Tag: kinship

Anthropology, General History, Native Issues, Oregon indians3 Comments

We Tricked them-We Are All One People

David G. Lewis, PhD

Aunt Pat in a low whispering voice was speaking to me before a Culture Committee meeting at Grand Ronde. Pat Allen was the chair and I was vice-chair, and I had learned not too much earlier that Pat and I are distantly related through the Tom family, probably called shirt-tail cousins among the rez folks. Pat had become a close confidant and had grown up at the Warm Springs Reservation along with her sister Cheryle Kennedy, the tribal chair. Their mother and father had met during the WWII at the Kaiser shipyards, formed a bond and moved to Warm Springs … Continue reading We Tricked them-We Are All One People

Anthropology, columbia river, General History, Kalapuya, Oregon indians1 Comment

Native Kinships and Wealth among the Middle Chinookans

David G. Lewis, PhD

Native kinships are incredibly complex. They do not follow the nice neat patterns of kinship that Americans have adopted from their European ancestors. Native peoples did not marry inside their own tribes, but were influenced by societal norms to marry someone from outside of the tribe. People born of royalty were encouraged to or arranged to marry royalty in other tribes and in this manner leadership roles and genealogies were kept within certain families. It can safely be said that all of the tribes in a particular region are all interrelated with one another by Native laws of marriage. But … Continue reading Native Kinships and Wealth among the Middle Chinookans

Native Issues, Oregon indians, Uncategorized, Willamette Valley1 Comment

Marriage Kinship among the Willamette Valley Tribes

David G. Lewis, PhD

Much is still not known about how marriages were arranged among the Kalapuya-Mollala-Clackamas tribes. Hints appear in ethnographic literature that still needs to be tracked down to greater specificity.  Generally, it is known that many marriages were arranged by the tribal chiefs and headmen. These arranged marriages were along political and economic lines of reasoning. It was considered preferable to marry your daughter to the son of a Chief of the Clackamas tribe, so that trade for dried salmon would be assured to include good prices and perhaps added benefits. Such marriages cemented relationships in the region so that they … Continue reading Marriage Kinship among the Willamette Valley Tribes