ESL and American Indians

It was a spirit of survival and perseverance that carried the Cherokee to Indian Territory on the Trail of Tears. Today, it is the same spirit leading the Cherokee.

–The Cherokee Nation-Date Unknown-

PRE-READING DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

Before you read the history of the Cherokee, consider the following situation:

Imagine that your country passed a law proclaiming that all of the land that you and your family had lived on for many years now belonged to the government. In addition to this you and your family were forced to leave your home under military supervision! With your group discuss the possible actions you might take in this situation.

Consider the title of the reading selection The Long Trail of Tears, and also consider this list of words and phrases taken from the reading: English settlers, conflict, treaty, firearms, territory, gold, U.S. government. Based on this information, develop a scenario which reflects what you imagine happened to the Cherokee.

The Cherokee: A Concise History

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1. The Cherokee people are believed to have settled into their ancestral homeland in the southeastern United States sometime before 1,500 years ago. Linguists classify the Cherokee language as Iroquoian, but it is a distant cousin of present-day Iroquoian languages, suggesting that the Cherokee people gradually split off from the more northern Iroquois a long time ago. They slowly developed an extensive system of villages covering much of present-day western North and South Carolina, north Georgia, and eastern Tennessee, with a population estimated at 22,500 by 1650.
2. Villages scattered across this region were typically a hard day’s walk apart. The economy of the Cherokee inhabitants was based on agriculture supplemented with hunting and gathering of natural foods. But the economy also involved creation of clothing, decoration, baskets, pottery, tools, and weapons, together with trade for these items, often over long distances. Houses evolved from early woven branches and mud to substantial log cabins with smoke holes and doors.
3. The first contact between the Cherokee and Europeans occurred in the 1540s when Hernando De Soto, the Spanish conqueror of Peru, led an army of exploration and conquest from Florida up through Cherokee territory and into the central United States, primarily searching for gold and other riches. De Soto died of fever on the banks of the Mississippi River in 1542. Other Spanish expeditions entered the territory at long intervals over the next 100 years, and the fact that much of the Cherokee territory lay in the Appalachian Mountains tended to minimize the contact between the Cherokee and the Spanish.
4. During the 1600’s, contact and conflict grew between the Cherokee and the English settlers growing outward from the Virginia colonies. During this period the Cherokee and tribes acquired firearms, and also substantially fortified their towns. This period was a tangled web of wars and alliances between Indian tribes including the Cherokee, Tuscarora, Creeks, Chickasaw, and Shawnee. There were also conflicts between the Indians, the British, the French, and the American colonists. Then the first smallpox epidemic, probably brought to Carolina by slave ships, broke out about 1738, and had a devastating effect on the Cherokee as well as other tribes because they had no natural immunity. During the American Revolutionary War of 1775–1783, the Cherokee and many of the other tribes sided with the British against the colonists.
5. Following the British defeat, some groups of Cherokee moved west of the Mississippi River to reside in Spanish territory, primarily in present-day Arkansas. This territory was ceded by Spain to France, and shortly thereafter, Napoleon sold it to the new United States as part of the Louisiana Purchase. Immediately from that time, President Thomas Jefferson and the Congress put steadily increasing pressure on all of the eastern tribes to move west of the Mississippi river into the new territory.
6. Even during this difficult time, Cherokee culture continued to grow and flourish. Between 1809-1821, the deservedly famous Cherokee scholar Sequoyah, after observing a book for the first time and referring to it as Talking Leaves invented a syllabic alphabet (a “syllabary”) for the spoken Cherokee language, and used that to establish a system of writing Cherokee. Within several years, it was in wide use in the Cherokee nation, and a newspaper, the Cherokee Phoenix, began publication using Sequoyah’s syllabary in 1828. This was the first American Indian newspaper published in the United States.
7. The pressure to move west increased, and only became worse when gold was discovered on Cherokee lands in North Georgia in 1828. The U.S. Congress passed the Indian Removal Act in 1830, but the U.S Supreme Court ruled that the Cherokee were a sovereign nation and removal could only be archived via negotiated treaties. Unfortunately, political divisions among the Cherokee led to the signing of just such a document by a small minority of Cherokee. Despite the fact that the Cherokee had fought with him in the Creek War (1813-14) and reputedly saved his life, then-President Andrew Jackson exploited this signing to use the U.S Army to force the removal of the Cherokee people from the east to new territories in Oklahoma. This episode has become known as the infamous Trail of Tears. More than 17,000 Cherokee were forced to move over 2,200 miles, and more than 4,000 died in the process.
8. The Indian Removal Act applied to Cherokees living on communally owned tribal land. Cherokees who lived on private land along with some others who had evaded the army, continued living in the Great Smoky Mountains of North Carolina, and their descendants today constitute the Eastern Band Cherokees. The Western Band Cherokees, located in Oklahoma, derive from those who made the march. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, the western group was still plagued by conflicts with settlers for lands, and both bands suffered from misguided government policies, including the forced education of Indian children in government boarding schools away from home, and from attempts to discourage use of the Cherokee language.
9. Today, the majority of the Cherokee Nation reside in western Oklahoma. They have their own schools and an excellent educational system. The tribe also does well in business and economic development. They are the second largest tribe in the United States, with over 200,000 tribal members. They have the sovereign right to exercise control over all tribal assets.

Exercise 1 Vocabulary Practice

Directions: The following vocabulary words are from the reading selection you’ve just finished. Find and highlight each of the following words in the paragraphs indicated in parenthesis, then infer the meanings from the context. Highlight any additional words that you aren’t familiar with and do the same with those. Check your answers with your group members, then refer to your dictionary or thesaurus to confirm your guesses.

