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zmammalton · Joined: 14 Oct 2009 Posts: 31

Soo Im lovin this book so far.
Each story shows the reader how important animals were in learning and the lives of American Indians.
I found the pleistocene overkill idea relatively interesting because Page introduced it to then say that he didnt believe that it really happened, that in fact the species the American Indians were hunting were in fact already on their way out. I feel as though we have a far greater problem with the overkill nowadays and that it would have been so simple for the Europeans to have learned from the American Indians, but I think that I will end up probably saying that about a million times throughout course of this class.
I think that Page goes over a lot of ideas that are relevant to society and people today, the arrows, the overkill, planting and energy use.
I also found a really interesting correlation between the last story and that of Jesus. The more and more stories I read from indigenous people the more I realize that christianity and other religions that i know vastly less about than christianity. Both idols sacrifice themselves for the "greater good". I find it curious that the same ideas pop up, but that the importance is planting and using nature responsibly, whereas Jesus just gives people shit.

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gaubin · Joined: 10 Feb 2010 Posts: 17

I am also really enjoying this book! I think it is really well written and I like how he lays out all the scientific evidence and conflicts before stating his opinion. I like that he does that because it lets me form an independent opinion from that of Page's. I thought the Pleistocene overkill idea was very interesting but from the beginning when he started to explain the idea I did not believe it. The animals he mentioned like mastodons and mammoths were huge animals and therefore although most Native Americans were skilled hunters I cannot believe that they could make them extinct. Also from what I know about Native Americans most if not all of them were very connected to the animals and only killed them when necessary unlike today when people go out and hunt for sport. So I do not see how the Native Americans would have made them extinct for all of these reasons. When Page talked about the crops especially the corn I found it amazing how one thing can change people's lives so profoundly in a good and bad way. For the Native Americans it seemed like a good thing because it was a regular thing they could depend on and if they needed they could also trade it with other tribes who did not grow corn in exchange for something else. Today I feel like corn and other farm crops are still good because corn is a staple food for so many people but the food industry has taken it to the next level and started destroying the enviroment and the land the Native Americans loved to grow more corn than we need and at a very fast rate. People today need to reflect on how much materlistic things we actually need and where our food comes from. A lot of the way food is grown today hurts the earth because farmers use pesticides and other things and like Zachary said we really need to learn from the Native Americans and take care of the earth.
Do you think that there is anything the Native Americans could have or can learn from Europeans? because we have talked a lot about the Europeans needing to learn from the Native Americans but not the opposite.

IsaacRynowecer · Joined: 17 Nov 2009 Posts: 26

There were a couple parts of the reading that I found particularly interesting. Before Page even mentioned the arguments against the Pleistocene Overkill theory, I thought it seem a little improbable, because he had mentioned that most mammoth remains were from animals that had died naturally. I also thought that it was interesting how things just naturally occur in a way that works, with how the beans and squash provide the necessary amino acid to make corn easier to digest. Another thing I thought was interesting was how incredibly inaccurate all stereotypes of American Indians are, for example plains Indians are almost always portrayed as nomadic hunters, but they actually had thriving communities and agriculture. One thing I like a lot about the book is whenever I have a question about something Page has answered it within a few sentences or paragraphs (so far).

fsadovnikoff · Joined: 10 Feb 2010 Posts: 12

Hi there!
I too enjoy this book for the most part. Page's organization of his information does throw me off from time to time. I really enjoy the actual Native American stories that he puts in. It helps me get a better idea of how the world looked, and may still look, through this group's eyes.
For the Pleistocene Overkill theory, I find it really interesting that of the people that posted so far, none of them believed it to be true. I wonder if anyone found it plausible because clearly there are some anthropologists or what have you that believed that this theory was right. Anyone think it was plausible? To me it does seem a little far-fetched but I don’t know much about Mastodons and Mammoths.
For me the more interesting part of the reading was the later in the section. In this first section Page talks about how the Native Americans would migrate with the bison. This made a lot of sense to me, by following the bison they were assured a steady supply of everything that they needed. What interested me was the fact that the Native Americans started to settle down. I knew that this would happen from what I’ve learned known previously, but it still didn’t make a lot of sense to me why they decided to settle. Like in the case of the people who ate the learned to cook the poisonous plants to make them edible. Page states that it takes “two full days” and “any less, say only thirty-six hours and it works as a powerful emetic.” (pg 45) It seems like it would be a lot easier to continue hunting bison. But it appeared to be the social aspect that had such a strong impact on the Native Americans and made this work worthwhile. At least, that’s how I perceived it.
Lastly quickly I want to say how much I loved the last story. That’s why I took this class, because I find traditional Native American tales enchanting, that last story was not an exception. Smile

