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Speaker 1: to stuff Mom Never Told You From how Stuff Works
Speaker 1: dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Caroline,
Speaker 1: I'm Kristin, and Kristen and I have tackled a whole
Speaker 1: lot of cultural stereotypes this year. We've talked about the
Speaker 1: spicy Latina stereotype, the issue of calling women exotic and
Speaker 1: really what that connotation entails. And today we're going to
Speaker 1: turn our attention to a stereotype that exists about a
Speaker 1: particular subset of American Indian culture, and that is the
Speaker 1: Indian princess stereotype. We want to look at where this
Speaker 1: whole stereotype came from, first of all, but also the
Speaker 1: effect that it can have on American Indian women today. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I have a feeling that unlike say the spicy
Speaker 1: latina stereotype, this one might not be as immediately recognizable,
Speaker 1: we might not see it as much in our day
Speaker 1: to day pop culture. But it's also partially because of
Speaker 1: that that we wanted to talk about it, because this
Speaker 1: is a stereotype in particular that really collapses all of
Speaker 1: these different cultures. I don't I don't think that many
Speaker 1: people even recognize the fact that there are, for instance,
Speaker 1: five hundred sixty two federally recognized Native American tribes in
Speaker 1: the US, and because a lot of times, for reasons
Speaker 1: that we'll talk about in this podcast, we see them
Speaker 1: through just this one one image, just one, or at
Speaker 1: least we see the women through uh this image. Yeah, Well, so,
Speaker 1: I mean there are plenty of stereotypes about Native Americans,
Speaker 1: not just women specifically. Historically, they've been portrayed as inferior
Speaker 1: to Europeans when Europeans first came to the continent and
Speaker 1: just generally inferior to white people. Today today, stereotypes exist
Speaker 1: about the fact that, oh, are all alcoholics living on reservations.
Speaker 1: They're all lazy, they won't go out and get an
Speaker 1: education and get jobs. And on the flip side of
Speaker 1: the same stereotype, a lot of people still just assume
Speaker 1: that every person of Native American heritage is more spiritual
Speaker 1: and wise than anyone else. And while certainly there are
Speaker 1: very real issues that happen on reservations in terms of
Speaker 1: economic blight, in terms of lower educational attainment, in terms
Speaker 1: of them not receiving the same kinds of resources that
Speaker 1: Americans elsewhere in the country receive, and because of that
Speaker 1: it has produced a lot of problems that do include
Speaker 1: things like alcoholism. But it is important to dig back
Speaker 1: into the history and see how we have gotten to
Speaker 1: this point, um, and we're going to focus in yes
Speaker 1: on this Indian princess stereotype. And also to a note
Speaker 1: on language. Uh, some people prefer Native Americans, other people
Speaker 1: prefer American Indian. The Associated Press style guide, for instance,
Speaker 1: recommends American Indian or when whenever possible, actually referring to
Speaker 1: someone as their tribe that they are a part of.
Speaker 1: So we are going to be using the terms Native
Speaker 1: American and American Indian, probably interchangeably throughout this podcast, but
Speaker 1: just to note that we have done our research on
Speaker 1: that part. Yeah. Well, so, Kristen mentioned the very real
Speaker 1: social and economic issues that face a lot of Native Americans,
Speaker 1: whether they're on reservations or not today, and a part
Speaker 1: of that stems from a lot of the papers we
Speaker 1: read talked about the fact that a lot of these
Speaker 1: issues stem from a culture of oppression that a lot
Speaker 1: of these people's, a lot of these cultures have faced,
Speaker 1: and a lot of that in turn stems from the
Speaker 1: limitations that are placed on people when you try to
Speaker 1: force them into these stereotypical roles, when you don't allow
Speaker 1: people to be who they are. And when we looked
Speaker 1: at the paper called Debunking the Pocahonist Paradox the Need
Speaker 1: for a Humanistic Perspective, they talked the writers talked about
Speaker 1: how early European explorers considered Native American Indians the quote
Speaker 1: essence of what people would be without Christian and civilized behavior,
Speaker 1: and that's both good and bad depending on who's writing
Speaker 1: the history at the time, because this perception led a
Speaker 1: lot of Europeans to assume that Native Americans were beasts,
Speaker 1: they were savages, and they were heathens. But at the
Speaker 1: same time that also led later on a little bit
Speaker 1: to the perception that American Indians were these noble savages
Speaker 1: who were so much more in touch with nature than
Speaker 1: the civilized white man. Well, and that also leads into
Speaker 1: from the fifteenth century this um perception of, particularly by Europeans,
Speaker 1: of American Indians as either good in terms of supporting
Speaker 1: their expansionist goals or bad in terms of fighting these
Speaker 1: invaders off from their land. And it's just incredible to
Speaker 1: see even how through artwork these very Eurocentric ideas of
Speaker 1: the savage versus the civilized christian um really plays out
Speaker 1: and sort of feeds into this concept of manifest destiny
Speaker 1: of oh, you know, we're actually doing a good thing
Speaker 1: by coming in here, because we will convert them to Christianity,
Speaker 1: we will civilize them, we will take their women and
Speaker 1: marry them, and won't that be great? Um. So, even
Speaker 1: if you look at early European art depicting Native American women,
Speaker 1: these kinds of themes that lead into uh, the Indian
Speaker 1: princess stereotype quickly emerge. For instance, there is a mid
Speaker 1: nineteenth century painter, he was pretty well known, Alfred Miller,
Speaker 1: and he painted all sorts of portraits um portraying American
Speaker 1: Indian life. And there is one in particular from eighteen
Speaker 1: forty five, the oil painting called the Trapper's Bride, and
Speaker 1: in the foreground there's a pocus pocahunta is like woman
Speaker 1: who is being handed off, presumably by her father, to
Speaker 1: a white trapper. And there's a paper that was reading
Speaker 1: about this that called it a symbolic portrayal of the
Speaker 1: marriage between civilization and the wilderness, uncivilized woman in need
Speaker 1: of domesticating by a civilized white man. And of course
Speaker 1: that ties into the greater metaphorical use of this imagery
Speaker 1: in terms of representing America or what would be America
Speaker 1: as the Native American, the wild and untamed person becoming
Speaker 1: tamed and civilized by white men basically. But yeah, he
Speaker 1: Alfred Miller also had another painting. I mean, he he
Speaker 1: painted all sorts of scenes of the of the frontier
Speaker 1: and of the untamed wilderness, and a lot of them
Speaker 1: featured half naked Native American women. There was one that
Speaker 1: shows a woman swinging from a treety branch and she's
Speaker 1: completely topless with just basically a skirt on, and it's,
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's open to interpretation as to whether
Speaker 1: he actually witnessed anything like that or just chose to
Speaker 1: portray Native American women in morally inferior positions to their colonizers.
