Native Americans

[cwelsch]

Everybody says they're like 1/32 Cherokee because a long time ago the Cherokee were the most "civilized" tribe and the most socially acceptable.  I don't dispute that anyone is, I just know it's highly exaggerated, and that tons of Americans, especially past the eastern time zone, are like 1/64th Cherokee or something.

I don't know how anyone could be 45% anything, it has to come down to 2 or 4 or 8 or 16, etc., unless you use rounding.


Native American is the mainstream term, American Indian is the distant second place but I've heard many use that term for themselves (eg the American Indian Movement or AIM).  We basically never say aborigine or aboriginal.  Aborigine in America means the Australian ones, and very few Americans know the Canadian term aboriginal.  Some don't care at all, you can say Indian, Injun, whatever.  Red Indian is only said by old people in cliches, and would very likely get a few stares or even a look of surprise.

The Native American habit is to abstain from politics.  Considering the Cherokee sued and won in the Supreme Court for the right to keep their land but Jackson ignored it, then there was a subsequent series of failures, betrayals and then a heaping dose of condescension and welfare, you can't blame 'em.  They're like 1% of the population, almost entirely on reservations.

The only three political Native Americans I can think of right now are:

- Leonard Peltier, who shot some FBI agents in Minnesota or South Dakota and is still in prison.
- Ben Nighthorse Campbell, the GOP Senator from Colorado who was first elected to the Senate as a Democrat.
- Russell Means, a contender for the 1988 Libertarian presidential nomination.


Plus Bob Barker is 100% Lakota (Sioux) or Cherokee.  I think they prefer, ideally, to be called by their tribal name.

And you have to be careful, most tribes had no name for themselves, so explorers got their names from surrounding tribes.  Since the tribes were often bitter, resentful or at war, the names for the neighboring groups were insults.  "Sioux" actually means snake, little adder or cutthroat, and metaphorically means enemy, so we were calling them Enemy to their face, thinking it was benign.  They each prefer Lakota, Dakota, Nakota and
Wahpeton instead of Sioux.

And Eskimo was a vulgar insult, I think.  They prefer Yupik/Inupiat/Inuit depending on which tribe they are.