Posted on 06/30/2014 11:04:07 AM PDT by reaganaut1
In our public elementary school, children are required to make a presentation about their "country of origin". I don't think students whose ancestors came from Mongolia should be forced to write about Mongolia -- it's none of the school's business.
One child in our daughter's class said her "country of origin" was America, since her ancestors came here more than a hundred years ago. Her teacher said that only "Native Americans" can claim the U.S. as their country of origin. I wonder if the use of the term "Native American" instead of the old "American Indian" is a way to suggest that someone whose ancestors have lived in the U.S. for generations is no more "native" than someone who immigrated here yesterday.
There is no such thing.
The Indians migrated over to the Western Hemisphere just like everyone else.
I made a distinction between recent immigrants and native-born recently to a Belgian. This reference resulted in a 5 minute discourse on defining our terms. The up-shot was, in her mind, there are no “native-born” Americans.
My country of origin is the United States. I was born here. I am therefore a native American.
These are “tribal americans”
My Descendents signed the Declaration of Independence and my wife’s family dates back to the 1600s. I think we are both native Americans because we were here before America was a country.
That teacher or whoever designed the curriculum is clearly of fairly recent immigrant origin, to think that every person has just one country of origin. There are those of us who cannot answer other than “American” because there just is no one country or group from which we arise. In my instance, despite having a surname that is as English as the day is long, it covers almost all of western Europe, the British Isles and several native tribes.
This what is annoying about liberals. Let's take St. Patrick's day for instance. This is a pet peeve of mine! Everybody and their brother Irish or not declare themselves Irish and go about getting drunk and stupid for a holiday that is not celebrated in Ireland in this manner. They eat food that is not eaten in Ireland. In Ireland it is a religious holy day, and cows are pretty scarce in Ireland. I have digressed. But it's crass and some say harmless. I disagree.
Oh, so teacher wants a paper on the original origin. I’d have my kid write a paper on the Garden of Eden and dare the teacher to not accept it.
Where did “native Americans” come from? Certainly not this continent.
It infuriates my spouse’s family (Apache descendants) when I pull the family tree dating back to 1670 and tell them I am a native American. The spouse used to get irritated but has given up on me changing now.
A redskin.
In Canada they call them “aboriginal”, which is a lot more accurate, since everyone born here is a native American.
I am a thirteenth generation American. How many generations are required before someone is “native”?
several years ago,
a big government HR/Personnel department sent “tell us your race” forms to all employees.
one fellow ticks the “Native American” box and returns the form.
shortly later, a Personnel lady calls him and tells him he had no business selecting “Native American”
his reply:
“I was born in Saint Louis, so I’m a Native American.” And since he’d answered her call, he terminated it.
At that time, (I just haven’t checked since is all) the law said the responder’s self-perception or self-identification was correct.
Hey, don’t worry about it. I’m Dakota Sioux.
Neither I nor any Indian friends and relatives of mine refer to ourselves as “Native Americans.” Only white liberals and their liberal Indian lackeys use that term.
America is not a name dictated by the elements, nor emblazoned in the clouds over her. Rather, adapted from the name of a European explorer--the term "American," as member of a new ethnicity, was adopted by the European settlers, who had risen against the Mother country to achieve the freedom of their respective States, to represent a sense of common purpose--a purpose shortly reflected in their written Constitution . . . The confusion in Academia is demonstrated by the penchant to lump American Indian tribes together under the nomenclature "Native American"; a clear insult to proud peoples, who often laid down their lives, fighting to preserve their own unique nations in the lands of their fathers.
The original "Native Americans," then, are the descendants of those settlers who first made the "American" identification, as a self-description; those to whom that identification proclaimed adherence to an ethnicity born in those communities, rallying to the creation of a common purpose, born in a common historic struggle, and affirmed in a Constitutional Federation, dedicated to their "posterity."
Of course, the descendants of those whose forebears came afterwards, and won acceptance as "Americans," have generally accepted the same identification. The demonstration by Leftist theorists in academia, gratuitously imposing that identification on those who had laid down their lives to validate other identifications--proud tribal nations--is merely one more example of the arrogance of those who would deny history in the pursuit of cloudborne ideas.
William Flax
By the way, at most universities here, the department that specializes in Indian language and culture is called the “American Indian Department.”
After that, I don't know, or care.
See my post #17. You nail the issue, very well.
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