obviously in dominant culture defined/recognized leadership roles. Our women didn't have to be men to be valued participants in our societies.

I was taught that men and women have different but equal roles. The men would have nothing to protect and defend without us. We carry the future generations in our wombs. We teach them our languages and cultures. It takes male and female contributions to make a healthy society.

However, your classmate is a victim of internalized oppression. He deserves pity. I can tell within half a minute of conversation whether or not a man has been raised with at least some traditional values. My greatest pleasures within Native contexts is talking to men who actually listen to me with their brains engaged, without my having to prove my intelligence first. Even men who I've never met before actually listen.

(Sorry you non-Native guys out there, but too many you still act like hearing intelligent comments come out of a throat without an Adam's apple is like hearing your cocker spaniel comment on international politics!)

[Joe's Dad]

Women belong barefoot and pregnant.

[Eagles]

Thank you to the two who commented & respected my question as it was meant.

Eagles

[OLChemist]

Women belong barefoot and pregnant.

How did you get those water moccs barefoot? No wonder it took three years for you to score

[Joe's Dad]

How did you get those water moccs barefoot? No wonder it took three years for you to score

I be gellin.

[OLChemist]

Some reading for your classmate. From nice dominant culture approved academic sources so he should believe them:

Eastern Band Cherokee Women:
Cultural Persistence in Their Letters and Speeches, Virginia Moore Carney; University of TN Press, 2005

Cherokee Women In Crisis: Trail of Tears, Civil War, and Allotment, 1838-1907; University of Alabama Press, 2003.

Masculindians: Conversations about Indigenous Manhood, ed Sam McKegney; University of Michigan Press, 2014


I found the last one quite a thought provoking read. It opened my eyes to some aspects of just how much some of my own images of our men had been influenced by dominant culture distortions.

[Joe's Dad]

Priscilla Jacobs - Waccamaw Siouan

[Eagles]

thank you

Thank you for the links. I'll certainly post them to the uneducated, Cherokee claiming former classmate.

[WhoMe]

Eagles,

You honor this bigot by debating him and spending the time to give him the answer he won't be satisfied with.

Why don't you just devalue him and tell him to believe what he wants to believe, smile and move on your merry way?

Using this tactic, you have won and didn't have to put much effort in saying much!

[gilisi]

Eagles,

You honor this bigot by debating him and spending the time to give him the answer he won't be satisfied with.

Why don't you just devalue him and tell him to believe what he wants to believe, smile and move on your merry way?

Using this tactic, you have won and didn't have to put much effort in saying much!

Thats REAL Cherokee ways LOL ^^^^

[Jack Anderson]

Crows did often

[gilisi]

Crows did often

Did what?