HISTORY OF THE HIDATSA

[Alan H. Hartley]

Jimm GoodTracks wrote:

>>(Your reference to two native Virginians as ""Americans"" -- implying
>
> that, because of their
>
>>European ancestry, they didn't really qualify -- also smacks of
>
> ethnocentrism.)
>
> No, there was no such implied nor suggested reference.  Perhaps it is a
> personal bias being read in here.

It's certainly not my bias, Jimm: you're the one who put quotation marks
around 'American.'

> how is it that Sakagawia's name per se consistantly is in
> Hidatsa language rather than Shoshoni?  It is not a practice to change the
> name as such.

I believe it was common for a captive/adoptee to be given a new name in
the language of her captors/adoptors. (Few Korean adoptees in the U.S.
have Korean names.) And Lewis and Clark came to know Sacagawea in a
Hidatsa community through Charbonneau who spoke Hidatsa but not
Shoshone, so it's understandable that they would have used her Hidatsa
name. Perhaps it's a reflection of their primitive ethnography that L&C
never learned--or at least didn't record--Sacagawea's Shoshone name.

> Again, the account has nothing to do with ethnocentrism of anyone.  What is
> amiss here is a present day bias to ennoble Lewis to a pious infallibility
> rather than a more mundane possiblity that indeed, his understanding of the
> native people, situation(s),  and translations erred on the side of human
> inaccuracy and/or misinformation.  History is filled with such
> misinformation and misrepresentations -- sometimes quite innocently and
> other times intentionally.  A good historian is a seeker of truth, rather
> than a supporter of misconceptions.

I plead innocent of ennobling Lewis (or anyone else). The fact remains
that, fallible as they are, the L&C journals are very valuable
first-hand records. (Likewise, their natural science leaves a lot to be
desired, but it's the best we have from that time in those places.) And
I think it's a misconception that oral traditions are somehow inherently
superior to written ones: we have little enough to go on, so let's use
everything we have.

Alan