Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Small world and women drumming.....

Back in the days of my psych class we were taught something that had never dawned on me, once I got  bit more out into the world and different parts of the country , I began to see it more and more. When you are young and learn something, anything, you assume that this is how it is everywhere with everyone. You think every part of the country does things the same way, eats the same foods, thinks the same thing. It doesn't. We currently have so many ways of traveling around the country, we can be on opposite coasts in a matter of hours, where it took our ancestors months. We have mass media, social media, and we can talk to a human in another part of the world just by dialing a phone or checking Skype.The world is getting smaller.

Imagine how our ancestors had things. They may have learned different ways of doing things, new foods to grow, and new celebrations as time went on, but it took decades for those things to happen. There wasn't any quick and easy way until the mid to late 1800's, and the speed of things today is mind blowing compared to that.

There was a lot of discussion yesterday about drumming after coming off of a pow wow weekend. There is a great misconception out there that it is traditional for men only to drum. That is a HUGE misconception. I grew up learning that women were equal (if not actually having more status), in my family's tribes. Our tribes were mixed, there were a lot of people in a small area, and they loved each other, killed each other, captured each other, and married both indigenous people and outsiders. We were the melting pot before the US was a melting pot. Yet what my grandmother taught me , and what I had seen first hand was that women were the ones who did everything, so did men. The society was matrilineal , so the woman's bloodlines were followed. We had great women leaders and even women who led war parties, like Weetamoo. We had women healers. There was no "this is a man's job", or "this is woman's work". My grandmother and her sisters knew much history and had passed it down through the women of the family. I didn't get to spend much time with her, she was miles away with my Dad's side of the family, a man my Mother divorced before I was born. Yet, she passed on much of her knowledge in that short time.

When I traveled to other parts of the country I did notice that some people had a different view of things, but let's talk drumming. Most of the people I met off of the east coast when I moved to NV, and NM didn't have big drums. They used hand drums. Think about it. Not much wood and large hides available in the desert are there? It was part of that realization that not everyone is the same, even similar people. When I met a Navajo medicine woman, she and I talked about much metaphysical, and never really got into the "pow wow" part of things, but she had hand drum that was made of cottonwood , it was beautiful. A friend later gave me a cottonwood drum.

I never in all my association with people from several nations and many tribes, heard a word of women not being allowed to do something until I landed in Indiana. I assumed it was the local way of things. It didn't really matter all that much, I was not about to toss my ancestors in the garbage for local beliefs, beliefs that really for the most part, aren't even local, but from Plains tribes. I work in spiritual endeavors each day, so my motto is "to each his own". I always respected other people's ways, because my travels and friendships with many tribes, I knew that no one did things the same.  There may be similarities, or you can see where one tribe adapted another tribe's ways (like the Lakota adopting the Ute Sundance and making it an important and integral part of their ways). Yet there was always the local twist. Most of the "twists" came from what was available to the people.  We didn't all live in tipis becasue we were not all nomads, nor had the huge buffalo hides needed to make one. This is just one example of what we learned in the movies, isn't so. Native people out west where John Wayne roamed the buttes, didn't live in tipis like in the movies. But I digress.....

We always drummed and learned songs that I barely remember pieces of. Heck, I barely remember pieces of ones I learned last week....but it was the way it was. I read all the books by James R Walker who lived with and was adopted by the Lakota in the 1800's. He wrote extensively of all the rituals, beliefs, and traditions, and never said "no women on a drum" anywhere. Women on their moon were not allowed to touch any ritual object, including a drum, but that was only when they were on their moon.

Once I started looking into trying to find out why women were supposedly not always allowed on the drum locally, I could only find from research the northern/ southern style indicator. Northern style  allows women at the drum, southern does not, they can sing, but stand behind the men. I then learned that this difference was modern, it was a style way of looking at things and really had nothing to do with where the tribe existed, as far as geographical location.

