Anishinabe

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Distribution of the Anishinaabe (g) tribal groups around 1800 (including the Ojibwa / Chippewa)
Ojibwa village near Sault Sainte Marie 1846, painting by Paul Kane
The wild rice is still one of the most important subsistence and market economy sources of income for the Anishinabe .

The Anishinabe ( Ojibwe ᐊᓂᔑᓈᐯ Anishinaabe ) are one of the largest Indian peoples in North America today . The name is used today in two different ways:

  1. In a broader sense - more correct in the plural - Anishinaabeg / Anishinabek ("First People", "Original People", or "Beings Created from Nothing") - the culturally and historically closely related tribes of the Algonquin , Nipissing , Mississauga , Potawatomi , Odawa , Oji-Cree (Severn Ojibwa), Saulteaux (Salteaux) and the Ojibwa (Chippewa) known as Anishinabe . They speak or spoke different variants and dialects of Anishinaabemowin / Ojibwemowin (ᐊᓂᔑᓈᐯᒧᐎᓐ), an Algonquin language .
  2. In a narrower sense - Anishinabe or Anishinaabe in the singular - is commonly only in Canada than Ojibwe or Ojibwa and in the USA as Chippewa designated tribe as well as its regional dialect and tribal groups of Mississauga and Saulteaux (Salteaux) Anishinabe referred. They used to refer to themselves as Ojibwe (plural: Ojibweg ), but now increasingly as Anishinabe .

This article aims to provide an overview of the cultural background and relationship of all the Anishinaabeg tribes - more detailed information on the individual tribes can be found under the respective articles. If the term Anishinabe is used, the tribe of the Ojibwe (Chippewa) is always meant.

The Anishinaabeg originally came from the region around the Great Lakes , later their traditional settlement area extended due to their expansion to the west and south-west during the fur trade from the Great Lakes over the southern Canadian Prairie Provinces to western Canada and the northern plains of the United States .

The majority of the Anishinaabeg live in Canada today, the rest mostly in the northeast of the USA. Among them, with around 335,000 tribal members, the Anishinabe are by far the largest group and are therefore among the largest Indian peoples in North America . The Anishinabe are organized in Canada in approx. 125 First Nations , which can be found from western Quebec to eastern British Columbia - there are approx. 77,940 Ojibwe (Chippewa); 76,760 Saulteaux (Salteaux) and 8770 Mississaugas - they are the second largest indigenous group among the First Nations after the Cree . According to the 2010 Census, there are also 170,742 Chippewa (Ojibwe) in the USA, who are organized in several federally recognized tribes and state recognized tribes, making them the fourth largest indigenous group among the tribes ( surpassed only by the Navajo , Cherokee and Lakota ) represent.

With its various regional dialects, Anishinaabemowin / Ojibwemowin (ᐊᓂᔑᓈᐯᒧᐎᓐ) is the second most widely spoken indigenous language in Canada (after Cree ) and the fourth most common in North America (after Navajo , Inuit and Cree). Today around 56,531 Anishinaabeg still speak their mother tongue , whereby the Anishinabe represent the largest group with around 33,000 native speakers .

Between 1680 and 1800 that began ethnicity of Anishinaabeg to expand to continue to occur inland in the fur trade as middlemen between the French and British and tribes; Now many groups set up their settlements, often near European trading posts, to supply trading companies with game , fish , rice , berries , fruits and pemmican , to serve as scouts , trappers and hunters , as well as the Europeans against enemy tribes (Dakota, Iroquois, Fox ua) to defend. Due to the need to adapt to the different tribal areas and the close contact in coexistence with the Europeans (with whom there were often mixed marriages, from which the Métis emerged ) they were divided into three groups in terms of cultural history:

  • Fishermen, elk and caribou hunters in the subarctic forests of central and northern Ontario; close to the Cree and today often mixed with them. This group is represented today by the Severn Ojibwa (Ojicree, Oji-Cree) with about 8,000 members (1999)
  • Bison hunters of the northern prairies; today West Ojibwa (Saulteaux, Plains Ojibwa or Bungi) west of Lake Winnipeg in Saskatchewan to some smaller groups in western British Columbia. With the extinction of the bison at the end of the 19th century, they lost their subsistence basis
  • Wild rice harvesters, hunters, fishermen and horticulturists between Lake Nipissing in the east and Lake Winnipeg in the west; today East Ojibwa, Central Ojibwa and Northwest Ojibwa. The latter include the dialects Saulteaux (Berens River Ojibwa), Lac Seul Ojibwa, Albany River Ojibwa, Lake of the Woods Ojibwa, and Rainy River Ojibwa

Some publications mention the northern Anishinabe hunters Ojibwa , the plains Ojibwa prairie hunters and the southern groups Chippewa .

