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The Anishinaabe, like most Algonquian-speaking groups in North America, base their system of kinship on clans or totems. The Ojibwe word for clan (doodem) was borrowed into English as totem. The clans, based mainly on animals, were instrumental in traditional occupations, intertribal relations, and marriages. Today, the clan remains an important part of Anishinaabe identity. Each clan is forbidden from harming its representation animal by any means, as it is a bad omen to do so.
The Anishinaabe peoples are divided into a number of doodeman, or clans, (singular: doodem) named mainly for animal totems (or doodem, as an Ojibwe person would say this word in English). [1] In Anishinaabemowin, ode' means heart. Doodem or clan literally would translate as 'the expression of, or having to do with one's heart'; in other words doodem refers to the extended family. According to written / oral tradition, the Anishinaabeg spanned the North Eastern Woodlands of Turtle Island (North America). The origins of the Clans where giving to the Getay-Anishinawbeg after the cleansing of the Earth by water. As the memory of people had been wiped clean. Anishinaabe Toodaims: is the social fabric context for politics, kinship, and identity of the Anishinawbeg peoples.
The men established "a framework of social organization to give them strength and order" [2] in which each totem represents a core branch of knowledge and responsibility essential to society. Today, seven general totems compose this framework. The crane and the loon are the leadership, responsible for over-seeing and leading the people. The fish are the scholars and mediators and are responsible for solving disputes between the crane and the loon. The bear are both police and medicine gatherers. The martens are hunters but also warriors as well. The moose are mediators and exemplify peace. Clans are both a means of acquiring and retaining knowledge for the Anishinawbeg. Knowledge gained through experience and interactions with the natural world and other clan members is passed down and built upon through generations. [3]
Traditionally, each band had a highly democratic independent council consisting of leaders of the communities' Families / clans or odoodeman, with the group often identified by the principal doodem. In meeting others, the traditional greeting among the Ojibwe peoples is "What is your doodem?" ("Aaniin odoodemaayan?") in order to establish a social conduct between the two meeting parties as family. Marriage among members of the same clan is forbidden. [3]
The word odoodem is a dependent noun. When speaking of one own doodem, the Anishinaabe would say nindoodem(-ag) ('my clan(s)'), gidoodem(-ag) ('your clan(s)') for addressees and odoodeman ('his/her clan(s)') for others. [4]
The clan system is an integral part of acquiring and retaining knowledge for the Anishinaabe. Each clan contributes a key element to the society and individual members contribute to a clan’s knowledge through experience. During a clan member’s lifetime, they are able to gain knowledge known by the clan; emphasis is placed on personal experience, rather than a strict student-teacher relationship. Although members learn through relationships with other clan members, it is the experience gained as a result of these relationships that allows them to attain knowledge. Throughout a clan member’s life, knowledge they gain that was previously unknown to the clan is added to the clan’s collective knowledge. [5] This knowledge is then passed down to future generations, contributing to the "flow of Nebwakawin (wisdom) that passes from generation to generation". [6]
Despite pressure from the colonial society in Canada and the United States, much Anishinaabe knowledge has survived and continues to be shared and built upon. Alexander Wolfe's Earth Elder 18 Stories: The Pinayzitt Path, Dr. Dan Musqua's The Seven Fires: Teachings of the Bear Clan, and Edward Benton-Banai's The Mishomis Book: The Voice of the Ojibway are a few notable works of Anishinaabe literature. These publications are important carriers of knowledge that pass from the ancestors to future generations. [5]
There were at least twenty-one Ojibwe totems in all, recorded by William Whipple Warren. Other recorders, such as John Tanner, list many fewer but with different doodem types. For the Potawatomi, at least 15 different totems were recorded. The clan types today are quite extensive, but usually only a handful of odoodeman are found in each of the Anishinaabe communities. Like any other All Anishinawbeg speaking peoples, the Anishinawbeg clan system served as a system of social weave as well as a means of dividing labour. The clan groups or phratries are listed below, listing each of the doodem clans or gentes within their group. The known Anishinawbeg clans are listed below.