Speaker 1: Um he was. He's been critiqued as using this whole
Speaker 1: domestic ideology to create images of Native American women as
Speaker 1: domestic moral influencers on the frontiers instead of co contributors
Speaker 1: to survival. And it's also worth noting that amid this
Speaker 1: background of trying to force these kind of domestic ideologies
Speaker 1: onto these people's, pre colonial American Indian societies were for
Speaker 1: the most part not male dominated. Yes, there was a
Speaker 1: division of labor, gendered division of labor, but a lot
Speaker 1: of tribes were actually matrilineal, for instance, including uh the
Speaker 1: Modo Pony, of which Pocons was a part of. But
Speaker 1: I don't want to get ahead of myself, right, and
Speaker 1: so it's interesting though to see this this total manipulation
Speaker 1: of what was going on, but manipulating things through art
Speaker 1: and and depicting things as being a certain way for
Speaker 1: European audiences. And I mean we still see echoes of
Speaker 1: that today in our modern media because newcomers to the
Speaker 1: quote unquote New World, their experiences with American Indians Native
Speaker 1: American people's were really shaped through the quote literary and
Speaker 1: visual representations that helped perpetuate stereotypes. And that reminded me
Speaker 1: of a point in this paper Our Indian Princess, Subverting
Speaker 1: the Stereotype by Nancy Mithlo that jumped out, which said
Speaker 1: white images of Natives tell us some more about whites
Speaker 1: attitudes and beliefs than about Native realities. And it's it's
Speaker 1: notable too that we've been talking for the past few
Speaker 1: minutes about art, because that paper Our Indian Princess was
Speaker 1: all about Native made art and also often how it's
Speaker 1: not so much considered art but more artifact, which also
Speaker 1: says a lot again about white's attitudes, right exactly. And
Speaker 1: so you know, if if we look at general tropes
Speaker 1: about American Indians, and there's a great website all about
Speaker 1: this called red face dot Us that's Red dash face
Speaker 1: dot Us that goes into all of these tropes and stereotypes,
Speaker 1: and they talk about the ones that are specific to men,
Speaker 1: like the chief, the noble, savage, UM, the warrior, or
Speaker 1: the brave UM. And then they go into the ones
Speaker 1: that are specific to women. And there's really two main ones,
Speaker 1: the squaw versus the Indian princess. And boy, if we
Speaker 1: in modern society do not still have the same arguments
Speaker 1: about women in terms of the squaw versus the Indian
Speaker 1: princess dichotomy, the whole quiet, subservient serving her husband woman
Speaker 1: versus the woman that we consider too strong and maybe
Speaker 1: maybe we call her a tramp. Well, and I didn't
Speaker 1: realize this. Um. In one of the sources we were reading,
Speaker 1: it noted that it was originally um a neutral word
Speaker 1: for woman, but it's now often perceived as a derogatory term. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And there was another paper that was talking about reclaiming
Speaker 1: the words squaw the way that we talk about reclaiming
Speaker 1: bitch or reclaiming queer today. While there are definitely languages
Speaker 1: that still use squaw and variations of the word squaw
Speaker 1: to talk about women or women or female things, animals, whatever, um,
Speaker 1: largely in modern society squaw is still considered pretty derogatory. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because it's sort of at least according to what we
Speaker 1: were reading, it has, in its derogatory sense, become uh
Speaker 1: autonomy for a woman's vagina because they're also through this
Speaker 1: specific trope. Um. Squaws also were considered sexual servants in
Speaker 1: a way for um white men in particular as well.
Speaker 1: They were the one They weren't the desirable princesses like
Speaker 1: a Pocahontas of legend, but rather um you know, you know,
Speaker 1: the women who were just willing to have sex. You
Speaker 1: would you would want to have sex with her, but
Speaker 1: you wouldn't want to marry her. That whole thing. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And and it's interesting to look at the first use
Speaker 1: among white Europeans of the words squaw. It's first mentioned
Speaker 1: in English by William Bradford and Edward Winslow, who were
Speaker 1: describing life in the Plymouth Colony, and they mentioned the
Speaker 1: squaw statue or the Massachusetts Queen, Massachusett being an entire
Speaker 1: culture of people. Uh um. And I mean that's going
Speaker 1: to lead us into talking about the Indian princess, because
Speaker 1: by talking about the Massachusetts Queen, these Europeans are framing
Speaker 1: Native Americans further as something that more white people could understand,
Speaker 1: like here's some language that you fellow Europeans back in
Speaker 1: England will understand and be able to get it basically right.
