Native American Women :: American America History

Native American WomenOn few subjects has there been such continual misconception as on the position of women among Indians. Because she was active, always engross in the camp, often carried heavy burdens, attended to the household duties, made the clothing and the home, and prep bed the family food, the woman has been depicted as the slave of her husband, a patient creature of encumbrance whose labors were never done. The man, on the other hand, was said to be an loaf, who all day long sat in the shade of the lodge and smoked his pipe, maculation his overworked wives attended to his comfort. In actuality, the woman was the mans partner, who preformed her share of the obligations of life and who employed an influence quite as important as his, and often more powerful.Native Americans complete primary relationships either through a clan system, descent from a common ancestor, or through a friendship system, much like tribal societies in other parts of the world. In the Choctaw nati on, Moieties were subdivided into several nontotemic, exogamous, matrilineal kindred clans, called iksa. (Faiman-Silva, 1997, p.8) The Cheyenne tirbe also traced their ancestry through the womans lineage. Moore (1996, p. 154) shows this when he says Such marriages, where the groomcomes to live in the brides band, are called matrilocal. Leacock (1971, p. 21) reveals that ...prevailing opinion is that hunting societies would be patrilocal.... Matrilineality, it is assumed, followed the emergence of agriculture.... Leacock (p. 21) then stated that she had found the Montagnais-Naskapi, a hunting society, had been matrilocal until Europeans stepped in. The Tanoan Pueblos kinship system is bilateral. The household either is of the nuclear sheath or is extended to include relatives of one or both parents.... (Dozier, 1971, p. 237) The statuses and roles for men and women varied considerably among Native Americans, depending on each tribes cultural orientations. In matrilineal and matril ocal societies, women had considerable power because property, housing, land, and tools, belonged to them. Because property usually passed from mother to daughter, and the husband joined his wifes family, he was more of a stranger and yielded authority to his wifes eldest brother. As a result, the husband was unlikely to become an authoritative, domineering figure. Moreover, among such peoples as the Cherokee, Iroquois, and Pueblo, a disgruntled wife, secure in her possessions, could simply divorce her husband by tossing his prop out of their residence.