The Bimaawidaasi group was charged with scouting, hunting and gathering.
The Giishkizhigwan group was charged with teaching and healing.
The Nooke group was responsible for defense and healing. Though today the Bear Clan has all merged into a single clan known as Nooke, at one time the Bear was the largest — so large, in fact, that it was sub-divided into body parts such as the head (Makoshtigwaan or 'bear-skull'), the ribs and the feet (Nookezid or 'tender-foot'), as well as different types of bears such as the Waabishki-makwa or 'white black bear' and the Mishimakwa or 'grizzly bear'.
The Baswenaazhi group were traditionally charged with outgoing International communications. Because of this, often members of the Baswenaazhi group are said to be the most vocal.
The Bemaangik are charged with internal/domestic communications. They were often charged with the community's own council fires and help facilitate dialogue on all internal/domestic issues.
On occasion, instead of referring to the totem by the actual being's name, a clan is identified instead by a metaphor describing the characteristic of the clan's totem. The metaphors that survive to today include:
Some national sub-divisions were simply referred to by their major clan component. An example of this would be the Maandawe-doodem ('Fisher-clan') of the Meshkwahkihaki peoples who live along the south shore of Lake Superior. More inland than the Maandawe-doodem were the Waagosh-doodem ('Fox clan') of the Meshkwahkihaki, who are called the Fox Tribe in English. When the Maandawe were defeated in a major battle between the Ojibwe and the Meshkwahkihaki peoples, the surviving Maandawe were adopted as part of the Ojibwa nation, but instead as the Waabizheshi-doodem ('Marten clan'). Among some of the Ojibwe people, the Waabizheshi clan is also used to denote a form of adoption, i.e., a non-native father and Ojibwe mother. In other instances, for example odoodem communities such as the Amikwaa, they were treated as fully interdependent Nations of the Anishinaabeg Confederacy, or given a designation to represent their primary function in the social order, as with the Manoominikeshiinyag ('Ricing-rails') or the Waawaashkeshi-ininiwag ('Deer[-clan] Men').
Some doodem indicate non-Ojibwe origins. Other than Waabizheshi, these include the Ogiishkimanisii-doodem (Kingfisher Clan) and Ma'iingan-doodem (Wolf Clan) for Dakota and Migizi-doodem (Eagle Clan) for Americans. There are other odoodem considered rare today among the Ojibwa because the odoodem have migrated into other tribes, such as the Nibiinaabe-doodem (Merman Clan), which shows up as the Water-spirits Clan of the Winnebagoes.
The Ojibwa understanding of kinship is complex, taking into account not only the immediate family but also the extended family. It is considered a modified Bifurcate merging (Iroquois) kinship system. Consequently, the Ojibwa would speak not only of one's grandfather (nimishoomis) and grandmother (nookomis), father (noos) and mother (ningashi), or son (ningozis) and daughter (nindaanis), but also would speak of elder brother (nisayenh), younger sibling (nishiimenh), cross-uncle (nizhishenh), parallel-aunt (ninooshenh), male sibling of same gender (niikaanis), female sibling of same gender (niidigikoonh) and sibling of opposite gender (nindawemaa), and cross-cousin of the opposite gender (niinimoshenh), to name only a few.
Siblings generally share the same term with parallel-cousins as with any Bifurcate merging kinship system due to being a member the same doodem, but the modified system allows for a younger sibling to share the same kinship term with younger cross-cousins (nishiimenh). In addition the complexity wanes as one goes away from the speaker's immediate generation, with some degree of complexity retained with female relatives (for example, ninooshenh is 'my mother's sister' or 'my father's sister-in-law'—i.e., my parallel-aunt—but also 'my parent's female cross-cousin'). The Ojiba collectively call both the great-grandparents' and older generations and the great-grandchildren's and younger generations aanikoobijigan. This sign of kinship/clans speaks of the very nature of the Anishinaabe's entire philosophy/lifestyle, that is of interconnectedness and balance between all living generations and all generations of the past and of the future.
