Dr. David Childs, Ph.D.
Northern Kentucky University
One of the most important ideals in a democratic society is to give voice to people from every sector of society. As it relates to Thanksgiving, Native Americans are often inaccurately portrayed in historical accounts of the holiday. Indeed, American Indians are one of the most often neglected ethnic groups in the United States. Much of their culture and history has been overlooked and even lost because of racial prejudice. During the Thanksgiving holiday we can take the “opportunity to learn about First Nations and the important role they played in American history and in present times.” While Thanksgiving in the US is a celebration of family and a time for feasting, it can also be a time to learn about and share a more historically accurate account of its origins and further explore Native American history. In an article posted last Thanksgiving we addressed some of the historical inaccuracies presented in popular history. Some of the information presented in our previous article is presented below.
“Often the narrative we learn about the first Thanksgiving is overly simplistic, historically inaccurate and censored. We hear a good deal about the Pilgrims coming to North America for religious freedom (Which of course was true). But we also learn that the Pilgrims wore austere black clothing with shoes and silver buckles. This was not true at all. Their clothing was much more colorful and cheerful. Furthermore, it is often thought that Europeans and Native American share a mutual reverence for the Thanksgiving holiday. In reality, the holiday for the Native Americans is a reminder of betrayal and blood shed by the Europeans.”
In a recent article we focused on the establishment of Indigenous People’s Day. The holiday was established to challenge the notion of Columbus Day and critique the life of Christopher Columbus, bringing attention to the atrocities he committed against Native Americans. The Indigenous People’s holiday was birthed out of The Indigenous Peoples Movement, which is a movement that focuses on an overall celebration of the culture and history of Native Americans. In the spirit of learning more about first nations, we can point to our Thanksgiving article from last year on the Democracy and Me site. We offered more history and information about Native American culture. See below:
“Many people do not realize that there are currently 573 federally recognized Native American tribes in the United States. There is a wide range of diverse Native American cultures and languages spoken today in North America. There are roughly 150 Native American languages still spoken in modern times and many of the old traditions are still maintained on reservations (Sovereign tribal lands)…. Furthermore, there is not a great deal taught in public schools about those Native Americans who already lived in the Plymouth Rock region before the settlers came. The tribe that the European settlers feasted with on that fateful day in 1621 were called the Wampanoag Indians (Also more correctly written as Wôpanâak). Often when we think about Native Americans or First Nation peoples we think about history and the past only. But the Wampanoag are alive and well today. During the 1600’s the Wampanoag were several tribes that were loosely aligned, but today many are a part of two federally recognized tribes; the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe and the Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head in Massachusetts. At the time the Pilgrims arrived there were approximately 40,000 Wampanoag people, but today as a result of genocide and disease there are only about 4,000-5,000 Wampanoag Indians. Even though the Indians rescued the Pilgrims from starvation and exposure when they first arrived, the Europeans went on to still systematically massacre them for their land and resources.
For a more in-depth discussion of this topic please check out our previous article entitled Thanksgiving and the Wampanoag People: Native American Culture in the Past, Present and Future. The article contains a number of teacher resources and lesson plans around the study of Thanksgiving history as well as Native American culture. A recent New York Times article entitled Everything You Learned About Thanksgiving Is Wrong also offers a wonderful historical essay and addresses more of the myths of the first Thanksgiving and offers more of an authentic history.
Resources and References
Wampanoag Homesite
https://www.plimoth.org/what-see-do/wampanoag-homesite
Wampanoag People
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Wampanoag
Wampanoag History
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wampanoag
First Thanksgiving (National Geographic)
https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/explore/history/first-thanksgiving/
1620s Daily Life: The Wampanoag and the Pilgrims (Fictional Dialogue with Wampanoag and Pilgrims.)
https://www.scholastic.com/teachers/articles/teaching-content/1620s-daily-life/
Federal Registry (Bureau of Indian Affairs)
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2018-07-23/pdf/2018-15679.pdf.
Most Common Native American Languages (by number of speakers today).
http://www.native-languages.org/most-spoken.htm
North American Indian languages
https://www.britannica.com/topic/North-American-Indian-languages
7 Most Popular Native American Languages in U.S.
https://tinyurl.com/ya77ujhy
List of Indian reservations in the United States
https://tinyurl.com/ydfq3cac
Maps of United States Indians by State
http://www.native-languages.org/states.htm
More Lesson Plans
Native American History Lesson Plans:
http://www.discoveryeducation.com/teachers/free-lesson-plans/native-american-history.cfm
Native American History and Culture Lesson Plans
https://www.scholastic.com/teachers/collections/teaching-content/native-american-heritage-0/
It is extremely disheartening to me that we teach our students inaccurate information about the first Thanksgiving. Students should be taught accurate events and should be censured in a way that it still teaches them about what really happened, but also still teaches them the actual events that occurred. Furthermore, students should learn that the first Thanksgiving was not a peaceful time between the Europeans and Native Americans. Learning history is important for students, but learning accurate, truthful, and uncensored (depending on age) information is even more important because history isn’t all flowers and daisies and learning about this hardship and help students to grow as citizens and make positive decisions about how to help their community in a meaningful way.
As a little kid, I loved Thanksgiving and always looked forward to it. I loved coloring pictures of Native Americans and the Pilgrims and creating turkeys with our hands. To me, Thanksgiving was a time of celebrating and being with family. If you look at it from an Indigenous person’s perspective, they see it as a day of betrayal and genocide. In school we always talked about the great feast the Natives and Pilgrims had together but we never talked about what happened after that day. That is a common reoccurrence in American History. It’s important to show the full truth to our students because I never knew the full story until I got older.
