Native American Festival

By Kelly Moody

This summer, there was a Native American Festival at the Hampton Coliseum that me and a few friends attended. The festival had vendors that sold many native american crafts, jewelery, literature etc. On the second floor of the coliseum, booths were set up for an array of native american cultures from the tidewater area and descendents and members of those tribes were respresented at each booth. They each had histories of their tribes, where the tribes were oriented geographically and what their lifestyles were like, and how they are trying to sustain their lives and cultures lives now post-colonially. In the stage area of the coliseum were performances from various tribes throughout the day. Each tribe did their dances and some tribes joined together for dances. While this was a very interesting and educational experience, i had a view stipulations and critisicms. I wondered about the former relations of all of these tribes coming together to create a "native american experience" for non-native americans. How do they assert their indivuduality by conforming to the eurocentric label of 'native american', and were they as unionized pre-european takeover? I thought it was interesting to analyze how their identity has changed, how much more they need to assert their culture now to seperate themselves from the rest of american culture, but the way they do it is very original and american. There are positives and negative aspects to this identification and unionization through the label of 'native american'. A positve aspect is the unionization itself, the fact that former groups that may not have gotten along or did not have relations, now come together as a force. The Native American Festival itself is evidence of that. Each individual native american culture can assert themselves within, but they all come together to become more powerful within the larger American society. Also, it is an educational experience, a chance to share with the public their way of life, their heritage. It is a great opportunity. Another positive from this is that they are reasserting their identity, emphasisizing their heritage more, in order to avoid as much as possible the homogenization into the rest of society. It gives them a place, it helps them maintain their traditions even if it is not in the same context or way that it used to be maintained. A negative of this though, is the meaning of this remergence, and the quality of this kind of festival, by dramatisizing what 'was' are they really being true to what was? An example of this was their clothing, it looked nothing like traditional Native American clothing, there were bright synthetic neons and shiny patterns, very mixed with modern fashion and traditional style. Is this genuine? Overall i felt as though this festival was a good thing. Though the tribes may not be completely maintaining their traditions, it is good for the public to understand how this land once was, a least a shadow of what once was, the kinds of people who cohabited here and what their lifestyles were like.