My last post dealt with the inaccuracies in a certain music video in relation to the Cherokee (Indians). In case you were wondering why I seem to be a mini-authority on the Cherokee, it all goes back to my second stint in college (1988).
I was taking a History of Journalism class at Arkansas Tech University. Our final assignment was to choose a newspaper and to trace its history. While all of my classmates chose "normal" newspapers like The New York Times, the Hearst Syndicate, the Chicago Tribune and an assortment of Arkansas-based publications, nonconformist me chose the Cherokee Phoenix.
What I found so interesting about this Cherokee publication is that, before they could put any words on paper, they had to invent an alphabet or, more accurately, a syllabary. Like many native languages, theirs was an oral, not a written, tradition.
The initial task of creating a written language from the oral one fell to Sequoyah. As stated in Wikipedia, "this was the only time in recorded history that a member of an illiterate people independently created an effective writing system." Really amazing stuff!
While doing the research for the paper, I learned a lot about the Cherokee people and that's why I know several of the images and statements related to the song are not historically accurate.
I was taking a History of Journalism class at Arkansas Tech University. Our final assignment was to choose a newspaper and to trace its history. While all of my classmates chose "normal" newspapers like The New York Times, the Hearst Syndicate, the Chicago Tribune and an assortment of Arkansas-based publications, nonconformist me chose the Cherokee Phoenix.
What I found so interesting about this Cherokee publication is that, before they could put any words on paper, they had to invent an alphabet or, more accurately, a syllabary. Like many native languages, theirs was an oral, not a written, tradition.
The initial task of creating a written language from the oral one fell to Sequoyah. As stated in Wikipedia, "this was the only time in recorded history that a member of an illiterate people independently created an effective writing system." Really amazing stuff!
While doing the research for the paper, I learned a lot about the Cherokee people and that's why I know several of the images and statements related to the song are not historically accurate.
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