AMERICAN INDIAN AND YANKEE LIFEWAYS 10/4/08
(class held at Old Sturbridge Village, Sturbridge, MA)
(class held at Old Sturbridge Village, Sturbridge, MA)
--Margaret Bruchac and Bette Lotterman (from OSV) were the main presenters at this workshop. Marge, over the day, asked the workshop participants to form a type of "KWL" chart.
Here’s what I know and where I started:
My school started a new program this year. The 4th graders are working with the art, gym, and music teachers on activities relating to Native Americans. They have been playing Indian games in gym, and in art class, they have been drawing a picture of a girl on a platform, scaring away crows in the cornfield. These activities have segued into a study of how we “get” food now vs. how Native Americans in the 18th and 19th century “got” their food. The students are beginning to realize that food production/gathering was a major part of an average person’s day. When they write letters to their imaginary Native American “friend” from the past, their letters show the knowledge they are gaining about Native culture from the 18th and 19th century. I myself tie the other content areas in (geography, math, etc.) whenever I speak of Native Americans. I love to explore the food of different cultures at school. I think what goes in your mouth…and what you had to do to get it into your mouth…speaks volumes about the people who created the dish. I want to know more about this interaction between the Native Americans and those who called themselves Yankees. The term “Yankee,” I must assume, in this context refers to residents of New England who were of European descent. There were many manifestations of the term “Yankee” through the history of the United States, and at the time period we are studying, I think that this description most aptly fits the bill.
Here’s what I want to know and what I did:
We began the day by working as a group…working together even though we didn’t know each other. What we had in common was a hunger for knowledge about Native American and Yankee interactions, especially in the common area of food. I thought that food would be an excellent area to examine the transfer of information and tradition between cultures...everybody’s got to eat! And so it was the hunger for information and the increasing hunger for a delicious meal that brought our group together.
We found that the European population relied on “receipts” (modern day translation: recipes) that were based upon ‘the same results time after time.’ Measurements such as a pint or a spoonful were common, and ingredients ranged from local to the exotic (read: imported). They preserved and/or dried much of the yearly harvest in order to have the same foods available year round. Many of their original receipts were based on what they had grown up on in Europe. The Native American communities, however, based their meals on what was locally available at the time they were cooking. Salt and spices were not a major factor in Indian cookery. Results were not based on a specific set of tasks, rather, a process that may or may not follow the same path to lead to a satisfying result. Consistently, the Native Americans proved to live by a diet that was varied by the seasons, but still fulfilled the components necessary for proper development and sustenance. There wasn’t a reliance on salt or spices as the European tongue desired. Flavoring was much more subtle, from the burnt grits on the edge of a kettle lending a smoky flavor to the Wampanoag Nasaump, to the creamy goodness of corn, lima beans, and butternut squash cooked with sweet-tasting bear fat over the fire to become Succotash (a term that roughly translates to “chopped into small bits”).
Here’s what I want to do next time:
I would absolutely love to continue this journey into the “foodways” of the New England Yankees and local Native American tribes. The adage “you are what you eat” certainly applies to the melding of cultures in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries of North American history.
Specific questions I would like to explore include how readily each culture accepted the ‘others’’ ways…what worked ‘best’ style and preparation-wise? I would also like to discover what each population had in common taste-wise with each other…was there a predilection towards creamy foods or crunchy, etc.? Were there similar or different preparation methods?
My school started a new program this year. The 4th graders are working with the art, gym, and music teachers on activities relating to Native Americans. They have been playing Indian games in gym, and in art class, they have been drawing a picture of a girl on a platform, scaring away crows in the cornfield. These activities have segued into a study of how we “get” food now vs. how Native Americans in the 18th and 19th century “got” their food. The students are beginning to realize that food production/gathering was a major part of an average person’s day. When they write letters to their imaginary Native American “friend” from the past, their letters show the knowledge they are gaining about Native culture from the 18th and 19th century. I myself tie the other content areas in (geography, math, etc.) whenever I speak of Native Americans. I love to explore the food of different cultures at school. I think what goes in your mouth…and what you had to do to get it into your mouth…speaks volumes about the people who created the dish. I want to know more about this interaction between the Native Americans and those who called themselves Yankees. The term “Yankee,” I must assume, in this context refers to residents of New England who were of European descent. There were many manifestations of the term “Yankee” through the history of the United States, and at the time period we are studying, I think that this description most aptly fits the bill.
Here’s what I want to know and what I did:
We began the day by working as a group…working together even though we didn’t know each other. What we had in common was a hunger for knowledge about Native American and Yankee interactions, especially in the common area of food. I thought that food would be an excellent area to examine the transfer of information and tradition between cultures...everybody’s got to eat! And so it was the hunger for information and the increasing hunger for a delicious meal that brought our group together.
We found that the European population relied on “receipts” (modern day translation: recipes) that were based upon ‘the same results time after time.’ Measurements such as a pint or a spoonful were common, and ingredients ranged from local to the exotic (read: imported). They preserved and/or dried much of the yearly harvest in order to have the same foods available year round. Many of their original receipts were based on what they had grown up on in Europe. The Native American communities, however, based their meals on what was locally available at the time they were cooking. Salt and spices were not a major factor in Indian cookery. Results were not based on a specific set of tasks, rather, a process that may or may not follow the same path to lead to a satisfying result. Consistently, the Native Americans proved to live by a diet that was varied by the seasons, but still fulfilled the components necessary for proper development and sustenance. There wasn’t a reliance on salt or spices as the European tongue desired. Flavoring was much more subtle, from the burnt grits on the edge of a kettle lending a smoky flavor to the Wampanoag Nasaump, to the creamy goodness of corn, lima beans, and butternut squash cooked with sweet-tasting bear fat over the fire to become Succotash (a term that roughly translates to “chopped into small bits”).
Here’s what I want to do next time:
I would absolutely love to continue this journey into the “foodways” of the New England Yankees and local Native American tribes. The adage “you are what you eat” certainly applies to the melding of cultures in the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries of North American history.
Specific questions I would like to explore include how readily each culture accepted the ‘others’’ ways…what worked ‘best’ style and preparation-wise? I would also like to discover what each population had in common taste-wise with each other…was there a predilection towards creamy foods or crunchy, etc.? Were there similar or different preparation methods?
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