CelinaFernandezAyala · Joined: 17 Nov 2009 Posts: 37

So far, there’s been this recurring idea of individualism and community throughout the reading. More specifically, with the rise of agriculture. Isaac mentioned that it “was interesting was how incredibly inaccurate all stereotypes of American Indians are, for example plains Indians are almost always portrayed as nomadic hunters, but they actually had thriving communities and agriculture.” To take that a little further, the reading also specified that there was no “fixed” way of living for Native Americans. In fact, it changed depending on climate and animal behavior. If the animals were less nomadic and the land was fertile, then the group was less nomadic. If not, the group dispersed and life depended more upon the individual. I found this really important because (aside from the stereotyping) it accounts for the difficulty in recording Native American history, and why earlier and earlier evidence of permanent settlement keeps showing up. It’s difficult to record history of a people with a nomadic background, especially when that’s true only half the time (if that).

To address Gigi’s question, I think learning could’ve (and did) happen both ways between the Native Americans and the Europeans. The Europeans learned about the crops and how to cultivate and harvest them. On the other hand, Native Americans could’ve benefited from European weaponry. Yes, technology was part of the reason the Native American population declined, but it probably could’ve helped with hunting. Guns and such are more efficient in hunting, and probably could’ve aided in killing less wastefully. But that’s just my speculation on this. Anyone else have any thoughts?

wdaube · Joined: 10 Feb 2010 Posts: 13

I started to understand why we made those lists about immigration in class after doing this reading. With examples such as people moving to adapt to the climate, primarily to be able to continue to support their business. Overall though, the first part of the reading focused mostly on hunting. I thought that interbreeding seemed to have been the main case for the weakening of the large-animal types, not Pleistocene overkill. But the reading acknowledges this and made that point. The turning point for me was when Page wrote about how archeologists said that killing a single huge animal (mammoth, mastodon, etc.) was a big deal.

One thought I was pondering while reading was how long it was before people felt comfortable moving on from strictly survival activities and onto more recreational, like decorative potting.

More along the lines of what others have been saying (Gigi and Zach about caring for the earth, etc.), the life style of the Native Americans is more focused and shaped around the world and they can't really fight it, they are forced to adapt. Nowadays as Americans, and humans in general, we have many ways of resisting the changes of the world's environment and continue to live (typically) in the same areas and do similar things on a day-to-day basis. For example, in modern day we have ways of preserving fruits to eat and sell in seasons that they wouldn't naturally survive in. I really found the dates and effect of cultivating plants (like corn) had on the people very interesting. Though they did not seem overly popular at the time, later, the found plants like maize would supply a "necessary amino acid" and other such nutrients. In general I found this all very interesting to read, I think partly just because its curious to observe human behavior.

asilver · Joined: 20 Nov 2009 Posts: 28

While the two myths that we read in this section were most likely chosen for their similarity, I was still struck by how similar they were. Both stories featured a person who encounters a super natural food item that dies and is reborn, and its body is used to feed the character and their family.
the interesting part is that these stories come from too wildly different tribes living far away from each other and have completely different life styles.
Its a bit of a stretch, but you could fit Jesus into this storyline too. He is supernatural, he dies and is resurrected, and people eat him (holy communion)
Do you think this is a real trend or just a coincidence, and why?

cooper · Joined: 12 Feb 2010 Posts: 11

ok so it took me like 20 minutes to log on cuz i couldn't rember my password so this muight be short.

I love this book, probably partly because i love science and field guides and facts and that is very much this guys writing style. He presents a lot of information through what has been found and what the speculation is for the specific purpose of the object or what not was uncovered. He set's all the little stories of daily life up like they are how animals interact and behave, which is why i love it. When hes talking about the buffulo its almost like he is describing the evidence of hunting and then explaining how these small scratches in a tree explain how cheetas hunt or something.
The whole section about the oven was a perfect example of taking a little fact or story and taking it to a greater level. Some archeologists discovered like a bunch of rocks in a weird shape and one of them looked big( the heat sink) and suddenly they all know that american indians have been using ovens. Not only that they have also found some plant that is related to agave the lechuguilla and they decide that this was like an extremely important tradition they had. Which says a lot about this specific tribe/fa,mily and the time period. you can learn alot from just a little information.

cbrandweinfryar · Joined: 10 Feb 2010 Posts: 12

So I'm also really enjoying this book. I loved the two stories. I think that even though they were similar, they were also a bit different...like the first story it was more the man experiencing the life as the prey, instead of living as the hunter. In the second story it was the story of how corn was made! That was probably my favorite, I don't think I've ever read a story about how a food "came to be."
I feel like I've heard stories before about the hunter becoming the hunted and realizing that they should have never treated the prey like that. (anyone seen brother bear? eh? eh?) He's turned into a bear, almost like in this myth!
I've come to really like the way the author writes, I like how he'll talk about something and then pause and tell us one of the myths that relates to the topic he's talking about. I'm definitely with....fsadovnikoff on this one, I think that's Nate haha but I love all of the myths and stories that come from Native American culture.
Another one of my favorite parts of this reading was also the oven part. It's amazing to think about how they thought of a great idea like that and put it to great use. I feel like nowadays people invent more intricate tools in order to one up each other and claim that they invented the best. I can't imagine something being made presently making as big as an impact on us as the oven did on them.

