Onondaga Myth: The Earth On Turtle's Back

All stories illustrate the beginning, with value and insight; indigenous knowledge is innately given. In an indigenous worldview, knowledge comes from the creator and from creation itself. The Haudenosaunee people are given principles to explicate for appropriate conduct to all of creation and its beings. The creation story illustrates that all of creation has a responsibility in growth, development, and sustainability; the great law of peace demonstrates how to live a “good mind”; the good message describes how to treat one another; the original instructions depict between the right and wrong doing’s; the symbolism of the wampum belts explicates the history of the Haudenosaunee people. These principles instruct humanity and assigns roles and

In the documentary, “The Split Horn: Life of a Hmong Shaman in America,” portrays the journey of an immigrant Hmong family battling to maintain their cultural traditions alive in the United States. In the Hmong culture, it is believed that every individual has seven souls and if they have an illness, for example sickness, it means that their soul has departed or taken by evil spirits. Hmong people believe in Shamans, who are gifted and respected people who can make contact with their ancestors and return the lost souls of people. In this documentary, the main character Paja Thao is a shaman who is challenged by American customs to keep his cultural Hmong traditions alive and pass it down to his children. Paja becomes sick because he feels like his children don’t care about the Hmong tradition anymore because they don’t participate in his rituals and realizes his children have assimilated to the American culture. The different ways one can look at Paja’s illness is by acknowledging the Hmong culture and by looking at the perspective of the biomedical world.

Ranging from the south Alleghenies mountain range all the way down to the south of Georgia and far west of Alabama, lived the Cherokee Indians. They were a powerful detached tribe of the Iroquoian family and were commonly called Tsaragi which translates into "cave people." This tribe was very prominent in what is now called the U.S, but over time has been split up or run out of their land because of social or political encounters with the new settlers from Europe. Despite the dispersion or the split amongst this tribe, they still obtained their core religious beliefs, practices and ceremonies. Their detailed belief system, fundamental beliefs, significant meanings, and their connection to song and dance make up their religious system. The early

Throughout history, many different people have wondered how life on Earth started. Different cultures came up with many different ideas on how life was created and used these ideas to create stories. Today we call these stories origin myths. The Native Americans had many different origin myths. Almost every tribe had their own individual story. “The Earth On The Turtle's Back” by the Onondaga tribe, “When The Grizzlies Walked Upright” by the Modoc tribe, and “The Navajo Origin Legend” by the Navajo tribe are all myths that explain how life was put here on Earth. In all three of these origin myths, the Native Americans show a great amount of respect towards nature and their deities.

The Mapuche people’s spiritual beliefs is closely linked to their natural environment. Their religion is guided by the Machi. The Machi are spiritual leaders that are typically women, the also can be men. Their job is to communicate will the celestial family to maintain the harmony and to combat the powers of evil. With the sacred Kultrun, a drum, the Machi’s use their supernatural powers during their religious ceremonies to chase away evil and to ask for wellbeing. Some Machi’s jobs are only spiritual while others are in charge curing their people any from illnesses by using their supernatural powers and knowledge of medicine. They believe that no man, animal or even an insect can live without the will of the great spirit. They have great respect for nature and must ask permission and give thanks to Mapun Kuse-Fucha when they receive nature 's

In the World on the Turtle´s Back the Iroquois wanted to emphasize how there was a Sky World, with people that had extravagant beliefs that explained how good and evil balanced everything in their life. This peculiar place had different gods, like Iroquois. They believed in weird thing for example they believed that a Great tree was the center of their universe. The Great Tree wasn’t a habitual tree, it was huge and had been in that place forever. In this Sky World, there was this woman that seemed to break the rules and desire things that are off limit. She practically forced her husband to get her what she wanted from the Great Tree, ending in an unfortunate event in which the pregnant woman felt from the Sky World. This stubborn woman got pregnant by a bizarre man that placed two arrows across her body. What she didn’t know is that she was expecting opposite twins, the white side and the dark side. Since the moment the twins where in their mother´s belly they caused her trouble.

“The Earth on Turtle’s Back,” a story from the Onondaga tribe, an original Native American group, is a myth which relates a story about the beginning of the world. Water is below the Skyland and it becomes an issue when the Great Tree is uprooted. Earth is located beneath the water, and the wife of the Ancient Chief falls through the hole left by the uprooted tree. The animals who live in the water know she is from the Skyland and that she cannot survive in the water. The muskrat saves her by diving into action and bringing the Earth up to the surface. Once the muskrat comes up, she puts Earth on the turtle’s back. After the Earth was placed on the turtle’s back, the wife drops seeds she was holding from the Great Tree onto the land. “The two Swans brought the Sky Woman down. She stepped

The Shoshone Native Americans are a peaceful, ancient tribe. Direct descendants from the Newe(people), they are a culture that prefers peaceful hunting and gathering to attacking other tribes. They have beautiful clothing, multiple religions and ceremonies, and men and women were treated as equals. They have lived in the Midwest for hundreds of years, and will continue to live there for hundreds more.

Although Wangero uses the oppression of her people as a reason to reject her roots. Later on Walker let us see that she really disliked her culture and did not want to feel attached to it.

The stories “The World on the Turtles Back” by the Iroquois, and The Way to Rainy Mountain by N. Scott Momaday discuss two different creation myths. “The World on The Turtles Back” is an Iroquois legend that has been passed down from generation to generation by word of mouth, making it an oral tradition. A creation myth is a traditional story that involves supernatural beings or events that explain how the some aspect of human nature or the natural world came to be. These myths have comparable aspects that are specifically the roles of men, women, animals, and nature.

The Iroquois people are one of the earliest cultures in American history, Their culture remains filled with an abundance of myths and legends that explain the nature of life itself. Their creation story, The World On Turtle 's Back, outlines not only the creation of Earth, but also the complex nature of people. The legend states that the Earth resided on the back of a great sea turtle, constituted first by a pregnant woman. The daughter of whom would birth the twins who would become the duality of deceit and order in every living being. This legend has been passed down through the generations, first through oral tradition and later translated to writing. Native-American Literature Scholars, Larry Evers and Paul Pavlich believe that such stories "remind the people of who and what they are, why they are in this particular place, and how then should continue to live here." The story of the World on Turtle 's Back effectuates these qualities through the significant cultural traditions of the Iroquois tribe, as well as the ways that the culture views the world.

Have you ever wondered how Native Americans believe the world came to be? Both stories include the elements that make the world balanced. The stories “World on the Turtle's Back” and “The Menominee” both include the importance of nature and animals. Also, their beliefs on what makes things good and evil. Finally, they include how the gods created man, woman, and earth. While some differences between “World on the Turtle’s Back” and “The Menominee” are obvious, the similarities are salient.

Between 600 and 1450 religion in the Middle East changed in that of major splits and new religion emerging; however the status of women seem to remain the same. There are three major religions that had a major impact on the Middle East. Judaism is the monotheistic religion of the Jews, it originated in Canaah Israel and Palestanian territories. Christianity is another major religion that originated in the Middle East. Later on the church was split into different groups. The last major religion is Islam. Islam is the one religion that had the most affect on the region.

When the Puritans got to Plymouth Rock they saw a vast land filled with “red skinned savages.” They did not agree on whose land this was and there creation stories were a bit different as well. The Native Americans like every civilization in the world have a creation story. The creation stories tell the origins of the world as they believe it begun. Native American stories were not written and kept a record of they were passed down orally, they are essentially the indians version of the bible. The Indians and Puritans culturistic views on how earth begun are different and similar to each other.