Tribal name (ethnonym)

Historic photo of a group of Chippewa men from the Bad River

The name Anishinabe means "human beings". The origin of the word 'Ojibwe' is not yet clear. Edmund Danziger (1978) asserts that the name derive from Ozhibii'oweg ( "Those who keep records of a Vision" - Those who their stories in symbols hold '), the name of a neighboring tribe ago, while Frances Densmore (1929 ) takes the now generally accepted interpretation that 'Ojibwe' is a linguistic variant of 'Anishinaabeg' and comes from a verb that means 'toast until it curls' (an indication of the special nature of this Tribal to seal the seams of moccasins ). The omission of the O from O'chippewa (a variant of 'Ojibwe') in incorrect Euro-American documents later led to the emergence of the word Chippewa , which is still used today as an official name by the American government.

The Chipewyan tribe, on the other hand, has nothing to do with the Chippewa / Anishinabe, despite the similarity of the name, but belongs to the Athabascan ethnic group .

history

Bandolier bag in the permanent collection of the Children's Museum of Indianapolis, probably made for a child circa 1900

Together with the Ottawa and Potawatomi , before the arrival of the Europeans, the Anishinabe formed the tribal confederation of the Council of the Three Fires , which lived in the area of ​​the east coast of the USA and the Saint Lawrence River and stood up to the Iroquois League.

Euro-American historiography generally assumes that the Anishinabe migrated from their original habitat to the area west of Lake Huron and east of Lake Superior (now Michigan) in the late 16th and early 17th centuries . From the Anishinabe in the strict sense, the Potawatomi, who settled on the lower peninsula of the state of Michigan , and the Ottawa, who settled on Lake Nipissing in the northern part of the province of Ontario, separated there. These two tribes are now considered to be independent peoples.

According to their own legend, they followed a sacred object, the so-called "miigis" shell, which had emerged from the ocean. It contained the order of the spirit world to lead the Anishinabe people to a new land "where food grows in the water" (wild rice). After the arrival of the Indians at their destination, the mussel was shown to the Anishinabe for the last time and has not been sighted since. The location of this last revelation is usually given as Mooningwanekaning (Madeline Island) in Anishinaabe Gichigami ( Upper Lake ).

Under the influence of the fur trade - which soon played a major role in their culture - they spread very widely in all directions. Since their most important trading partners were the French, they fought on their side against the English in the four North American colonial wars. Some groups moved further west and in the late 18th century drove the Dakota out of what is now the state of Minnesota .

By 1840 they had settled in the area north of Lake Superior and Lake Huron, as well as parts of Minnesota, North Dakota , Wisconsin , Manitoba, and Saskatchewan . From 1850 to 1923 the British signed a series of land use agreements with various Anishinabe tribes in Canada. In the USA, the establishment of reservations began in 1854, which resulted in increasing assimilation in American society with a departure from traditional economic methods (see also: cultural change ) .

Cultural background

Pictographic signs of the Ojibwa

All Anishinabe cultures were based to a greater or lesser extent on hunting, fishing and gathering . While the bison hunters of the prairies and the elk and caribou hunters of the Nordic forests were pure game and field hunters, the inhabitants of the lake areas did little to horticulture (maize, pumpkin, beans) and, above all, the harvest of wild rice (Zizania aquatica) and Add maple sap.

Birch bark played an important role in the culture of materials : The mostly dome-shaped wigwams , canoes and numerous everyday objects were made from it. In addition, pictographic characters were carved into the bark, which were used in rituals as mnemonic aids in telling myths.

Social organization

Petition of various Ojibwa chiefs from the Wisconsin River from 1849 to the US President in 1849. It concerns two broken contracts. The tribes shown here are represented by the totems marten, bear, human and catfish as well as the crane as the founding clan. The lines show the bond between the clans and their lake area
Ojibwa spearfisher 1908

Before contact with European fur traders, there existed countless, relatively egalitarian (equal) and acephalous (domination-free) local groups that were only connected to one another by a patrilineal (paternal inheritance), totemic clan system: every person was born as a member of one of dozen exogamous clans , the distinguished from each other by animal names ( totems ) (term from the Ojibwe language of ototeman , also derived from odoodeman = siblings by blood). These in turn were subordinate to six founding clans who traced their origins back to six supersensible, anthropomorphic primeval beings. This created a "family" cohesion on the one hand and protection against incest on the other , because it was forbidden to enter into sexual relationships with people of the same clan (see also: totemism ) .