So I have a question for everyone, and it'll take some imagination! Haha but if a historian was writing a book about our generation, what do you think the next 'revolution' will be? Jake Page talked about how that oven was the "agricultural revolution" what do you think about ours? If you think we'll even have one with such an impact.

Kai · Joined: 10 Feb 2010 Posts: 13

On the pleistocene overkill, it seems pretty unlikely that humans were solely responsible for the extinction of an entire species. It's not too unreasonable to think that today we can and do kill off species, but the way people lived then had much less of an impact on the planet. It seems like the mastodons were pretty screwed anyway from the information about the climate change. Add on that they were absolutely enormous and it's much harder to sustain a viable population of animals that weigh 8 tons than animals of a normal weight...it seems pretty inevitable. People hunting them probably didn't help, but it's hard to believe that was the sole cause. This could be totally wrong, but I think they probably killed more than we know though. The book talked about how most mastodon remains people have found died of natural causes, but almost every part of an animal can be used for something. If they were using everything from the fur to the organs (cool thing--some Alaskan tribes make bags out of walrus stomachs), we probably aren't going to find much for remains of mastodons that they killed.

I thought the part on page 42 about the rooms with the bison skulls, supposedly from a shaman, was really interesting. It seems to me like the whole thing with hunting the bison with these corrals would be a pretty big deal, and probably something people looked forward to, but there was still someone making sure everything was done right and any religious rituals that needed to be done were done. It seems like religion was pretty much daily life instead of like...saying your prayers at night and on sundays. I hope we get to learn more about American Indian religions Smile

And to Chelsea...YES IT MADE ME THINK OF BROTHER BEAR TOO. So. good.

athornton · Joined: 18 Nov 2009 Posts: 23

So i agree with Kai on the pleistocene overkill subject. I think that it is hard to believe that humans back then could have lead the the complete destruction of a species, especially one so big. However I think that they definitely killed more than they needed. Not as much as we do now but I cant see every single native american being completely for the whole "take what you need" idea. And I think that people often think they need more than they actually do.
Like everyone else, I am really enjoying how this book is written. Its not too much information and it is split up into nice segments so I never feel like im getting overwhelmed with information. I also like the examples and stories that he chooses to use. I think they are all interesting and they all fit with what he is saying.
To try and answer Chelsea's question, I think there are many things that are very useful ideas or objects but I dont know if any of them will have as much impact as the oven did. I think that many things have already been created that make our lives easier that it would be hard to come up with another thing that we "need" that would greatly improve life. I couldnt come up with one but maybe someone else will.

So like Kai i'm also interested in learning about religion and how it fit in with their lives. I wonder if the religion differed as much as the languages did, because they seemed all over the place.

pgui · Joined: 17 Nov 2009 Posts: 36

I just caught up on the reading from last night as well as tonight so the first 30 pages are fresh on my mind. Specifically the creation stories I found interesting we talked about them briefly in class but I thought it was really amazing how similar some of them were. Where did this idea of land coming out of the water come from? Also the consistant theme of animals in the stories was amazingly similar. I do not know too much about Christianity however I can see how similar they are in some ways. The idea of water being present on the entire surface of the earth seems so arbitrary to me and yet it is so consistent. I wonder why the differences that do exist are there. In Native American stories there always seem to be animals and they are quite connected with humans. In Western religions there always seems to be an intentional disconnect between humans and animals. I found the story on page 16 to be especially opposite of Western religion. "They changed form and grew fur like dogs, wolves, and bears"..."By the time they had arrived in the third world, they had become people," This seems very similar to the theory of evolution.

Kai I also found the sculls on page 42 interesting. It seems as though the Natives were hunting many bison than I thought. And the fact that this was tied into their religion seemed practical. I too hope we spend time learning about the religions. I would like to know how the religions of the Natives compare to each other.

GarceDrinkwater · Joined: 12 Feb 2010 Posts: 10

-This book is really catching my interest! I thought it was interesting how few people believed the Pleistocene Overkill to be untrue. I think it could definitely have some truth to it. As I was reading this part I got all philosophical and was thinking how weird it was that (If this were true) humans were causing animals to go extinct back then and we still are now. It seems like nothing has really changed for us. Maybe 11,000 years from now some kids will be reading about how we killed off many species.
-The section later on about agriculture and such was really interesting because their diet looks very healthy to me. Beans, berries, bison, corn. Thats a pretty balanced diet and i cant help but wonder if our bodies started out needing these food groups or if they adjusted over time to need them. Food for thought.

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