Wilma Mankiller: The First Female Leader of the Cherokee Nation
The historical figure of Wilma Mankiller, the first female leader of the Cherokee nation, is of great importance to the understanding of the cultural identity struggle of the Native Americans. Her biography is highly revelatory for the rebuilding of the Cherokee nation after what was called the Trial of Tears or the Cherokee Removal during the years 1838-1839, because many of the methods she used in her leadership emphasized the importance of the interdependence between the members of the Cherokee communities and the rebuilding of the nation through the reaffirmation of its cultural identity and its traditional resources. Wilma Mankiller's historical role is many-sided. Thus, in addition to the role she played in solving the racist issues connected with the identity of the Cherokee people, she also set an important example as a female leader of her people, therefore contributing to the feminist movement. Alongside with these facts, Mankiller also proved that a powerful and influent leader can be born among the poor people, as her family was a numerous and suffered from financial difficulties. All the examples that Wilma Mankiller set, were in one way or another, problems that she had to face and surpass in her own life, star
When she was ten years old she moved with her parents to San Francisco, with one of the government programs for relocation, which made it possible for the Native Americans to move from their traditional lands to urban areas. "( Udel, 1) Thus, the most important principles to follow for the Cherokees, prove to be the struggle for independence but this is realized through an increased respect for traditions and culture of the community and a focus of the interdependence and unity of its members into a cultural whole. " (Mankiller) Mankiller also managed to effectively put her theories into practice, as her own example of helping a small and very poor community to actually help themselves: she promised to give them the funds, but they had to volunteer for actually building the houses and all the other facilities needed in the village: "People did show up that first day, and the film crew, the CBS film crew, stayed with us through the whole project and actually filmed the completion of the water system. One instance of this is the fact that until the 1970's the president of the Cherokees was designed by the American Government, instead of being elected by the tribe. " ( Mankiller)5 Thus, as we deduct from Wilma Mankiller's own writing, as well as from the her biographers, like David Edmunds or from the books relating the Cherokee history, like Anderson's book, make is obvious that one of the things that most defines Native American culture is their struggle for maintaining identity and their powerful traditions that advocate the importance of the family and union as the core of the community. ting with feeling different from the white people in school, to being confronted with the sexist challenges during her leadership career. We put together a new political system, signed a new constitution in 1839. )all emphasize the importance of men to the revitalization of Native communities. This worked as a division factor for the Cherokees, since they came to regard their own chiefs as extraneous to them, and since wealth and great social distinction came to be a necessary condition for the election of the president. " (Mankiller)1 Herein lies the core of the racist error, according to Wilma Mankiller: the discrimination made against the Native Americans comes from the naive issues of the white people who proclaimed the former' s lack of civilization failure because of their own failure to recognize and understand the cultural differences: "I like history a lot, and looking at old historical documents -- is to see that in the 1840s there was still a significant number, not the majority or anywhere near the majority, but there were a significant number of people in this country that were still questioning whether Indians were human, or whether Indians had souls, when we and many other people like our tribe had been running our own governments for a long, long time. Don't place the burden on Native children by asking them how they're different. As Mankiller interpreted it, the Removal was not only a territorial displacement for the Cherokees, but also an identity displacement, as the people were forced to leave everything they had known behind. We're going forward and backward at the same time. " (Mankiller)2 Apart from the first Cherokee Removal, there was a second removal in 1907, as the United States Government allowed white settlement in Oklahoma, although it had made a promise to the Cherokees that this would not happen.
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