Reading Response #6:

Irene Holmes
Ms. Darrow
ENG 140
July 20,2009
Reading Response #6:
Race
In the contemporary world of today the population is becoming more diverse especially with race. Among the Native American Indians the number of full bloods are become rare due to intertribal and interracial marriages. I will use myself as an example, I am a descendant of Lakota and Navajo which makes me half blood, my first claim is Lakota since Native American Indians society is a matrilineal society. I am married into the Hopi Tribe, therefore makes my children a forth Lakota, a forth Navajo and half Hopi.
Again due to the matrilineal society my children will make claim to being Lakota first and the community that we reside in will also label them Lakota first and then Hopi. This is how most Native American Indian tribes society works.
Speaking of diverse populations, from my fathers side of the family who are Navajos, including my father there are nine siblings. Out of the nine only three Uncles married back into the Navajo tribe, one married into Lakota tribe, and five married into the Anglo Saxon people. When we have a family gathering there is such a diversity, other Navajo families will label my father’s family as “Those that brought other’s into the Bitterwater clan.” Here only three out nine brothers can make claim that their children are full bloods and all the others are half bloods.
Within my husband family, there are five siblings and out of the five, only one is living with a Hopi, three married into the Navajo tribe and one into the Lakota tribe. Here again the Hopi family is faced with the diversity in race issues, since Hopi is also a matrilineal society, only two of the sisters can make claim to being Hopi, but only one out of five has children that are full blood Hopi.
As each new generation is exposed to the outside world off the reservation, more and more Native American Indians are finding themselves in intertribal and interracial relationships often leads to new offspring resulting in the diversity of race they will represent.