In addition to the Anishinaabeg doodem, clans of other tribes are considered related to the Anishinaabe clans if they have the same designation. Consequently, for example, a union between an Anishinaabe Bear Clan member with a Cherokee Bear Clan member would be considered illegal — even incestuous — by many traditional community groups.
The white crane clan were the traditional hereditary chiefs of the Ojibwe at Sault Ste. Marie and Madeline Island, and were some of the more powerful chiefs encountered by the first French explorers of Lake Superior. Members of the crane clan include:
Closely associated with the crane clan, members of the loon clan became important chiefs on Lake Superior's south shore during the fur trade period. Members of the loon clan include:
Always the most numerous of the Anishinaabeg, members of the bear clan were traditionally the warriors and police (Ogichidaa), as well as the healers. Many members of the clan continue in these roles today. The bear clan provided most of those who participated in the Bad River Train Blockade. In fiction, the police officers in the novels of Louise Erdrich come from the bear clan.
Now one of the most common clans, the eagle totem was once of the smaller clans. However, the number of eagle totem members grew when new members whose paternal ancestors were Americans were assigned to this totem. Since the first sustained contact by the Anishinaabe with the United States was through government officials, the symbol of the American eagle was taken for a clan marker. Members of the Eagle clan include:
Anishinaabe traditional beliefs cover the traditional belief system of the Anishinaabeg peoples, consisting of the Algonquin/Nipissing, Ojibwa/Chippewa/Saulteaux/Mississaugas, Odawa, Potawatomi and Oji-Cree, located primarily in the Great Lakes region of North America.
The Ojibwe are an Anishinaabe people whose homeland covers much of the Great Lakes region and the northern plains, extending into the subarctic and throughout the northeastern woodlands. The Ojibwe, being Indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands and of the subarctic, are known by several names, including Ojibway or Chippewa. As a large ethnic group, several distinct nations also consider themselves Ojibwe, including the Saulteaux, Nipissings, and Oji-Cree.
A totem is a spirit being, sacred object, or symbol that serves as an emblem of a group of people, such as a family, clan, lineage, or tribe, such as in the Anishinaabe clan system.
The Council of Three Fires is a long-standing Anishinaabe alliance of the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi North American Native tribes.
The Red Lake Indian Reservation covers 1,260.3 sq mi in parts of nine counties in Minnesota, United States. It is made up of numerous holdings but the largest section is an area around Red Lake, in north-central Minnesota, the largest lake in the state. This section lies primarily in the counties of Beltrami and Clearwater. Land in seven other counties is also part of the reservation. The reservation population was 5,506 in the 2020 census.
The Anishinaabe are a group of culturally related Indigenous peoples in the Great Lakes region of Canada and the United States. They include the Ojibwe, Odawa, Potawatomi, Mississaugas, Nipissing, and Algonquin peoples. The Anishinaabe speak Anishinaabemowin, or Anishinaabe languages that belong to the Algonquian language family.
Gitche Manitou means "Great Spirit" in several Algonquian languages. Christian missionaries have translated God as Gitche Manitou in scriptures and prayers in the Algonquian languages.
The Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, also known as the Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians, is a federally recognized American Indian tribe in east-central Minnesota. The Band has 4,302 members as of 2012. Its homeland is the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation, consisting of District I, District II, District IIa, and District III.
The Lac Courte Oreilles Tribe is one of six federally recognized bands of Ojibwe people located in present-day Wisconsin. It had 7,275 enrolled members as of 2010. The band is based at the Lac Courte Oreilles Indian Reservation in northwestern Wisconsin, which surrounds Lac Courte Oreilles. The main reservation's land is in west-central Sawyer County, but two small plots of off-reservation trust land are located in Rusk, Burnett, and Washburn counties. The reservation was established in 1854 by the second Treaty of La Pointe.
