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African and Native Americans have interacted for centuries. The earliest record of Native American and African contact occurred in April 1502, when Spanish colonists transported the first Africans to Hispaniola to serve as slaves.[191] Buffalo Soldiers, 1890. The nickname was given to the "Black Cavalry" by the Native American tribes they fought. Sometimes Native Americans resented the presence of African Americans.[192] The "Catawaba tribe in 1752 showed great anger and bitter resentment when an African American came among them as a trader".[192] To gain favor with Europeans, the Cherokee exhibited the strongest color prejudice of all Native Americans.[192] He contends that because of European fears of a unified revolt of Native Americans and African Americans, the colonists encouraged hostility between the ethnic groups: "Whites sought to convince Native Americans that African Americans worked against their best interests."[193] In 1751, South Carolina law stated: "The carrying of Negroes among the Indians has all along been thought detrimental, as an intimacy ought to be avoided."[194] In addition, in 1758 the governor of South Carolina James Glen wrote: it has always been the policy of this government to create an aversion in them Indians to Negroes.[195] Europeans considered both races inferior and made efforts to make both Native Americans and Africans enemies.[196] Native Americans were rewarded if they returned escaped slaves, and African Americans were rewarded for fighting in the late 19th-century Indian Wars.[196][197][198] Ras K'Dee, Pomo-Kenyan singer and editor from California "Native Americans, during the transitional period of Africans becoming the primary race enslaved, were enslaved at the same time and shared a common experience of enslavement. They worked together, lived together in communal quarters, produced collective recipes for food, shared herbal remedies, myths and legends, and in the end they intermarried."[199] Because of a shortage of men due to warfare, many tribes encouraged marriage between the two groups, to create stronger, healthier children from the unions.[200] In the 18th century, many Native American women married freed or runaway African men due to a decrease in the population of men in Native American villages.[196] Records show that many Native American women bought African men but, unknown to the European sellers, the women freed and married the men into their tribe.[196] When African men married or had children by a Native American woman, their children were born free, because the mother was free (according to the principle of partus sequitur ventrem, which the colonists incorporated into law).[196] European colonists often required the return of runaway slaves to be included as a provision in treaties with American Indians. In 1726, the British Governor of New York exacted a promise from the Iroquois to return all runaway slaves who had joined up with them.[201] In the mid-1760s, the government requested the Huron and Delaware to return runaway slaves, but there was no record of slaves having been returned.[202] Colonists placed ads about runaway slaves. While numerous tribes used captive enemies as servants and slaves, they also often adopted younger captives into their tribes to replace members who had died. In the Southeast, a few Native American tribes began to adopt a slavery system similar to that of the American colonists, buying African American slaves, especially the Cherokee, Choctaw, and Creek. Though less than 3% of Native Americans owned slaves, divisions grew among the Native Americans over slavery.[203] Among the Cherokee, records show that slave holders in the tribe were largely the children of European men that had shown their children the economics of slavery.[197] As European colonists took slaves into frontier areas, there were more opportunities for relationships between African and Native American peoples.[196] Based on the work of geneticists, a PBS series on African Americans explained that while most African Americans are racially mixed, it is relatively rare that they have Native American ancestry.[204][205] According to the PBS series, the most common "non-black" mix is English and Scots-Irish.[204][205] However, the Y-chromosome and mtDNA (mitochondrial DNA) testing processes for direct-line male and female ancestors can fail to pick up the heritage of many ancestors. (Some critics thought the PBS series did not sufficiently explain the limitations of DNA testing for assessment of heritage.)[206] Another study suggests that relatively few Native Americans have African-American heritage.[207] A study reported in The American Journal of Human Genetics stated, "We analyzed the European genetic contribution to 10 populations of African descent in the United States (Maywood, Illinois; Detroit; New York; Philadelphia; Pittsburgh; Baltimore; Charleston, South Carolina; New Orleans; and Houston) ... mtDNA haplogroups analysis shows no evidence of a significant maternal Amerindian contribution to any of the 10 populations."[208] A few writers persist in the myth that most African Americans have Native American heritage.[209] DNA testing has limitations and should not be depended on by individuals to answer all their questions about heritage.[206][210] So far, such testing cannot distinguish among the many distinct Native American tribes. No tribes accept DNA testing to satisfy their differing qualifications for membership, usually based on documented blood quantum or descent from ancestor(s) listed on the Dawes Rolls.[211] Native American adoption of African slavery Further information: Cherokee freedmen controversy Native Americans interacted with enslaved Africans and African Americans on many levels. Over time all the cultures interacted. Native Americans began slowly to adopt white culture.