Apache history and cultural significance

Apache

Farrer profusely described in her book (Thunder Rides a Black Horse) the symbolic elements used by Apaches during the puberty ceremony. Identify and describe some of those symbols and compare them with symbols used in other cultures? (Give examples of, and describe, some symbols used in other cultures). Why do people use symbols? What symbols are important for you? And why are they important?

The Apache ceremony takes place at sunrise. This time is only fitting, given that it is a coming of age ceremony for the young girl, the sunrise of her new womanhood. The rising sun symbolizes a new day, as she is entering into a new life stage. The sky and the cosmos are very important for the Apache, and it is thought that all truths are written in the stars. But the symbol of the sun that brings a new day is very important in many cultures, not just this particular Native American culture. For example, take New Year's Day for European-Americans. Although New Year's Eve might be a night where people drink and engage in bad behavior, when the sun rises, people are supposed to turn over a new leaf. The rising of the sunlit day symbolizes a new beginning.

The different phases of the moon also symbolize changes in the year or life stage, as people are supposed to be made crazy by a new moon. For Chinese people, the lunar New Year may bring a year of great wealth, like this year of the pig, or a year of auspicious marriage, depending on the animal traditionally associated with that year.

The girl's body has changed, and the Apache coming-of-age rituals symbolize the changing of the young girl into The Changing Woman of the myth that is being reenacted over the course of the ceremony. The girl prepares herself physically, through physical conditioning before the four day's ceremony actually days place, and the girl's body is massaged and touched, to reflect her accepting the fact that she is entering a new life stage and that she is no longer a child. This change of body and change into a new type of life may be seen in the ritual of circumcision amongst Jewish people, where a baby boy is circumcised and his body is changed to reflect the fact that he is now not merely born, but a member of Jewish society and religion. In some sects of Judaism, a woman's hair upon marriage will be shaved, and she will then cover her hair and wear a wig, to show her new modesty and matronly status. People also change their physical appearance of body to enter a sacred place, like a church or temple, by covering their heads with a hat or other covering, like a yarmulke or veil. In Japan, people will take off their shoes when they enter a home, or even different parts of the home, like the bathroom, to keep certain areas ritually pure and free from contamination.

The Apache girl dances and runs throughout the ceremony, and her running to the four corners of the earth to symbolize her running to all four corners of life and through important life stages. Four is a sacred number in many cultures. It is the number of the four seasons, and four balanced corners make a perfectly balanced square. The appreciation for the four seasons is marked in American culture by observing the rituals of the different solstices, as Americans observe their winter holidays of Christmas and Hanukah, their spring rituals of Easter, Memorial Day to mark the beginning of summer, and Labor Day for the season of fall.

The girl is covered with paint during the ritual, also to symbolize her new status, and to set her apart from the other members of the tribe, as she is in the process of being 'changed' before she becomes fully a woman. Like a Hindu bride is painted with henna, a change in life is signified through disguise behind make-up. This also could be seen in Easter eggs, as ordinary objects are given ritual significance through paint, or the ashes on the forehead that some Christians accept on Ash Wednesday. The girl must keep this paint on her until the end of the ceremony, when she blesses the people of her tribe with the sacred colors.

Symbols are important because sometimes it is difficult to communicate things in words. By taking the girl through the ritual, the tribe is able to make the girl feel as though she is going through a special occasion in her life. Having her first period might be a private ceremony, or embarrassing for the girl as it sometimes is in modern culture, but this important life event becomes a public ritual of celebration for the Apache. Also, the entire emphasis of the ceremony indicates that something has changed of great significance in the tribe as well as in the girl's life. The tribe will now treat the girl differently.

Just as when a child goes to school for the first time, the symbols of the child getting new pencils, a book bag, and all of the necessary things to survive in school are not merely important because they are required items but also because both the parent and the child need a way of saying to one another that life has changed, but things are also still the same and we love one another. Even holidays are ways for a family to take the time out of their busy lives and to have a break from the daily routine and to say things they normally do not say to one another, such as 'I love you.' Rather than having to say these things aloud, using symbols makes expressing one's self easier, and also establishes continuity between past and present, if the same symbols are used.

My own personal symbols, like the photographs I took of my friends in Korea are important to me, even though I remember what people look like, because they make me feel as if my home in America looks like my home, back in my real home, and that things are staying the same, even though they have also changed because I have left home.

Question

Read again the origin myth on page 81 from Thunder Rides a Black Horse and answer the following: what origin myth were you taught as a child? How did you learn it? How has it influenced the way you see and understand the world?

One Korean creation myth is that of Dan-Gun, the First King of Korea It goes something like this: once upon a time there was a prince in heaven who asked his father the king to give him some land, what became the land of Korea. His ministers were rain, cloud, and wind, and the minister's various officials controlled grain, life, sickness, death, and good and evil. Then, a bear and a tiger came to the prince and said they wanted to become human beings. The prince gave the bear and the tiger "a bundle of mug wort and twenty bulbs of garlic and told them that if they ate only these and stayed in the cave for one hundred days that they would become human," ("Korean Myth of Origins," 2006). Although the tiger could not stand this great test, the bear endured and the bear was transformed into a woman, who gave birth to the first human king of Korea. The bear-woman was so happy that she became queen of the world, and the boy became the first human king.