The northern Ojibwa lived like their neighbors the Cree in small hordes of a maximum of one hundred people until the 1930s.

The groups in the area from the Great Lakes to Lake Winnipeg consisted of 300 to 400 people, who were divided into 15 to 23 clans. Only in the summer months did some of these semi-sedentary Chippewa groups move into a common camp in one place, while they lived separately in the winter months. Only the contact with the Europeans led to a segmental tribalism with chiefs who inherited their position in the paternal line. Although these chiefs were highly regarded, their power was limited and they could be removed at any time.

The social status of a man depended on his performance as a warrior, although the Ojibwa to the peace-loving peoples included.

The main point of reference of the Anishinabe Indians was the nuclear family of parents, children and grandparents. Due to the long, heavy winters in Canada and the northern United States and the need to traverse large swaths of land in search of food, there were isolated, isolated households that only kept contact with the closest neighbors and where several generations lived in a tent, the norm. In the summer such households formed small villages consisting of 10 to 12 families.

"Non-destructive-aggressive societies"

The social psychologist Erich Fromm used ethnographic records to analyze 30 pre-state peoples, including the Anishinabe, for their willingness to use violence as part of his work Anatomy of Human Destructiveness . He finally assigned them to the “non-destructive-aggressive societies”, whose cultures are characterized by a sense of community with pronounced individuality (status, success, rivalry), targeted child-rearing, regulated manners, privileges for men and, above all, male tendencies to aggression - but without destructive ones Tendencies (destructive rage, cruelty, greed for murder, etc.) - are marked. (see also: "War and Peace" in pre-state societies )

Religion, cosmology and totemism

Herbalist ( Wabeno ) preparing medicine

Dreams and their encrypted messages have always played a special role in the beliefs of the Anishinabe. They were seen more real than reality. The ethnic religion of the Anishinabe was both individually animistic and common in hunter cultures - i.e. H. everything was considered to be animated, occupied by good or bad spirits - as well as by complex communal rituals and forms of expression, as is customary for agricultural cultures (strictly speaking, one would have to speak of different religions in the residential areas prairie, northern forests and lake areas, since the focal points and cults differ approximated the respective cultural areas ). For the northern Ojibwa animals, trees, sun, moon, stones (which appeared in dreams), metal kettles or tobacco pipes were regarded as "thinking and acting persons" like humans. In addition, all of these beings can take on very different shapes. A special expression of religion among all Algonquian peoples is the idea of ​​the pantheistic "world spirit" Man'ido .

Everyday life was not separate from religion, that is, things of faith played an important role in all activities. Each tribe member had a “personal guardian spirit ” (nigouimes, not totem!) In the form of an animal, a plant or a mineral that was acquired during a personal search for a vision . When hunting, special rituals ( taboo ) had to be observed in order to reconcile the spirits of the dead animals.

The spirits regularly had to be made positive with prayers, tobacco rituals or with the help of the shamans . For these last-named spiritual experts, who were also responsible for the preservation of myths , rites and traditional knowledge as well as for the healing of the sick (see also: Shamanism ) , there was a far-reaching differentiation among the Ojibwa: On the one hand there were the simple spiritual healers ( Kusbindugeyu ), who localized sick spirits under the clatter and song and "sucked out" them with hollow bones and who were also herbalists. Then there were the specialists for mental illnesses ( Djiskiu ), as well as for lost souls or things that fell into a trance in a special tent through prayer, singing and noises and made the tent vibrate (“Shaking tent”). In addition, there were various ritual societies that consisted of several initiates with different tasks and ranks. The Wabanowin League ("Dance to the East") healed certain illnesses through magical practices. The largest and most complex medicine association was called Midéwiwin . Depending on their level of training, its members acquired skills in contact with spirits and, under the guidance of priest-like functionaries, learned special dances and rites, for example the so-called power transmission rites in the shape of a shell. The ritual death and subsequent rebirth were central, but the Midéwiwin adepts were also given extensive knowledge of various healing methods.