[196] Native Americans in the South shared some experiences with Africans, especially during the period, primarily in the 17th century, when both were enslaved. The colonists along the Atlantic Coast had begun enslaving Native Americans to ensure a source of labor. At one time the slave trade was so extensive that it caused increasing tensions with the various Algonquian tribes, as well as the Iroquois. Based in New York and Pennsylvania, they had threatened to attack colonists on behalf of the related Iroquoian Tuscarora before they migrated out of the South in the early 1700s.[199] In the 1790s, Benjamin Hawkins was assigned as the U.S. agent to the southeastern tribes, who became known as the Five Civilized Tribes for their adoption of numerous Anglo-European practices. He advised the tribes to take up slaveholding to aid them in European-style farming and plantations. He thought their traditional form of slavery, which had looser conditions, was less efficient than chattel slavery.[195] In the 19th century, some members of these tribes who were more closely associated with settlers, began to purchase African-American slaves for workers. They adopted some European-American ways to benefit their people. From the late 1700s to the 1860s, the Five Civilized Tribes were involved in the institution of African slavery as planters.[212] For example, Cherokee leader Joseph Vann owned more than 100 slaves. The proportion of Cherokee families who owned slaves did not exceed ten percent, and was comparable to the percentage among white families across the South, where a slaveholding elite owned most of the laborers.[213] The writer William Loren Katz contends that Native Americans treated their slaves better than did the typical white American in the Deep South.[203] Though less than 3% of Native Americans owned slaves, bondage created destructive cleavages among those who were slaveholders. Among the Five Civilized Tribes, mixed-race slaveholders were generally part of an elite hierarchy, often based on their mothers' clan status, as the societies had matrilineal systems. As did Benjamin Hawkins, European fur traders and colonial officials tended to marry high-status women, in strategic alliances seen to benefit both sides. The Choctaw, Creek and Cherokee believed they benefited from stronger alliances with the traders and their societies.[citation needed] The women's sons gained their status from their mother's families; they were part of hereditary leadership lines who exercised power and accumulated personal wealth in their changing Native American societies. The historian Greg O'Brien calls them the Creole generation to show that they were part of a changing society.[citation needed] The chiefs of the tribes believed that some of the new generation of mixed-race, bilingual chiefs would lead their people into the future and be better able to adapt to new conditions influenced by European Americans.[203] Proposals for Indian Removal heightened the tensions of cultural changes, due to the increase in the number of mixed-race Native Americans in the South. Full bloods, who tended to live in areas less affected by colonial encroachment, generally worked to maintain traditional ways, including control of communal lands. While the traditional members often resented the sale of tribal lands to Anglo-Americans, by the 1830s they agreed it was not possible to go to war with the colonists on this issue. Who are Native Americans? Further information: Native American identity in the United States and Cherokee freedmen controversy Admixture and genetics Members of the Creek (Muscogee) Nation in Oklahoma around 1877; they include men with some European and African ancestry.[214] Intertribal mixing was common among many Native American tribes prior to European contact, as they would adopt captives taken in warfare. Individuals often had ancestry from more than one tribe, particularly after tribes lost so many members from disease in the colonial era and after.[36] Bands or entire tribes occasionally split or merged to form more viable groups in reaction to the pressures of climate, disease and warfare.[215] A number of tribes traditionally adopted captives into their group to replace members who had been captured or killed in battle. Such captives were from rival tribes and later were taken from raids on European settlements. Some tribes also sheltered or adopted white traders and runaway slaves, and others owned slaves of their own. Tribes with long trading histories with Europeans show a higher rate of European admixture, reflecting years of intermarriage between Native American women and European men, often seen as advantageous to both sides.[215] A number of paths to genetic and ethnic diversity among Native Americans have occurred. In recent years, genetic genealogists have been able to determine the proportion of Native American ancestry carried by the African-American population. The literary and history scholar Henry Louis Gates, Jr., had experts on his TV programs who discussed African-American ancestry. They stated that 5% of African Americans have at least 12.5% Native American ancestry, or the equivalent to one great-grandparent, which may represent more than one distant ancestor. A greater percentage could have a smaller proportion of Indian ancestry, but their conclusions show that popular estimates of Native American admixture may have been too high.[216] DNA testing is not sufficient to qualify a person for specific tribal membership, as it cannot distinguish among Native American tribes. Native American identity has historically been based on culture, not just biology, as many American Indian peoples adopted captives from their enemies and assimilated them into their tribes. The Indigenous Peoples Council on Biocolonialism (IPCB) notes that: "Native American markers" are not found solely among Native Americans. While they occur more frequently among Native Americans, they are also found in people in other parts of the world.[217] Geneticists state: Not all Native Americans have been tested; especially with the large number of deaths due to disease such as smallpox, it is unlikely that Native Americans only have the genetic markers they have identified [so far], even when their maternal or paternal bloodline does not include a [known] non-Native American.