Speaker 1: The Indian princess is basically a female equivalent of the
Speaker 1: male noble, savage figure that quote unquote good Indian that
Speaker 1: the Europeans would talk about and before we get into
Speaker 1: more into Poco Hottas, because a lot of it really
Speaker 1: stems from her and uh not even really who she
Speaker 1: was in reality, but more what her legend became. Um,
Speaker 1: this reduces women a lot of times, this Indian princess
Speaker 1: stereotype reduces women to helpless maidens or metaphors. Um. We
Speaker 1: read a paper about this, call all the Pocahontas Paradox,
Speaker 1: a Cautionary Tale for educators, and it says that the
Speaker 1: Indian princess stereotype is rooted in the legend of Pocahontas
Speaker 1: and it's typically expressed through characters that are maidenly, demure
Speaker 1: and deeply committed to some white man. And a lot
Speaker 1: of this too is echoing the history portion of our
Speaker 1: Spicy Latina podcast, where there is usually that that connection
Speaker 1: between the woman of color and her you know, love
Speaker 1: and loyalty to white men. Yeah, exactly. And this this
Speaker 1: paper was written by Cornell Pewee Wardie, who is an
Speaker 1: incredible educator and activist in the Native American community, and
Speaker 1: he writes that this, this metaphor, this woman that we're
Speaker 1: talking about, she's powerfully symbolic as queen and princess, and
Speaker 1: she's been with us since the time that she came
Speaker 1: to stand for the quote unquote New World, a term
Speaker 1: he says that in and of itself reflects, of course,
Speaker 1: at Eurocentric value judgment. But it's interesting to watch the
Speaker 1: evolution of these metaphors, the princess and the queens, specifically
Speaker 1: getting away from just talking about the squaw as some
Speaker 1: basically subservient character in the European imagination. But if we
Speaker 1: go back to Terrell Alway, a Guy Heap Portman and
Speaker 1: Roger D. Harring, who were the authors of that paper
Speaker 1: we talked about earlier debunking the Pocahona's paradox the need
Speaker 1: for humanistic perspective, they point out that is early as
Speaker 1: fifteen seventy five, artists were interpreting the Indian queen character
Speaker 1: as a bare breasted woman who was wearing animal skins
Speaker 1: and leaves and jewelry and weapons. She was totally decked
Speaker 1: out as this wild thing, and she also was often
Speaker 1: depicted with her foot on some sort of dead conquest,
Speaker 1: and she was meant to represent not only the abundance
Speaker 1: of the New World, but the danger of the new world.
Speaker 1: And this then evolved into the image of the Indian princess,
Speaker 1: because the longer that white people were in the New World,
Speaker 1: all the less scary it became, as they were sort
Speaker 1: of conquering people around them and conquering the environment around them,
Speaker 1: and this whole Indian princess image. This woman was more
Speaker 1: non threatening. She had lighter skin and more romanesque clothes.
Speaker 1: She wasn't quite as wild with leaves and animal skin.
Speaker 1: She was more draped in a familiar, sort of educated
Speaker 1: Greek fashion. She wasn't as much of a warrior, it
Speaker 1: sounds like, compared to the Indian queen, and she's absolutely
Speaker 1: a precursor to like the lady liberty figure, and she
Speaker 1: was often she was often wrapped in like a colonial
Speaker 1: flag too, being like, hey, she's like our mascot, well right,
Speaker 1: she's bridging the gap between the two cultures. But it's
Speaker 1: also though notable that uh, those artistic depictions of the
Speaker 1: so called Indian queen that go back to the sixteenth century,
Speaker 1: which probably explains why Alfred Miller, in that portrait you
Speaker 1: were describing, shows the woman bare breasted swinging from the tree.
Speaker 1: She was probably more of a queen, more of a
Speaker 1: warrior than this more diminutive princess, right exactly. And so,
Speaker 1: just like Kristen and I have talked about with other
Speaker 1: issues of stereotypes and racism, these stereotypes basically served to
Speaker 1: justify a certain behavior, in this case, justified expansion. And
Speaker 1: so a portman inhering right that these stereotypical images of
Speaker 1: Indian princesses became instrumental in furthering the cultural domination necessary
Speaker 1: to the colonialist enterprise. We've talked before about how perceptions
Speaker 1: and racism about black people was used as a way
Speaker 1: to justify their enslavement in our country, and so we
Speaker 1: see the same attitude here being applied to Native Americans
Speaker 1: of all cultures, of all tribes, because it was a
Speaker 1: way of being like, oh, well, they don't matter, we
Speaker 1: can just shove them out of the way and achieve
Speaker 1: our NFS destiny. And once that happens, use her image
Speaker 1: as a very popular marketing tool and In our research
Speaker 1: for this episode, we found this incredible repository of all
Speaker 1: of these different products and even songbooks from the eighteenth
Speaker 1: and nineteenth century and even into the twentieth century, using
Speaker 1: the image of either the Indian Queen or the Indian
Speaker 1: Princess to sell all sorts of products, but especially for
Speaker 1: quote unquote natural goods because remember she also has this
Speaker 1: spiritual side to her as well. Right, it's just the
Speaker 1: whole stereotype of uh, Native Americans being tied closer to
Speaker 1: nature than white people, and isn't that cute and so
Speaker 1: good for them? But yeah, we have things like the
Speaker 1: Victorian era Indian Queen perfume sold by Bean and Brother
Speaker 1: in Philadelphia. And then we saw an ad this is
Speaker 1: also from the Victorian era for No Water Radium Sanitarium company,
Speaker 1: which sold radioactive water largely thought to improve health. This
Speaker 1: was like all the health rage back in this time period,
Speaker 1: I think, all the way up through the twenties if
Speaker 1: I'm not mistaken. But here we see just cartoons basically
Speaker 1: imagery of Native American women being used to advertise something