The mistreatment and brutality that Native Americans have had to endure has often been treated as a historical issue. Yet, present day injustices exist, such as lack of federal funding from the nation we built around them. I personally was unaware that Thanksgiving serves as a reminder of the injustices Native Americans have faced as a result of settlers. Although discretion may be necessary regarding details when educating younger age groups, the absolute truths need to be taught in classrooms. Without proper education on the wrong doings and ignorance of some of our ancestors, history has the potential to repeat itself.
This article immediately got my attention because of its topic of Thanksgiving. Before even reading through it, I thought to myself how I view Thanksgiving and what kind of history knowledge I really knew about it overall. And after thinking about it, I came away very surprised how little I actually know about the Holiday of Thanksgiving and the history behind it. Thanksgiving to me and my family has always been about family and being thankful for the many many things that there are to be thankful about, for example where we live, things we have, people in our lives, as well as many other things. And as far as the historical knowledge that I know about Thanksgiving goes, it was very broad and not specific at all, as I just remember how it involved Pilgrims sharing a feast with Native Americans as I can picture and recall various images from my elementary school days of individuals in black & white clothing, black shoes, some wearing hats, sitting along side Native Americans with everything looking perfect for both sides. Over the years I have learned that a lot of what Thanksgiving was said to be was not nearly as accurate as it should’ve been, but still I am very foggy on the exact details / specific facts. After reading through the article, while I was expecting more detail / information regarding Thanksgiving, there was still a lot that I was able to walk away with knowing that I had previously not really known exactly. One thing being how little is focused on and mentioned about how poorly Native Americans have been treated and how they were systematically massacred (as that is not really discussed when talking about Thanksgiving in the 2nd grade). And more specifically how the Pilgrims coming into North America, brought in many diseases that drastically impacted Native Americans in a negative way. Another very interesting fact that I did not know about until reading this article was the amount of federally recognized Native American tribes in the United States, with the total being 573! Overall, I thought this was a very interesting and educational article and has really enlightened me to more information regarding Thanksgiving and has also motivated me to further learn more about not only Thanksgiving, but other national holidays that we celebrate yearly, as I think it is important to understand as much as possible about the country that you live in and how many people and events from the past that helped shape where we are today.
I was drawn to this article because I realized that I really know nothing about Thanksgiving. I do remember learning in Kindergarten about a great feast that the two cultures shared and that we still recognize today, but since then I’ve also learned that Christopher Columbus was not the man I believed he was which has lead to me forgetting most of the nice version of the story from Kindergarten.
While the article did not go as in depth about the holiday as I thought it would, I did find a few things interesting. First off, the cartoons could have fooled me. I thought the pilgrims wore little black shoes and black hats with gold buckles and no color. I also had no idea that there were so many Native American tribes in the United States now. It has lead me to wonder the differences in all the tribes; they all got grouped together and depicted as one in earlier education. However, I imagine that, just like there is a culture difference between inner cities and rural counties, there are even larger cultural differences in the tribes! One more things of which I was entirely ignorant before this article: The Indigenous People’s Movement. I had never heard of it.
I agree that Native Americans are often overlooked and extremely neglected in our history. When talking about how there was not much history on Native Americans before European immigrants- it makes sense considering they could not effectively document their history and when immigrants came they could not always communicate well to find out, and many were killed by disease so their history died with them. The Thanksgiving feast happened in 1621 and became a federal holiday in 1863 by Abraham Lincoln. He wanted a holiday to unify Americans of all races. Thanksgiving was about breaking bread with your neighbors and giving thanks in 1621 and has continued to mean the same thing since. Native Americans were dramatically wiped out by Europeans’ disease and murder. Europeans did horrible things to Native Americans. I believe that Thanksgiving still holds its original meaning. I also believe that K-12 should be taught more about Native American history and present. There is much to learn.
There is a huge misrepresentation about Thanksgiving what it stands for the Native Americans because it was not a happy ending for them. Ever since the settlers came to North America the American people have abused and hurt these people by segregation, starvation, and plain murder. I have mixed feelings about Thanksgiving because I still want to celebrate and be thankful for all my good fortunes, but at the same time I cannot forget about the origin of the holiday.
I believe there is a huge lack, but a huge need for these discussions to be had. When we celebrate this Holiday but ignore the atrocities that happened we do a great disservice to the dead, but also to future generations. They get this diluted, sugar-coated perspective on our history, which doesn’t allow them to also learn from the mistakes our country has made.
Native Americans have been overlooked when it comes to historiography, and their struggles deserve a larger place within the curriculum. Most of the education around Thanksgiving is given in lower grade levels, and unfortunately, it is usually through rose-colored glasses. While this is understandable for certain age groups, controversial topics such as the plight of Native Americans should not be forgotten. It’s an odd holiday where we seemingly push aside atrocities in favor of a commercial outlook.
This article shows the importance of historical context and thinking that many do not even consider. The core of Thanksgiving is often overlooked and not even taught. Native Americans have truly been neglected and left behind in history. Not enough has been taught on Native Americans today and Thanksgiving is a great reminder to be lifelong learners and understand there are always two sides to a story. Native Americans are still prevalent in society today and we need to stop overlooking them and respect and celebrate their culture. Sometimes understanding the bad and looking at past mistakes promotes a better future. Therefore, we need to educate people about Native Americans and about what Thanksgiving truly represents.