Of course Navajo insight is more than welcome, but most skinwalker info those non-indigenous of us have comes from the Navajo. 600+ years ago there was a war between Utes and Navajo after which the Navajo conducted a widescale witch hunt and burning, based on their belief that many Utes were skinwalkers/evil shamans/witches. As someone who has been marginalized my entire life, in part because of my interest in the paranormal and strange phenomena from at least the age of 2 (now 58), I'm always interested in learning the other sides of a story, or perspective before forming any sort of opinion. How do the rest of the indigenous peoples feel about skinwalkers?
This is a long shot, but are there any local groups for native/indigenous persons? It’s very hard to connect here.
In this post, I am using the word "Creole" to refer to the small multiracial tribes which formed in marginal hinterlands — deep forested mountains and marshlands typically — throughout the Americas during the XV~XIX centuries. They each tended to be composed of some mixture of Whites of marginal or low status in the colonies, runaway slaves (Maroons), some of whom never fully de-Africanized, and Native Americans. Sometimes there was a smattering of Middle Eastern, Romani, or Pacific Island ancestry as well, depending on the location along international trade routes. These small tribes tended to be unaware of each other, each speak a distinctive creole dialect, and keep a distinctive mixed set of traditions, both spiritual and secular. They tended to be illiterate and not formally schooled, with creole dialects that were entirely unwritten. They were universally feared and shunned by White colonists, and for the most part kept to themselves. Most of these creole communities were quite wary of outsiders until recently, and were endogamous after their initial formation. Most were never numerous, their settlements tending to range in population from a few hundred to tens of thousands at any given time.
Most such Creole peoples, as I call them, have both emic and etic names that are a corruption of some language's word for "mixed": Melungeons, Maroons, Cimmarons, Seminoles, Mixtis, Santees, Jackson Whites, Lumbees, Métis, and many more. I understand that the word Creole is controversial, and varies widely in its social acceptability throughout the Americas. But I have yet to encounter a preferred catch-all term for such groups of people, who are products of the Colonial Age. Please enlighten me if you know one.
I understand "indigenous people" to be defined thusly:
- Their nation formed in land controlled by their state, and has continually inhabited this land since before their state's control of it.
- There is no state officially dedicated to advancing their nation's interests.
Any nation of people emically or etically called "Native Americans" or "American Indians" fits the above definition beyond question. But so do a lot of these Creole peoples. Many of these Creole peoples, even those with little or no Native American genetic input, formed as distinct ethnic groups well before July 4, 1776, on land that became part of the United States of America that day. These peoples became American citizens that day, theoretically. But I think most members of t
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Cult Led by Predominately White Old Men Tries to Further Erase the Culture and Native Wisdom of People of Indigenous Heritage
There. Fixed it.
Hope that make sense. I come from a Caribbean family and I’ve seen a more “Taino” movements in PR and the DR.
Sadly, the vast majority of Taino groups are completely fraudulent. They make up traditions, play “Taino” music, and dress themselves in “indigenous” clothing and face paint. Much of this is just them copying other indigenous groups in the Americans. I’ve seen some wear war bonnets. Many claim they have a grandma that’s “full blooded Taino” despite that being literally not possible. They claim they deserve native status like other native groups in the US. It’s really something.
Do you have something similar in your country?
Palm oil companies have destroyed over a million acres of land in Indonesia. And there have been natives fighting for their ancestral land since 2014, and they finally got an Indonesian court's attention, which made the decision not to reinstate 24 large palm oil companies' permits. This, to me, is a bittersweet victory. It took them almost eight years, and a loss of a million acres of land to get their voices heard finally. Here is the article. The ruling happened on Dec 8th of 2021. Indonesian court rules to save Indigenous ancestral lands from palm oil companies’ exploitation