Speaker 1: that was supposedly a natural remedy for health. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: we find her image on cigars on the nine Swamp
Speaker 1: Root Almanac, which was promotional literature for the manufacturers of
Speaker 1: the delicious sounding swamp root, which apparently was a quote
Speaker 1: great kidney, liver and bladder remedy. So between swamp root
Speaker 1: and your radioactive water, you probably feeling tip top. I'm
Speaker 1: I'm getting heartburn just thinking about it, right, And then
Speaker 1: the very cleverly named Mischief, as in Miss Chief Washington Apples,
Speaker 1: and of course the illustration on that was a buxum,
Speaker 1: very cartoonish Native American woman. Yeah, and you do see
Speaker 1: similar things. They're probably as many products marketed using the
Speaker 1: warrior stereotype. The first thing that comes to mind are
Speaker 1: the big Chief writing tablets um that you know, kids,
Speaker 1: school kids used for years and years and years. And
Speaker 1: in addition, of course to this marketing angle, she plays
Speaker 1: very well on screen, particularly in Western films, of course, Yeah, definitely,
Speaker 1: and it's it's interesting to see the sort of parallels
Speaker 1: with the spicy Latina trope. And in six is Duel
Speaker 1: in the Sun, the woman character Uh is supposed to
Speaker 1: be half Native American and half Hispanic, and of course
Speaker 1: she's viewed as a bad girl who gets involved with
Speaker 1: two white brothers and ends up stirring up all of
Speaker 1: this trouble between them. Um. And then of course you
Speaker 1: have nineteen these Broken Arrow in which a young Native
Speaker 1: American woman falls head over heels for a white man,
Speaker 1: and then Disney. Then there's Disney with Peter Pan and
Speaker 1: I had totally forgotten about this until reading up for
Speaker 1: this episode. There's Peter Pan and Tiger Lily, and Tiger Lily,
Speaker 1: like in the animated feature, she dances for Peter and
Speaker 1: then kisses him while the song what Makes the Red
Speaker 1: Man Red is playing, And of course when Tiger Lily
Speaker 1: kisses Peter, then his cheeks turned very red. And oh,
Speaker 1: it's like a whole play on the thing what makes
Speaker 1: the Red Man Red? And of course they're then surrounded
Speaker 1: by caricature depictions of Native American men, And that's a
Speaker 1: criticism that is constant for Disney from uh Peter Pan
Speaker 1: through Pocahonas which we're about to talk about, because all
Speaker 1: of the caricature, like uh, Native American men in that cartoon,
Speaker 1: they all look exactly the same. Whereas you have someone
Speaker 1: like Windy and Peter Peter himself, who are white children
Speaker 1: whose features are like incredibly detailed in their movements are
Speaker 1: incredibly detailed, but then you have what looks like like
Speaker 1: basically Hannah Barbera cartoons of Native American men. And it's
Speaker 1: one of the same criticisms that surfaced in the nineties
Speaker 1: when Disney's Pocahonas came out, because again, like, okay, all
Speaker 1: of the Native American people in this movie essentially look
Speaker 1: exactly the same. Well, because they're just scenery. Oh and
Speaker 1: let's just remember that we have a tendency to collapse
Speaker 1: hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of tribes just into one,
Speaker 1: one poorly drawn image. I mean, yeah, exactly, And so
Speaker 1: of course this brings us to Pocahonas. Um Pocahona is
Speaker 1: the animated feature exactly. Yes, important note, right. The Disney
Speaker 1: Pokehontist figure who in the movie V is a beautiful
Speaker 1: young woman who saves and then falls in love with
Speaker 1: the strapping John Smith rather than marry a man from
Speaker 1: her own tribe, And of course she's portrayed as this buxom,
Speaker 1: fully grown adult woman in tune with nature and animals.
Speaker 1: And of course, in researching I wanted to appropriately researched
Speaker 1: for this episode, so naturally I went back and watched
Speaker 1: a ton of clips from the movie, and I got that, like,
Speaker 1: you know, that very specific like full body, hot, sweaty
Speaker 1: feeling that you get when you're so embarrassed for someone else,
Speaker 1: Like I got that watching those clips because it's horrifying.
Speaker 1: I have not seen that movie since I was a
Speaker 1: kid and it was out in theaters. And of course
Speaker 1: when you're a kid, you don't think anything of it.
Speaker 1: You're like, oh, yeah, that's what Indians are like. Um,
Speaker 1: but I mean there's literally a scene for those of
Speaker 1: you who don't know or don't remember, there's literally a
Speaker 1: scene when Pocahonas encounters John Smith for the first time.
Speaker 1: They haven't spoken. He's a stranger. She can't speak English
Speaker 1: and he can't speak her language, and she is surrounded
Speaker 1: by this magical, glittery rainbow wind and suddenly she can
Speaker 1: speak English and perfectly. And it's it's weird, and a
Speaker 1: lot of people makes sense take issue with it. But Caroline,
Speaker 1: I mean the thing I don't think you're getting because Caroline,
Speaker 1: have you ever heard the wolf cry to a bluecorn moon? What? Well,
Speaker 1: deeper question? What is a bluecorn moon? I don't know.
Speaker 1: I might be getting the lyrics wrong. Horn Moon William horne.
Speaker 1: Who's to say, yeah, it could be a blue corn
Speaker 1: blue horn. Um or Or asked the grinning Bobcat why
Speaker 1: he grins, Well, I just talked to my raccoon friend
Speaker 1: that follows me around everywhere. I mean, I will say
Speaker 1: that when this movie came out, the feature film my
Speaker 1: mother was, she was not about to let me see
Speaker 1: it because, in her words, is revisionist history. He's revision's history.
Speaker 1: But more I think she took issue with the fact
Speaker 1: that Pocons was not talking to a tree. She could
Speaker 1: not talk to trees. So so that was my that
Speaker 1: was my Pokehonta's history. But we do want to uh
Speaker 1: correct that revisionist history. Let's revise that revisionist history. When
Speaker 1: we come right back from a quick break and talk
Speaker 1: about who Pokehonas really was. And now back to the show.
