Unit Background
"Like all people inhabiting the United States of America, the American Indians were the first immigrants to the land" (Hamm 3). Anthropologist and other researchers have found evidence to indicate that remains from this culture can be "dated twenty-seven thousand years old" (Hamm,1983: 4). These remains were located in the Yukon Territory. Through archeological excavations, the remains of the earliest Americans indicate that "these people resembled the modern Chinese or Japanese, or present-day Eskimo" (Hamm, 1983: 4). In studying these remains, present day scholars have made connections of these people to the Indians and some Hispanics of today.
Although the Native Americans had many different cultures and traditions, it is important to show how the correlations between music and dance are impacted or influenced through culture. The tribes discussed in this unit were classified and distinguished by culture areas. In other words, culture areas were geographic locations where various groups of Native Americans had in common or similar life styles and traditions which included music and dance. The cultural areas to be studied within this unit are classified as followed: Southeast and the Northeast. The cultural areas and their connections between each tribal groups will be discussed in another section of this unit.
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