Draft 1 As Long As the River Flows: Native American Burial Grounds & Four Mile Creek

This topic submitted by Grace Schneider, Erica Govich, Maureen Kiley ( spunkfullyyours@hotmail.com ) on 2/13/03. [ Rivers Team: Grace Schneider, Erica Govich, Maureen Kiley-Section: Garrison/Green]

Introduction

We wish to study Native American burial grounds in Hueston Woods and their relationship to Four Mile Creek. We plan to study the land to learn if there were scientific reasons for placing burial grounds near a river, as well as, studying the historical and current emotional relationship Native Americans share with rivers. This project will connect to the ideas of sublime nature, human connections with nature, and preservation through an interdisciplinary method. We believe that by studying Native American culture and tradition we can demonstrate that having an emotional bond with nature is an inherent human quality which is experienced across years and cultures.

Relevance

Book/Journal References

Grose, Teresa. "Reading the Bones: Information Content, Value, and Ownership Issues Raised by the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act" Journal of the American Society for Information Science 47 (August 1996): 624.

This source will help us research the legislation concerning Native American burial mounds.

Hoffman, Thomas J. "Moving Beyond Dualism: A Dialogue with Western European and American Indian Views of Spirituality, Nature, and Science" The Social Science Journal 34 (April, 1997): 447.

This source will help us understand Native American culture and then link culture with nature and science.

Flanders, Nicholas E. "Native American Sovereignty and Natural Resource Management" Human Ecology 26 (1998): 425.

This source shows how Native American rights are tied to water rights and preservation throughout the nation.

Chambers, David Wade. "Seeing a World in a Grain of Sand: Science Teaching in Multicultural Context" Science and Education 8 (1999): 633.

This source will show to make our project more interdisciplinary as it shows how the arts, sciences, and Ôindigenous modes of knowingÕ are related to understanding nature.

Morris, Roma J. "The Whole Story: Nature, Healing, and Narrative in the Native American Wisdom Tradition" Literature and Medicine 15 (May 1996): 94.

This source will be used in our analysis of Native American traditions and their references to nature in literature.

John, G.E. "Cultural Nationalism, Westward Expansion and the Production of Imperial Landscape: George CatlinÕs Native American West" Ecumene 8 (April, 2001): 175.

This article ties together art, nature, and Native American relocation in the time frame of the 1800Õs thus giving us an historical perspective for our project.

Stanlake, Christy. "Seventh Generation: An Anthology of Native American Plays (review)" Theatre Journal 52 (March 2000): 144.

This resource will be used in analyzing Native American literature and how nature is expressed and related to in such works.

Hughes, Robert. "The Wilderness and the West" American Visions. New York: Alfred Knopf, Inc., 1997.

This article will help us tie our research to the idea of the human emotional connection with nature, as well as, to the idea of how people then represent nature in their artwork.

McShine, Kynaston. "On Divers Themes from Nature" The Natural Paradise Painting in America 1800-1950. New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 1976.

This article will also help in tying our project to the class themes of the human connection to nature and how we represent nature in our art, along with providing something to compare Native American connections and representations of nature to.

James, Peter and Nick Thorpe. Ancient Mysteries; New York: Ballantine Publishing Group, 1999.

This source provides information about the traditions surrounding Ohio Native American burial mounds, and will thus be useful as part of our cultural and historical research.

Forty, Jo. Mythology: A Visual Encyclopedia. London; PRC Publishing, 1999

This book shows many different Native American artifacts and art pieces and will thus aid us in our cultural and art study of Native Americans.

Telesco, Patricia. Folkways: Reclaiming the Magic and Wisdom; St. Paul, Minnesota; Llewellyn Publishing, 1995

This book describes cultural customs from around the world with many focusing on Native American customs which are inspired by nature.

Internet References

The Library of Congress. The First American West: The Ohio River Valley 1750 Ð 1820. 2002; available from http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/award99/icuhtml/fawhome.html; Internet, accessed 10 February 2003.

This website will give help us with our historical research and provides links to other sites with maps, scientific descriptions of the land, and traditions surrounding burial mounds.

Cultural Analysis of Indian Art and Photography. Available from http://www-personal.umich.edu/~jamarcus/photo2.html; Internet, accessed 10 February 2003.

This website talks about Native American Art and its relationship to nature and religion. It also gives a timeline of Native American history which lists different events and legislation that affected the lives and traditions of Native Americans.

Teachserve. Native Americans and the Land. 2002; available from http://www.nhc.rtp.nc.us:8080/tserve/nattrans/ntecoindian.htm; Internet, accessed 10 February 2003.

This site talks about how Native Americans utilized the land, and gives many links to sites which talk about the relocation of Native Americans and other effects of European settlement on Native tribes and the land.

National Council for Science and the Environment. Native Americans and the Environment: Cultural and Historical Issues. 2002; available from http://www.cnie.org/NAE/culture.html; Internet, accessed 10 February 2003.

This site provides links to many other sites which address various ideas including the relationship between Native Americans and the land, how Native American techniques have been utilized in preservation and restoration programs and changed how scientists view ecosystem stability, as well as, the symbolic roles nature takes in Native American art and literature.

American Indian Heritage Foundation. Essay on Native American Environmental Issues. 1995; available from http://www.indians.org/library/intro.html; Internet, accessed 10 February 2003.

This website discusses why Native Americans value nature and how they are involved with environmental efforts throughout the years.

AIM Support Group. Census Numbers of the Greater Cincinnati Area. 2002; available from http://home.cinci.rr.com/aimsupport/2002_03_24_aim-blog-archive.html; Internet, accessed 10 February 2003.

This website gives numbers of how many Native Americans are still living in Butler county and the surrounding areas, and we hope will provide a way for us to get in contact with nearby Native Americans whom we can interview.

Interdisciplinary Approach

We will be studying the cultural history and traditions of Native Americans who resided in Butler County. We also hope to contact some of the remaining tribe members and interview them to learn of their cultural connection. We will be researching past legislation which pushed the Native Americans away from their burial grounds, as well as, what present legislation protects these sacred areas. We plan to study this from a scientific perspective by characterizing the physical areas and land use present in this area of Four Mile Creek and researching if Native Americans chose this spot for scientific reasons along with their traditional reasons.

Research Design

Our research design will focus mainly on the land use around the burial grounds and how it pertains to the ecological use of Four Mile Creek. We plan to utilize surveys of Native Americans still living in Butler County and historical resources to learn more about their traditions and connections with rivers. We also plan on researching different Native American works of art and literature which connect to the emotional dynamic of the river. And we hope to study how pre-European practices may have affected stream water quality, as well as, the topography of the land.

Materials and Methods

We will be utilizing people and historical archives as we learn about the Native American traditions and culture. Artworks and literary works will be used to determine how the river relates to Native American cultural values. Local archives will utilized to study the landÕs past and present topography and ecology, and how this may affect stream water quality. Water quality testing may be done to further understand the streamÕs health near the burial mounds. The research team will utilize a cooperative effort to complete our study of the connections between Native American burial grounds, nature and of course rivers. We also will utilize population and relocation statistics to show how the burial grounds were related to not only the natural environment but also the human environment in the past.

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