Speaker 1: So before we took a break, we were talking about, well,
Speaker 1: my mother's this taste for revision's history and Disney animated
Speaker 1: feature films. But more importantly, um, we need to talk
Speaker 1: about though, the very real truth of how this legend
Speaker 1: of Pocahonas which snowballed into this Disney film and the
Speaker 1: follow up film. There was a follow up of Pocahona
Speaker 1: st where they were like sorry about that, but was
Speaker 1: even worse they didn't really correct anything. Um, But we
Speaker 1: need to talk about how this so called Pocahontas paradox,
Speaker 1: as academics call it today, has served, you know, really
Speaker 1: too mold a more European understanding of Native American women.
Speaker 1: We really see Native American women a lot of times
Speaker 1: through this Pocahontas lens. And you know, we should explain
Speaker 1: that the Pocahontas paradox what it is, because we've mentioned
Speaker 1: it several times since it is in the name of
Speaker 1: several studies we've cited. But it's the same thing as
Speaker 1: the Princess squad dilemma or the Prince's prostitute syndrome, or
Speaker 1: as you might know it, the Madonna Wore paradox as well.
Speaker 1: But it's basically combining the stereotypes of the beautiful, exotic,
Speaker 1: lustful woman and the dangerous, strong, powerful woman. It's basically
Speaker 1: a lot of fears about women. Yeah, and not to
Speaker 1: turn this into an episode of stuff you missed in
Speaker 1: history class, but we need to do our due diligence
Speaker 1: of just ironing out what really happened. Um. First of all,
Speaker 1: Pocahonas was from the Moto Pony tribe. And by the way,
Speaker 1: Pocahonas was not actually her name. It was a Powertan
Speaker 1: nickname meaning the naughty one or spoiled child. And her
Speaker 1: personal name was mata Waca or Matoa, and she also
Speaker 1: had a public name of Amnute, and she was the
Speaker 1: daughter of Chief Powertin. But it's also important to remember
Speaker 1: too that Chief Patin was not a king, which means
Speaker 1: that po was not a princess. Although with the Moto
Speaker 1: Pony tribe the chieftain power was matrilineal. However, Pocahonas would
Speaker 1: not have been the next in line. It would have
Speaker 1: been one of it would have been a brother still
Speaker 1: getting the being handed the chief torch, which is also
Speaker 1: which is also not how things work. I am now
Speaker 1: mangling history yet again. Hot at every turn we're running
Speaker 1: into hurdles. But okay, so there is a definite questionable
Speaker 1: time frame here, because you know, we mentioned that in
Speaker 1: the Disney movie she is a fully developed adult woman
Speaker 1: who falls in love with John Smith. But actually in
Speaker 1: the time that Pocahonas and her family encountered John Smith
Speaker 1: in seven, Pocahonas actually would have been about ten or
Speaker 1: eleven years old, and the whole circumstance by which she
Speaker 1: first meets him is still something that historians and anthropologists
Speaker 1: are trying to figure out. There's still a lot of
Speaker 1: theories about how they initially encountered each other. Now, of course,
Speaker 1: as the legend goes, which John Smith wrote years after
Speaker 1: Pocahonas died, um, he says that she essentially rescued him
Speaker 1: from being killed by Chief Powaton. And that's probably not
Speaker 1: what happened at all. I mean, there there's a chance
Speaker 1: that perhaps there was a ceremonial introduction happening and she
Speaker 1: interrupted it. Because there's also a good chance that she
Speaker 1: would not have had like it would not have been
Speaker 1: her role to be in that place at that time. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: all sorts of things that could have happened. But John
Speaker 1: Smith is not the most reliable narrator for this story. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because the whole thing is that he wrote this account
Speaker 1: of spending a winter with this group of people, um,
Speaker 1: and the account didn't mention anything of the sort about
Speaker 1: a rescue. It wasn't until seventeen years later that he
Speaker 1: wrote the follow up account, and historians basically say, like, yeah,
Speaker 1: there was a pre existing story about a Native American
Speaker 1: young woman who did help out a white guy at
Speaker 1: some point, So he could have stolen the story because
Speaker 1: it sounded good, or he could have actually been helped
Speaker 1: out by old Pocahonas, But either way, it's possible that
Speaker 1: he was just trying to make his way as a
Speaker 1: writer of New World adventures after it was pretty clear
Speaker 1: that because he was such a jerk, he wouldn't actually
Speaker 1: be going back there to make his fortune. Well, and
Speaker 1: it would have furnished his image because by this time
Speaker 1: Pocahonas was well known because she had, you know, been
Speaker 1: to Europe and made this huge impression. So how convenient
Speaker 1: for him to be like, oh, bt Dubbs, she actually, uh,
Speaker 1: she rescued me. So yeah. But in sixteen twelve, then
Speaker 1: seventeen year old Pocohonas, who was married at the time.
Speaker 1: She was married to a Palatin named Kakum, who in
Speaker 1: the Disney movie is portrayed as a violent, savage creature
Speaker 1: who she chooses John Smith over by the way um
Speaker 1: she's married, she's taken prisoner by Jamestown residents on a
Speaker 1: ship for more than a year, and while she was captive,
Speaker 1: she meets John Rawle, who is twenty eight already a
Speaker 1: widower because it is sixteen twelve, and he takes an
Speaker 1: interest in her. Some sorts to say that, yeah, the
Speaker 1: feelings were mutual. Um. But in the process she converts
Speaker 1: to Christianity. She's baptized under the name Rebecca and Mary's Rolf.