Todays situation

Ojibwa girls in the bell dress dance at Spokane Pow Wow on August 26, 2007

The majority of the American Anishinabe now lives in seven Indian reservations in Minnesota, five reservations in Wisconsin and one reservation in North Dakota as well as in several large cities, especially the twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul on the upper reaches of the Mississippi River . Through various legal and illegal incidents, the Anishinabe have lost much of their reserve land to this day. The Leech Lake Anishinabe in Minnesota, which today owns less than seven percent of their contracted land, is particularly hard hit by the loss of land . The former Anishinabe country is mainly used by the Euro-Americans for electricity production (dam) and for timber industry.

As with most Indians, there is also a very high unemployment rate among the Chippewa (often over 50%) and incomes are low. Many of them have therefore migrated to the big cities. In addition, however, all reservations in Michigan and Wisconsin have good casinos or bingo halls . The large reserves also operate businesses in agriculture and forestry, outdoor tourism as well as commercial wild rice harvesting and fishing. Fur hunting ( trapping ) still plays an important role in Canadian forests . In addition to the market economy activities, there and in the near-natural reserves of the USA are still hunted, fished, collected and wild rice harvested for self-sufficiency . In Michigan and Canada, the Indians officially have hunting and gathering rights. There these subsistence activities are subject to modern management by the reserves in order to avoid overexploitation.

Although the US Supreme Court granted the Chippewa of Wisconsin the right to night fishing with lamps (formerly torches) in 1983, the police now and again have to protect them from attacks by racist whites who are vocal and sometimes violent against fishing protest.

Preservation and modification of culture

Kei-a-gis-gis, an Ojibwa woman, painting by George Catlin , 1832

“When you stop looking around in nature, you also stop learning what the natural course of things is. […] We look around quite a bit, find their rhythm, their heartbeat and adapt our steps accordingly. Concrete has no rhythm and steel cannot breathe. When you spend your time in the forest and in this land, you learn to live the way of forest and land. With the natural course of things. With the course of the universe. If you pass the time between steel and concrete, you learn to live according to their way. "

- Richard Wagamese, Anishinabe writer

The Anishinabe are one of the few North American peoples who still have a living ethnic identity : the Ojibwa language is taught in schools, various collaborations (often from women's associations) are actively committed to the preservation of culture, art and language as well as a Sustainable marketing of the traditional products wild rice, maple syrup and handicrafts ( re-indigenization ) . Some spiritual practices and shamanic covenants still exist - albeit to a much lesser extent - with all Anishinabe groups, although most people are officially Christian. Since the beginning of the 21st century, the revitalization of ritual traditions has intensified.

In individual villages, the “Woodland School” - an original painting with traditional motifs - has developed over the past few years, which is appreciated by Americans and offers good income opportunities.

Personalities of the Anishinabe

Winona LaDuke, probably the most famous ojibwa

See also

Movie

  • The silent film The Silent Enemy, shot in 1928/29, tells of the life of the Anishinabe long before the whites colonized the North American continent. It was produced by Douglas Burden and William Chanler back then, knowing that the Indian cultures of North America and their traditional way of life are threatened with extinction. The story is based on the records of Jesuit missionaries who were the first whites to contact the Anishinabe. The film was shot on location in northern Ontario. More than 250 men, actors and team worked for over a year, often at temperatures below minus 30 degrees. The filming locations could only be reached by canoe in summer and only with dog sledding in winter. Clothing, canoes, tepees, weapons and tools have been faithfully reproduced, so that the film paints an authentic picture of the life of the Anishinabe in the pre-Columbian era.