When I get stuck, I always try to get a hold of my elusive aunt. I think she is a wandering Lakota at heart because I can never get her at home....she doesn't have a drop of Lakota blood, but she sure is out and about a lot. I asked her yesterday about women on the drum, and she said...what do you mean, what kind of silly question is that? A question like that to here is like "Do you get wet when it rains?" It is most likely to be answered with a "duh".  She said that women don't drum as much as they just have other things they want to do, but no one tells them they cannot or should not, and that is our way. Always has been, always will. She told me to look up a "Shannon someone" who talks about current research.

Looking up a "Shannon someone" isn't easy, but I found it.  Apparently current research shows it really never was a rule that women were not allowed at the drum. They were always at the drum, keeping the drum, singing the songs, keeping the songs. They didn't sit on the drum much after a while just out of personal preference, and then it suddenly got switched from  "don't want to much" to  "they are not allowed to" in the 1970's. Did the native nation all get together and pass a law saying women were not to drum? No, it never happened. Like many rumors, it took hold, and stories were formed to make it be a "man's right". It never was to begin with.

Those of us who grew up knowing better, always wondered at why there were beliefs that a woman didn't belong at a drum. I blame it on the movies made in the 40's and 50's. We were a Man's Nation at that time, and I think some people started thinking Hollywood knew more about Indians than Native Peoples. Some figured it was tribal difference, and those may have actually existed, but there was NEVER a blanket belief that women were not allowed to drum. NEVER. There really is not a blanket Native belief period. When something is tradition, it is Navajo tradition, or Lakota tradition, or Cree tradition, not Native tradition, there is no blanket NA policy on "this is the way it will be and always has been". That doesn't exist , never did. If anyone EVER tells you , "that is Native American tradition" they are totally incorrect. That concept and reality doesn't exist.

The research showed that in the 1970's men started with the "no women at the drum anywhere" talk and it was adopted by many. The people who always had a bunch of women who drummed just shook their heads, and kept drumming, but certain people bought into it, and all of a sudden we had northern and southern style drums. We still do not have a "no women at the drum rule" for the Native community as a whole, that never came to be. Tribes held on to their traditions, and became known as "northern drums". They certainly aren't all in the north either.

So as our small world that existed in the 70's ever expands and new researchers are talking to elders who are over 80 years old, they realized there was never a "no woman at the drum" rule. There may have been a  particular ceremony where the women didn't drum, or the men didn't do a certain task, but there was never a blanket rule about drumming.

There was never a rule about women not drumming in the northeast, and much of the southeast. There weren't even big drums in many tribes out west.

When people have a mistaken belief that they have had for years, it is hard to erase it or change it overnight. My aunt's "are you kidding me",  response made me laugh, I realized to her I sounded like I was saying something akin to "Is my husband allowed to walk through the kitchen?". I must have sounded slightly insane to her.

A quote from the research:
 Northeastern tribes have a long history of women involved in all aspects of ceremonial life, dances, and tribal leadership.  Women are considered the original song givers and played the drum for their people.  Thus, no one can say that Northeastern women have no place to sit the drum.

The pendulum always swings back to center, to truth, to the way it needs to be, and it has been for a few years now, yet there are still people out there that believe someone, somewhere, at one time back in their tribal history said "no women at the drum ever", and in most cases, they are incorrect.

The more important part of this is that when someone else has a different tradition (and they will!), you respect it, you honor it, and you allow them to do their thing their tribal way. You take a step to the side and allow them to peacefully participate without telling them they are wrong or cannot do that. The NA community is varied and has as many different traditions as there are languages.

Like I said yesterday, think about the joke...How many Indians does it take to screw in a light bulb? I think the best answer is "how many tribes are there?"

Always allow room for the ways of others, including people from every part of this world. This is 2012, it is not "my way or the highway", it is not about saying "my tradition is better than yours". There are thousands of cultures on this planet. There are hundreds of belief systems, let each person do what is their way without interference.

Never limit yourself , be open and aware of other people's lifestyles, beliefs, and ways. Just because you learned something as a child, doesn't mean that it is the way it is for EVERYONE! This small world is getting smaller , don't be squeezed out!

Happy drumming!!!




Peshaui Wequashimese



(C)2012 Dr R M Wolf. May not be used, copied or reproduced without prior written permission


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