Word Paragraph

1. ancestral (1)
2. Linguists (1)
3. Iroquoian (1)
4. agriculture (2)
5. supplemented (2
6. evolved (2)
7. substantial (2)
8. smoke holes (2)
9. expeditions (3)
10. intervals (3)

Exercise 2 Discussion Questions for Comprehension

1. What evidence was there that the Cherokee people originated from the Northern Iroquois?
2. What did the early Cherokee economy consist of?
3. Describe the first dwellings of the Cherokee.

Exercise 3 Questions for Reflection and Discussion

1. During the 1600s numerous wars occurred between the Cherokee and other American Indian tribes. What do you think caused those wars?
2. Why were the Americans, British and the French also at war with the Indians?
3. What made the Cherokee side with the British during the American Revolutionary War (1775-83)?
4. Why were the Cherokee children forbidden to speak their language and forced to learn English during the 1800s and 1900s?

Exercise 4 Research Activities

Directions: Choose a person or an event from the following list for research and prepare a presentation for class or for group discussion.

• Sequoyah
• The Indian Removal Act
• The Trail of Tears

Exercise 5 Writing Activities

1. Write an essay in which you express your opinion on the events leading up to and including the Trail of Tears.
2. Write an essay in which you discuss the small pox epidemic and the effect it had on the Cherokee and other tribes.

Sources:

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• Cherokee History (Lee Sultzman)
• Cherokee History Resources on the Web

A Cherokee Myth

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Just as their forefathers did in the past, Cherokees today enjoy telling stories. Many of these myths usually have a moral for young ones to learn. A good many of these wonderful stories involve animals who possess human characteristics…including human flaws, as the following story demonstrates.

Possum Loses His Hair

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Possum had a long bushy tail. He was very proud of it, combing it out every day. If anyone came over to his house, he would show off his tail right away. Coyote didn’t like this. Everyone laughed at Coyote’s tail. They said it was all scratchy and full of weeds and dirt.

One time the Animal People decided to have a council and a big dance. They told Coyote to spread the news. Coyote went by to see Possum. Possum said, “It must be where everyone can see my fine tail, I will dance with my tail if you give me a special place.”

“You come along then,” said Coyote. “We’ll have a special place for you. I will even send Cricket over to comb your tail out and dress it all up for the dance.” Possum was very pleased with this offer. Coyote went over to see Cricket and they had a talk. Cricket was the best haircutter anyone knew.

In the morning, Cricket went over to see Possum and told him he was there to fix up his tail for the dance. Possum stretched out and Cricket went to work. When he was all through combing and smoothing the hairs, he wrapped Possum’s tail in a bright red string.

Cricket said, “Possum, this string will keep all the hairs smooth until the dance. When you get to the council and it’s time to dance then you can take the string off.” When it was night Possum went to the lodge where the dance was to be and found that the best seat was ready for him. When it came his turn to dance, he loosened the string and stepped out into the middle of the floor.

The drummers began drumming and Possum began singing, “See my beautiful tail!” Everyone shouted and Possum danced around and around. “See how fine the fur is!” The people shouted more loudly than before and began laughing. “Look how it sweeps the ground!” All the people were laughing now and Possum was wondering what it meant.

He stopped dancing and looked around at the circle of animals. They were all laughing at him. Then he looked at his tail. There wasn’t any hair on it at all! His tail looked like Lizard’s tail. Cricket had cut off all the hairs at the root and now they were scattered all over the dance floor.

Possum was so astonished and ashamed that he didn’t say anything. He rolled over on his back and grinned at everyone. Possum still does this when he’s caught by surprise.

Exercise 1. Vocabulary Practice

Directions: With a partner, reread the myth and highlight the following words from the reading. Match the words from the myth with their meanings by placing the letter of the word next to the meaning.

Exercise 2. Reading Comprehension- Recalling the Characters

Directions: Without rereading the myth, match the character to his phrases. Then check your answers in the reading.

Characters:

• Story Teller
• Possum
• Coyote
• Cricket
• Animal People

“Everyone shouted and Possum danced around and around.”____

“Look how it sweeps the ground! Ha! Ha! Ha!”____

“Possum, this string will keep all the hairs smooth until the dance.”____

“I will even send Cricket over to comb your tail out and dress it all up for the dance.”____

“When it came his turn to dance, he loosened the string and stepped out into the middle of the floor.”____

“See my beautiful tail!”____

“The people shouted more loudly than before and began laughing.”____

“See how fine the fur is!”____

“Possum was so astonished and ashamed that he didn’t say anything.”__

Exercise 3. Using Adjectives to Describe Emotions

Directions: The myth you’ve just read deals with the topic of feelings. Think about how different situations can affect the way you sometimes feel. The following sentences describe situations that can affect how you feel. Read a sentence and then either choose one of the words from the list below or supply your own word to describe how you would feel. You may use a word more than once.

Example:

If you slipped and fell, and everyone laughed, you would probably feel angry.

Situations:

1. You are coming out of the store with a bundle of shopping bags, and somebody bumped into you without saying, “Excuse me”.
2. You just found out you won 5,000 dollars!
3. Your lover brings you a beautiful flower, and it isn’t even your birthday.
4. It’s a beautiful sunny day and everyone you see smiles at you!
5. You have just heard that one of your relatives has had an accident.
6. Your best friend tells you she/he really desires your boyfriend/girlfriend.
7. You have just received the highest grade in your class!

Word List:

• proud
• love
• embarrassed
• worried
• excited
• happy
• angry
• jealous