literature

  • Gerald Vizenor: The everlasting sky: New voices from the people named the Chippewa. Crowell-Collier Press, New York 1972.
  • Basil Johnston: Ojibway heritage. McClelland and Stewart, Toronto 1976.
  • Edmund J. Danziger Jr .: The Chippewa of Lake Superior. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman 1978.
  • Frances Densmore : Chippewa customs. Minnesota Historical Society Press, St. Paul 1979. (originally published 1929).
  • Gerald Vizenor: Summer in the spring: Ojibwe lyric poems and tribal stories. The Nodin Press, Minneapolis 1981.
  • John A. Grim: The shaman: Patterns of religious healing among the Ojibway Indians. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman 1983.
  • Gerald Vizenor: The people named the Chippewa: Narrative histories. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis 1984.
  • Thomas Vennum Jr .: Wild Rice among the Ojibway People. Minnesota Historical Society Press, St. Paul 1988.
  • Basil Johnston: And Manitu created the world - myths and visions of Ojibwa. Diederichs, 1994.
  • Wub-e-ke-niew: We have the right to exist: A translation of aboriginal indigenous thought. The first book ever published from an Ahnishinahbæótjibway perspective. Black Thistle Press, New York 1995.
  • JD Nichols, E. Nyholm: A concise dictionary of Minnesota Ojibwe. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis 1995.
  • Lawrence W. Gross: The comic vision of Anishinaabe culture and religion. In: American Indian Quarterly , 26, pp. 436-459, 2002.
  • Hartmut Krech (ed.): Life descriptions of two Anishinabe women. In: Indian life. Indian women and men tell their lives. Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2009, pp. 175-204.
  • Winona LaDuke: Last Standing Woman. An Indian saga from 1862–2018 . Frederking and Thaler, Munich 2000, ISBN 978-3-89405-113-6

Web links

Commons : Ojibwa  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Anishinaabeg or Anishinabek
  2. ^ Anishinaabe Nations by State or Province / Anishinaabe Akiing ( Memento from May 10, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
  3. ^ Carl Waldman: Encyclopedia of Native American Tribes. 3rd edition, Checkmark Books, New York (USA) 2006, ISBN 978-0-8160-6273-7 . Pp. 65-66.
  4. ↑ a b c d e f Ojibwa . In: Hartmut Motz: Languages ​​and Peoples of the Earth - Linguistic-Ethnographic Lexicon. Volume 2. Projects-Verlag Cornelius, Halle 2007, ISBN 978-3-86634-368-9 , pp. 392–395.
  5. ↑ Eastern Woodland Hunters on firstpeoplesofcanada.com
  6. ↑ Ojibwe History on tolatsga.org
  7. ^ The Children's Museum of Indianapolis in the English language Wikipedia
  8. ↑ Bertram Verhaag (director) Claus Biegert : The thunderbird woman. Winona LaDuke. DENKmal Filmgesellschaft, Munich 2003.
  9. ↑ a b c d Barry M. Pritzker: A Native American Encyclopedia. History, Culture and Peoples. Oxford University Press, New York 2000, ISBN 978-0-19-513877-1 , pp. 406-412.
  10. ↑ Gerhard Kubik: Totemism: ethnopsychological research materials and interpretations from East and Central Africa 1962-2002. Volume 2 of: Studies on ethnopsychology and ethnopsychoanalysis . LIT Verlag, Münster 2004, ISBN 3-8258-6023-X , pp. 4–9.
  11. ^ A b c Mariko Namba Walter, Eva Jane Neumann Fridman (Ed.): Shamanism - An Encyclopedia of World Beliefs, Practices, and Culture. Vol. 1, ABC-CLIO, Santa Barbara (USA) 2004, ISBN 1-57607-645-8 , pp. 334-336.
  12. ↑ Erich Fromm: Anatomy of human destructiveness . From the American by Liselotte et al. Ernst Mickel, 86th - 100th thousand edition, Rowohlt, Reinbek near Hamburg 1977, ISBN 3-499-17052-3 , pp. 191-192.
  13. ↑ Christian F. Feest : Animated Worlds - The religions of the Indians of North America. In: Small Library of Religions , Vol. 9, Herder, Freiburg / Basel / Vienna 1998, ISBN 3-451-23849-7 . Pp. 15, 60-61.
  14. ↑ Nils Olav Breivik: Høygud og bearer of culture. To Werner Müller's förståelse av de central skogsindianeres religioner. In: Religionsvidenskabeligt Tidsskrift. No. 12, 1988, pp. 3-24, especially pp. 5-6.
  15. ↑ Horst Südkamp: Cultural and Historical Studies: Totemism: Institution or Illusion? (PDF) Yumpu.com, p. 33; accessed on January 23, 2015.
  16. ↑ Christian F. Feest: Animated Worlds - The religions of the Indians of North America. In: Small Library of Religions , Vol. 9, Herder, Freiburg / Basel / Vienna 1998, ISBN 3-451-23849-7 . P. 139.
  17. ↑ Richard Wagamese: Guardian of the Drum. Schneekluth, Augsburg 1997. p. 62.
  18. ↑ HP Carver: The Silent Enemy  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. at arte.tv@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.arte.tv