Chief Earth Woman was a nineteenth-century Ojibwa woman and a significant figure in Ojibwa history. She claimed that she had gained supernatural powers from a dream, and for this reason, accompanied the men on the warpath. While some Ojibwa warrior women responded to necessity, Chief Earth Woman chose to become a warrior, entering battle with the Sioux. Her dreams provided her fellow Ojibwa warriors with protection, and guided them through the battle. She confided with the leader that her dreams predicted the movements of the Sioux, aiding the Ojibwa in battle. In the battle, she succeeded in scalping an enemy, earning her traditional honors. Ruth Landes' research in the 1930s described Chief Earth Woman as one of few women to command a war party and receive the honors of a man, and later research by Colleen Sheryl McIvor places Chief Earth Woman within the tradition of the Anishinaabe Ogichidaakwe, or woman warrior.
The Midewiwin or the Grand Medicine Society is a religion of some of the Indigenous peoples of the Maritimes, New England and Great Lakes regions in North America. Its practitioners are called Midew, and the practices of Midewiwin are referred to as Mide. Occasionally, male Midew is called Midewinini, which is sometimes translated into English as "medicine man".
Seven fires prophecy is an Anishinaabe prophecy that marks phases, or epochs, in the life of the people on Turtle Island, the original name given by the indigenous peoples of the now North American continent. The seven fires of the prophecy represent key spiritual teachings for North America, and suggest that the different colors and traditions of the human beings can come together on a basis of respect. It contains information for the future lives of the Anishinaabe which are still in the process of being fulfilled.
Chief Buffalo was a major Ojibwa leader, born at La Pointe in Lake Superior's Apostle Islands, in what is now northern Wisconsin, USA.
Michel Cadotte, Kechemeshane in Ojibwe was a Métis fur trader of Ojibwe, Wendat and French-Canadian descent. He dominated the business in the area of the south shore of Lake Superior.
Andaigweos, also written as Ou-daig-weos and other variants of Ojibwa: Aandegwiiyaas, was an Ojibwe leader who lived in the Zhaagawaamikong (Chequamegon) region in present-day Wisconsin on Lake Superior during the 18th century. Andaigweos was member of the Loon doodem. He was born on Madeline Island in the early 18th century. His father was from Canada and moved to the western end of Lake Superior during the Ojibwe migrations of the 18th century. In his youth, the hereditary chiefs at Zhaagawaamikong were members of the Crane doodem. He was the grandfather of Chief Buffalo.
Chief Shingabawossin was an Ojibwa chief about Sault Ste. Marie. Chief Shingabawossin was of the Crane doodem.
Chief Tagwagané was an Anishinaabe (Ojibwa) sub-chief of the La Pointe Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, located in the Chequamegon area in the first half of the 19th century. He was of the Ajijaak-doodem. His village was often located along Bay City Creek within the city limits of what now is Ashland, Wisconsin.
William Whipple Warren was a historian, interpreter, and legislator in the Minnesota Territory. The son of Lyman Marcus Warren, an American fur trader and Mary Cadotte, the Ojibwe-Metis daughter of fur trader Michel Cadotte, he was of Ojibwe and French descent. William lived in two cultures, because his father was white, he was not considered Ojibwe, but an Ojibwe "relative", because in the Ojibwe patrilineal culture, inheritance and property were passed through the paternal line. His mother was Ojibwe and he learned her culture from her family. He is the first historian of the Ojibwe people in the European tradition.
Nipissing First Nation, meaning "place of little waters", is a long-standing community of Nishnaabeg peoples, who traditionally speak Anishinaabemwin, located along the shorelines of Lake Nipissing in northern Ontario. They are referred to by many names in European historical records, since the colonists often adopted names given to them by other nations.
Bugonaygeshig was an Anishinaabe leader of the late 19th century and early 20th century. Bugonaygeshig was native to the Leech Lake Indian Reservation of Minnesota. The Anishinaabe people of the Leech Lake Reservation are known as the Pillagers, another term for the military and police totem of the Anishinaabe people. They were called by members from other Anishinabe totems, the Noka Nation or Nooke-doodem. The Nooke clan were the most numerous of the clans of the Anishinaabe people.