The Hopi : A Case Study Of The Hopi

Navajo culture distinctively took hold in the four corners area of the Colorado Plateau around 100 A.D., although they are believed to have been around for centuries before then. Disliking the term “Navajo Indians”, they refer to themselves as the “Diné” which means “The People” or “Children of the Holy People”.

The perception of evil for the Navajo and Hopi widely differs from what our culture believes. To us, you can either be good or evil but not both. We see a split and think that a person is just bad, whereas the Navajo and Hopi cultures have views that are less severe to the individual in question. The Navajo believe that what distinguishes good from evil is control, because acts can be both good and evil. When something has little ability to be controlled by man, the situation has a higher likelihood of being evil.

speak with a certain eloquence. They tell of a people adept at building, artistic, in

The Navajo are the largest federally recognized Native American Indian tribe in the United States. The Diné Bikéyah or “Navajoland" encompasses 27,000 square miles residing within Arizona, Utah, and New Mexico and contains a population of over 220,000 natives. The

The Navajo Indian is the largest tribe in North America, how did their culture develop over time and where are they today in regards to modern times?

When first considering the Navajo-Hopi land dispute as a topic of research, I anticipated a relatively light research paper discussing the local skirmishes between the two tribes. However, my research has yielded innumerable volumes of facts, figures and varying viewpoints on a struggle that has dominated the two tribes for over 100 years. The story is an ever-changing one, evolving from local conflict to forcible relocation to big business interests. The incredible breadth of the dispute's history makes it impossible to objectively cover the entire progression from all viewpoints. I will therefore focus on current issues - and their historical causes - facing the two tribes as they mutually approach

The Navajo Indians used to live in northwestern Canada and Alaska. 1,000 years ago the Navajo Indians traveled south, because there was more qualities they had seeked there. When the Navajo Indians traveled south there was a lot of oil in the 1940’s. Today the Navajo Indians are located in the Four Corners.

The Hopi Indians are Native Americans who lived on 1.5 million acres of reservation in Northeastern Arizona. In the beginning, the Hopi Indians were a hunting and gathering group divided into small groups that lived in pit houses. (A pit-house is a building that is partly dug into the ground and covered by a roof.) Around 700 A.D. the Hopi Indians became an agricultural tribe by growing blue ears of corn by using runoff from the mesas.(A mesa is an isolated flat-topped hill with steep sides.). In the late 1200’s a ginormous drought forced 36 of the 47 villages on the Hopi mesas to be abandoned. Following the massive drought, the 11 remaining villages increased in size where then three new villages were established in Northeastern Arizona.

In terms of nomos, the Hopis’ religion served just as well as any could have. At birth babies are born onto sacred sand. When they need rain for crops, the Katcinas dance in the plaza. To live a healthy life and bear many children, Hopi’s have intercourse with the Salt Woman. These rituals and traditions make sense to the Hopi and provide mental security. It shields them from terror and imposes a meaningful order upon reality, as put in The Sacred Canopy. The Hopi can use their religion to eschew helplessness and a fear of being spiritually alone in the world. It provides them with answers and makes them calm and happy. These qualities make their religion successful as defined by The Sacred Canopy’s requirement of nomization for a meaningful life.

- Hopi and Zuni in AZ and NM built large planned towns and traded as far as Miss R and Mexico

Though today, the Blackfoot territory is defined by reserve/reservation boundaries and divided by the United States-Canadian border, their homeland, Nitawahsinnanni (“our land”), continues to be defined by topographical features using their language (The Blackfoot Gallery Committee, 2013, 12). This traditional homeland spans from the North Saskatchewan River (Ponokasisahta, the Elk River) as far south as the Yellowstone River, Montana (Otahkoitahtayi) and from the Rocky Mountains as far East as the “Great Sand Hills

The Navajo, also known as the Diné, are one of the largest Native American Tribes in the world. Their culture is made up of very distinct and unique characteristics that have been passed down from generation to generation. They have been taught to adapt to their surroundings and to the land. Each moral, standard, belief and value are what make the Navajo so unique to the Native Americans. In the following, their primary mode of subsistence, kinship system, beliefs, values, and economic organizations will be briefly examined to gain a better knowledge of the Navajo culture.

Arizona’s historical development dates back to thousands of years ago. Arizona holds the second largest amount of indigenous/ Native American population of any other state in the United States. One of the first groups of people to live on Arizona’s land was the Native Americans, or otherwise called the American Indians. These Natives came much before any of the Europeans, or the Spanish settlers came to Arizona. There were three main Native American groups that truly began the exploration of Arizona. These groups include the Anasazi, Hohokam, and Mogollon tribes. Each of their tribes settled in different sections of Arizona ranging from Northeastern to Southeastern parts of the land.

The world view of the Navajo who had lived for many centuries on the high Colorado Plateau was one of living in balance with all of nature, as the stewards of their vast homeland which covered parts of four modern states. They had no concept of religion as being something separate from living day to day and prayed to many spirits. It was also a matriarchal society and had no single powerful leader as their pastoral lifestyle living in scattered independent family groups require no such entity. This brought them repeatedly into conflict with Spanish, Mexicans and increasingly by the mid-nineteenth century, Americans as these practices were contrary to their male dominated religiously monolithic societal values. The long standing history

On this journey through this essay on the Truth of a Hopi, it will be illustrated the reasons for the Hopis migration and the establishment of new communities. The journey will take a look into such communities established relating to Oraibi, Hotevilla, and Bacabi. This journey will show how persistent the theme of migration is in Hopi oral history.