[206][210] Tribal membership To receive tribal services, a Native American must be a certified (or enrolled) member of a federally recognized tribal organization. Each tribal government makes its own rules for eligibility of citizens or tribal members. Among tribes, qualification for enrollment may be based upon a required percentage of Native American "blood" (or the "blood quantum") of an individual seeking recognition, or documented descent from an ancestor on the Dawes Rolls or other registers. But, the federal government has its own standards related to who qualifies for services available to certified Native Americans. For instance, federal scholarships for Native Americans require the student both to be enrolled in a federally recognized tribe and to be of at least one-quarter Native American descent (equivalent to one grandparent), attested to by a Certificate of Degree of Indian Blood (CDIB) card issued by the federal government. Some tribes have begun requiring genealogical DNA testing of individuals' applying for membership, but this is usually related to an individual's proving parentage or direct descent from a certified member.[218] Requirements for tribal membership vary widely by tribe. The Cherokee require documented direct genealogical descent from a Native American listed on the early 1906 Dawes Rolls. Tribal rules regarding recognition of members who have heritage from multiple tribes are equally diverse and complex. Tribal membership conflicts have led to a number of legal disputes, court cases, and the formation of activist groups. One example of this are the Cherokee Freedmen. Today, they include descendants of African Americans once enslaved by the Cherokees, who were granted, by federal treaty, citizenship in the historic Cherokee Nation as freedmen after the Civil War. The modern Cherokee Nation, in the early 1980s, passed a law to require that all members must prove descent from a Cherokee Native American (not Cherokee Freedmen) listed on the Dawes Rolls, resulting in the exclusion of some individuals and families who had been active in Cherokee culture for years. Increased self-identification Since the census of 2000, people may identify as being of more than one race.[106] Since the 1960s, the number of people claiming Native American ancestry has grown significantly and by the 2000 census, the number had more than doubled. Sociologists attribute this dramatic change to "ethnic shifting" or "ethnic shopping"; they believe that it reflects a willingness of people to question their birth identities and adopt new ethnicities which they find more compatible. The author Jack Hitt writes: The reaction from lifelong Indians runs the gamut. It is easy to find Native Americans who denounce many of these new Indians as members of the wannabe tribe. But it is also easy to find Indians like Clem Iron Wing, an elder among the Lakota, who sees this flood of new ethnic claims as magnificent, a surge of Indians 'trying to come home.' Those Indians who ridicule Iron Wing's lax sense of tribal membership have retrofitted the old genocidal system of blood quantum—measuring racial purity by blood—into the new standard for real Indianness, a choice rich with paradox.[105] The journalist Mary Annette Pember notes that identifying with Native American culture may be a result of a person's increased interest in genealogy, the romanticization of the lifestyle, and a family tradition of Native American ancestors in the distant past. There are different issues if a person wants to pursue enrollment as a member of a tribe. Different tribes have different requirements for tribal membership; in some cases persons are reluctant to enroll, seeing it as a method of control initiated by the federal government; and there are individuals who are 100% Native American but, because of their mixed tribal heritage, do not qualify to belong to any individual tribe. Pember concludes: "The subjects of genuine American Indian blood, cultural connection and recognition by the community are extremely contentious issues, hotly debated throughout Indian country and beyond. The whole situation, some say, is ripe for misinterpretation, confusion and, ultimately, exploitation."[citation needed] Genetics For more details on this topic, see Genetic history of indigenous peoples of the Americas. The genetic history of indigenous peoples of the Americas primarily focuses on human Y-chromosome DNA haplogroups and human mitochondrial DNA haplogroups. "Y-DNA" is passed solely along the patrilineal line, from father to son, while "mtDNA" is passed down the matrilineal line, from mother to offspring of both sexes. Neither recombines, and thus Y-DNA and mtDNA change only by chance mutation at each generation with no intermixture between parents' genetic material.[219] Autosomal "atDNA" markers are also used, but differ from mtDNA or Y-DNA in that they overlap significantly.[220] Autosomal DNA is generally used to measure the average continent-of-ancestry genetic admixture in the entire human genome and related isolated populations.[220] The genetic pattern indicates Indigenous Americans experienced two very distinctive genetic episodes; first with the initial-peopling of the Americas, and secondly with European colonization of the Americas.[14][221][222] The former is the determinant factor for the number of gene lineages, zygosity mutations and founding haplotypes present in today's Indigenous Amerindian populations.[221] Human settlement of the New World occurred in stages from the Bering sea coast line, with an initial 15,000 to 20,000-year layover on Beringia for the small founding population.[14][223][224] The micro-satellite diversity and distributions of the Y lineage specific to South America indicates that certain Amerindian populations have been isolated since the initial colonization of the region.[225] The Na-Dené, Inuit and Indigenous Alaskan populations exhibit haplogroup Q-M242 (Y-DNA) mutations, however, that are distinct from other indigenous Amerindians, and that have various mtDNA and atDNA mutations.[226][227][228] This suggests that the paleo-Indian migrants into the northern extremes of North America and Greenland were descended from a later, independent migrant population.[229][230] |
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