Speaker 1: And this is a huge deal for the Europeans because
Speaker 1: this means that the now renamed Rebecca Rolf is the
Speaker 1: first American Indian woman on record to marry a white
Speaker 1: guy and even more importantly, convert to Christianity. What a
Speaker 1: prime example of how these Europeans are bringing civilization to
Speaker 1: the quote unquote New World. And she made such a
Speaker 1: splash in sixteen sixteen when she and her husband traveled
Speaker 1: to England because she captured their imaginations. She was the
Speaker 1: New World equivalent of a princess. Here's this woman who
Speaker 1: has been made rafa end and civilized by the civilizing
Speaker 1: influence of her white husband. But she's also the daughter
Speaker 1: of the Indian equivalent of a king right well, which
Speaker 1: also justified Ralph marrying her because a lot of people
Speaker 1: still were horrified at the thought of that kind of
Speaker 1: racial intermingling. Too, so that the Indian princes stereotype also
Speaker 1: served that role. Yeah, but so in England she was
Speaker 1: used in the Virginia Company of London's campaigns to get
Speaker 1: people to move to the New World. And of course
Speaker 1: she eased people's fears because oh, well, she's in a
Speaker 1: ball gown or a big, you know, fancy dress, just
Speaker 1: like I am. So clearly she's not that savage. But
Speaker 1: the story does not have a happy ending, as one
Speaker 1: might imagine. In sixteen seventeen, she got very ill on
Speaker 1: the way back to America, and when they basically turned
Speaker 1: around and came back to England to get her help,
Speaker 1: she ended up dying at the age of twenty one.
Speaker 1: And well, she probably died of something that I'm sure
Speaker 1: a lot of people died of at the time, possibly pneumonia, tuberculosis,
Speaker 1: or some type of smallpox. Contemporary reports of the day,
Speaker 1: tying in with this whole legend and the whole stereotyping,
Speaker 1: said that she died of a broken heart. Oh goodness,
Speaker 1: it was probably likelier smallpox or just living in uh,
Speaker 1: sixteen seventeen, because remember too, by the time Ralph meets
Speaker 1: hero at twenty eight, he's already a widower. Um. But
Speaker 1: it's just incredible that that rather tragic, not tragic to
Speaker 1: the point of say Sarky Bartman, who we talked about
Speaker 1: in our episode on fat Bottomed Girls, um, but still someone,
Speaker 1: you know, this woman of color being shipped off to
Speaker 1: Europe specifically to be used kind of put on display
Speaker 1: in a way. And if you look at drawings and
Speaker 1: depictions of her um from Save the seventeen d eighteen hundreds,
Speaker 1: it is very disnified already because it's her with very
Speaker 1: long lashes, she has um, you know, very she's very attractive.
Speaker 1: She's wearing a ballgown, but also she's wearing a headdress.
Speaker 1: So it's like the melding of these two, these two cultures. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And so of course, now that we have told you
Speaker 1: the true story with a sad ending, let's look back
Speaker 1: at Disney and what the cartoon version did in terms
Speaker 1: of furthering stereotypes, because we already mentioned Pocahon's near magical
Speaker 1: powers thanks to her of course, because she's an Indian,
Speaker 1: her super amazing connection with nature, and of course the
Speaker 1: furthering of the stereotype totally serves to disconnect her from
Speaker 1: the actual human person that we've just told you she was, well,
Speaker 1: and there's the whole thing too with falling in love
Speaker 1: with the first white man. She sees that's a common
Speaker 1: um trope within a trope, and Perety, who we cited earlier,
Speaker 1: said that quote. Disney has created a marketable new age
Speaker 1: pocahonist to embody our millennial dreams for wholeness and harmony
Speaker 1: while banishing our nightmares of savagery and emptiness. In this regard,
Speaker 1: how Indian women are portrayed in the movies is an
Speaker 1: extension of White America's attempt to cope with a sense
Speaker 1: of cultural guilt. And that also reminds me of that
Speaker 1: paper by Nancy myth Flow, Our Indian Princess, in which
Speaker 1: she interviews a lot of Native American artists, and one
Speaker 1: of whom was talking about how um everyone She's like,
Speaker 1: everyone always wants me to paint the warrior chief on
Speaker 1: a horse, and of course I never am going to
Speaker 1: I'm never going to do that because it's you know,
Speaker 1: fulfilling this image. Although there are some days when I
Speaker 1: am hungry and I need money, and I consider, you know,
Speaker 1: how how quickly could I paint that horse? How quickly
Speaker 1: could I do that? Because it is all of this.
Speaker 1: It ties into all of this imagery God, and it
Speaker 1: goes back to that Arthur Miller guy who was just
Speaker 1: painting images of the savage Native people's, you know, all
Speaker 1: of them running around without clothes on and being sinful. Well,
Speaker 1: and even farther back to because Sydney, say fifteventy five
Speaker 1: when we first see those, uh, those paintings of the
Speaker 1: Indian Queen. And there's a lot of conversation about art
Speaker 1: in this because it is important because kind of like
Speaker 1: from our Women Explorers episode where you have the botanist
Speaker 1: sitting there painting these flowers because obviously Google image did
Speaker 1: not exist, photography what did not exist, and so you
Speaker 1: relied on art to see these these new worlds. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I mean this ties together so many things we've
Speaker 1: talked about because just like in our Spicy Latina episode
Speaker 1: where we talked about what modern media is doing four
Speaker 1: stereotypes of Latino women, it's the same thing. It's just
Speaker 1: not it's not primetime TV obviously, but it's paintings and
Speaker 1: lithographs and rawings and journal accounts that are going back
Speaker 1: to England to inform people's image and their thought process
Speaker 1: about what the new world was like and so for
Speaker 1: a lot of people, that meant that it was a wild,
Speaker 1: scary place full of savage, sinful people who walked around
Speaker 1: without shirts on. Yeah. And and the unfortunate thing is
Speaker 1: I have noticed that a lot of people, especially like
Speaker 1: a lot of Americans today who are not native American,
Speaker 1: we're not American Indians, often tend to greet these kinds
Speaker 1: of conversations with an eye roll of like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: here we go again about the American Indians. Yeah, we know,
Speaker 1: we know, and or whenever, for instance, there are conversations about, hey,
Speaker 1: that that stereotypical kind of racist mascot. We might not
Speaker 1: want to use that anymore. People, You know what, It's
Speaker 1: just a mascot, Come on, um, but it's actually no
Speaker 1: just being wilfully ignorant of history and why it's just
Speaker 1: strange that we are so a lot a lot of
Speaker 1: people are so um intensely defensive of wearing blinders to it,
Speaker 1: right exactly. And so that leads us to our next
Speaker 1: point about how these stereotypes affect our kids. Because we
Speaker 1: mentioned at the top of the podcast that there are
Speaker 1: very real issues, social issues, economic issues affecting a lot
Speaker 1: of American Indians today, and a lot of times that
Speaker 1: starts with children because, uh pe, we already argues that
Speaker 1: this whole stereotyping issue is part of a larger miseducation
Speaker 1: of all of our children, both Native and otherwise, because
Speaker 1: you have non Native children who developed these stereotypes of
Speaker 1: the continents, aboriginal inhabitants um and Native American children being
Speaker 1: presented with confusing reflections and interpretations of their own cultures.
Speaker 1: Because you know how many people are going to go
Speaker 1: out and serve which of the truth in terms of like,
Speaker 1: especially with non Native people. I mean, you're gonna be
Speaker 1: presented with a stereotype or a story about Christopher Columbus
Speaker 1: and you're going to be like, well, I don't know
Speaker 1: how else to get a different version of things. So cool. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And we read a study from two thousand eight in
Speaker 1: the Basic and Applied Social Psychology Journal looking at the
Speaker 1: psychological impacts of American Indian sports mascots on Native American kids,
Speaker 1: and what was interesting about the finding was that the
Speaker 1: students themselves reported positive associations with these actual mascots, but
Speaker 1: at the same time reported depressed state self esteem and
Speaker 1: community worth. Because even though we might see these mascots.
Speaker 1: I mean, Caroline, let's go ahead and identify the elephant
Speaker 1: in the room, which is the fact that we live
Speaker 1: in Atlanta and our baseball team, our beloved hometown team,
Speaker 1: are the Atlanta Braves, and we have a mascot called
Speaker 1: Chief Nakahoma. That's not okay? And do I do the
Speaker 1: tomahawk chops sometimes? Yeah, And that's probably not okay. Um,
Speaker 1: because these might seem like just fun kinds of fandom things,
Speaker 1: but they clearly in the process of collapsing these cultures
Speaker 1: and limiting the of what kids kind of can see
Speaker 1: themselves in leads to that, you know, the lowered self esteem. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And so the writers of that study said that basically
Speaker 1: American Indian mascots are harmful because they remind American Indians
Speaker 1: of the limited ways that others see them and in
Speaker 1: this way constrain how they can see themselves. And it's
Speaker 1: in it's things like this that are especially in sidious,
Speaker 1: especially when you look at girls in particular. Teresa la
Speaker 1: FROMBOS did some research into Native American adolescents and found
Speaker 1: that girls were six times more likely to be sexually
Speaker 1: abused than boys. They're more prone to depression and more
Speaker 1: likely to be suicidal with higher incidents of alcohol abuse,
Speaker 1: and she writes the impact of the welfare culture and
Speaker 1: the losses can be identified at the individual level by
Speaker 1: feelings of victimization attributable to racism and stereotyping, value conflicts
Speaker 1: or confusion, isolation, and oppression. She writes, unresolved grief over
Speaker 1: losses and effects of ongoing cultural genocide are often presented
Speaker 1: by clients in the form of chronic cycles of crisis
Speaker 1: and oppression. So what do we do? I mean, that's heavy?
Speaker 1: What do we How do we? Is it possible to
Speaker 1: even fix that? And fix seems like too simple of
Speaker 1: a word. Yeah, well, I mean, so we've presented here
Speaker 1: that the a lot of the issue is how children
Speaker 1: see themselves and the image that they see reflected back
Speaker 1: when they turn on the on the television, and so
Speaker 1: pee wee reready that educator activist author calls on his
Speaker 1: fellow teachers, for instance, to encourage reflective exploration of this
Speaker 1: and other dimensions of multicultural education. Basically, get in on
Speaker 1: the ground level, show kids that there are so many
Speaker 1: multifaceted cultures out there, that it's not just pocahonas and
Speaker 1: the majestic Indian chief well. And this also brings up
Speaker 1: a quote from Wilma Mankiller, who we did a podcast
Speaker 1: on a long time ago. Um, she was the first
Speaker 1: woman to lead the Chaerokee nation, and she said quote
Speaker 1: the appalling lack of accurate information about Indigenous women fuels
Speaker 1: negative stereotypes. Television, film, and print media often portray Indigenous
Speaker 1: women as a sexual drudges, the squaw, or innocent children
Speaker 1: of nature. The power, strength, and complexity of Indigenous women
Speaker 1: are rarely acknowledged or even recognized, probably because of these
Speaker 1: very stereotypes we've been talking about, and I mean so
Speaker 1: tying all of the harm that these stereotypes can do
Speaker 1: back to education, I mean, Pewee Aready basically addresses the
Speaker 1: fact that there's so much to learn and to unlearn.
Speaker 1: And my thought about it in reading all of these
Speaker 1: sources was that it's good to remember that history tends
Speaker 1: to be the stories of the winner, the conqueror the
Speaker 1: person who won the war. And so even though we
Speaker 1: have things like matrilineal cultures in Native American societies and
Speaker 1: women holding important roles in positions, the European men who
Speaker 1: came over wouldn't have even noticed or cared, or they
Speaker 1: wouldn't have wanted it reflected and sent back to their
Speaker 1: families in England. And so a lot of the histories
Speaker 1: that we hear focus only on men, and not only
Speaker 1: on just men, but on the noble savage. And so
Speaker 1: the more we can learn about both women in all
Speaker 1: of these various cultures, and the more that we can
Speaker 1: focus on the fact that these were real, actual three
Speaker 1: dimensional humans, I think the better will be. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: this is probably with the point where we need to
Speaker 1: do a follow up episode at some point to actually
Speaker 1: talk about those women, you know, to highlight Native American
Speaker 1: women both from history and today who have helped shape
Speaker 1: these tribes and these cultures and who are still working
Speaker 1: every day to advocate on behalf of them and on
Speaker 1: behalf of you know, people outside of their tribes as well.
Speaker 1: But this is where we have to wrap up today.
Speaker 1: So really curious to hear from listeners about this. If
Speaker 1: there are any American Indians listening, anyone who has any
Speaker 1: insights direct insights into this Indian princess stereotype, we'd love
Speaker 1: to hear from you. Mom Stuff at how stuff works
Speaker 1: dot Com is our email address you can also tweet
Speaker 1: us at moms a podcast, or messages on Facebook. And
Speaker 1: we've got a couple of messages to share with you
Speaker 1: right now. Okay, I have a letter here from Judith
Speaker 1: about our Girl Gangs episode. She says, I really enjoyed it,
Speaker 1: but I had a few thoughts after listening. I really
Speaker 1: thought that this topic could have been expanded. I know
Speaker 1: you guys have constraints sometimes. This is probably a whole
Speaker 1: other topic. There are women like Griselle de Blanco, who
Speaker 1: was a famous drug lord of the Median cartel and
Speaker 1: one of the first in the cocaine trade of Miami
Speaker 1: during the seventies. She was also known as the Black
Speaker 1: Widow she killed her ex husband's, the cocaine godmother, and
Speaker 1: the queen of narco trafficking. If you look at places
Speaker 1: like Baltimore and d C. There's been an uptick in
Speaker 1: recent years in girl gangs, even as recently as this
Speaker 1: past week when headlines were made in Baltimore. Also, many
Speaker 1: gangs that are formed by women are not necessarily for
Speaker 1: offensive means, but for defense, like in the Pink Sorry
Speaker 1: gang in India, which was created to protect women from
Speaker 1: domestic violence and abuse of all sorts. Or the gang
Speaker 1: of women in Mexico that are protecting others from violent cartels,
Speaker 1: and while not necessarily an organized gang, you also have
Speaker 1: Diana the Hunter Nuarez, who again protects victims of rape
Speaker 1: and abuse. Like I said, I'm a big fan of
Speaker 1: the podcast. I just thought the topic could have been
Speaker 1: fleshed out more along the lines of race, especially in class.
Speaker 1: Thanks guys, and thank you Judith. Um. You bring up
Speaker 1: some really excellent points. Um. You know, we we were
Speaker 1: focusing more on like a specific subset of the whole
Speaker 1: gang issue, but I love your ideas and suggestions, so
Speaker 1: thank you. Well. I've got a letter here from Meredith
Speaker 1: with the incredible subject line quote they that die mades
Speaker 1: will leap apes in Hell? Or why our culture is
Speaker 1: anti spinsters? She writes. I teach British literature at a
Speaker 1: community college in Texas, and while preparing for a class,
Speaker 1: I wrote a poem by Catherine Phillips, a cool lady
Speaker 1: who wrote a married state. Her last line sent me
Speaker 1: on a j store spiral to understand what was going on.
Speaker 1: I came across an old article about the quote and
Speaker 1: the subject line of this email and what exactly it meant.
Speaker 1: It really shed some interesting light on our cultural aversion
Speaker 1: to spinsterhood or virginity in general. The article argues that
Speaker 1: it's all because of the English Reformation and the need
Speaker 1: for the Protestants and Henry the Eighth, as well as
Speaker 1: his children Edward and Elizabeth, to distance the English population
Speaker 1: from quote the Popish practice of celibacy by basically denouncing
Speaker 1: all celibates as heading directly for Hell, and that quote
Speaker 1: he who vows chastity is an infidel. At first, it
Speaker 1: seems to be about both men and women who vow chastity,
Speaker 1: but as so many unpleasant religious and cultural things do,
Speaker 1: it eventually shifts to the idea that maids are the
Speaker 1: one who will be doomed to leap apes around Hell.
Speaker 1: As religious celibacy ends in fifteen thirty six, the need
Speaker 1: to tar priests with this brush ends, and since male
Speaker 1: virginity is so often seen as a joke and also improbable,
Speaker 1: but female virginity is a threat to the order of things,
Speaker 1: it begins to be associated with the social and economic
Speaker 1: burden of old maids. Although luckily this saying is now obsolete,
Speaker 1: it seems to reflect and strengthen the fears are culture
Speaker 1: has had for so long of spinsterhood. I find it
Speaker 1: frustrating and also fascinating that this symbol virginity can be
Speaker 1: at first upheld as an ideal and then disparage as
Speaker 1: something foolish and dangerous. Just another example of an impossible
Speaker 1: dichotomy for women do live up to. So thank you
Speaker 1: Meredith for that fascinating insight from and she even included
Speaker 1: her journal citation from the Journal of American Folklore. And
Speaker 1: if you have any journal citations to send our way
Speaker 1: or just wanna let us know your thoughts, Mom, stop
Speaker 1: at House of Works dot com is our email address
Speaker 1: and for links to all of our social media as
Speaker 1: well as all of our blogs, videos and podcasts, including
Speaker 1: this one with our sources so you can learn more,
Speaker 1: perhaps about the true history of Pocahona's. Head on over
Speaker 1: to stuff Mom Never Told You dot com for moralness
Speaker 1: and thousands of other topics. Does it how stuff Works
Speaker 1: dot com