Interview Process and term
In the study that I conducted, I found that there are two types of identities. The study was conducted through interviews with two basic questions. It was interesting. Once I read the response I noticed there were two types of identity that I could refer to. Through this survey, the term “Identity” signified the characteristic of those individuals who were interviewed.
Identity can be defined through religion that entails some sort of blessing through religious or spiritual calling. In Diné language it is called bee bi’dool zίί’. This type of spiritual calling is very rare. It is told by medicine man that the gift of spiritual healer is bestowed onto an individual from the deities. The expression “the chosen one” fits the description.
The second type of identity was identity with the use of cultural teaching. This identity entails the discipline, conditioning, and knowledge of cultural emergent stories. This identity uses valuable traits that teach one to use stories to associate their understanding of life. In one of the interviews conducted, the candidate uses the logic of these stories and the individual is able to overcome negativity of life. One of the six survey participants connected his identity to his father’s teaching of the spirituality of a horse. He understood the symbolism of a horse. In addition, he drew out the four cardinal directions and their meaning to his identity. Diné are taught the symbolism of the four colors, four elements, four behavioral aspect, and four stages of planning. It is noticeable that Diné scholars who had access to books and in addition the cultural teaching that connected our culture stories and philosophy were able to be successful. In addition, two of the four individuals lived by Diné philosophy which was taught by their parents. This teaching is carried down from generation to generation in the belief that it is the way of life. The two individuals use their common daily life and teaching from minimal cultural identity that connected through family expectation.
Five of the six interviewees categorize their awareness of identity through life learned experiences rather than learning through intense cultural teaching and Diné philosophy. With these individuals some cultural foundational teachings were taught to each individual but did not use the cultural approach extensively. Instead real life experience helped tie their understanding of identity. Jones and Galliher stated that a young Diné person can live in a culture and at the same time the individual will not fully connect to the purpose of oral creation stories or culture foundation. I believe this holds true because I am able to witness this effect in our Diné students in our classroom. The Diné children live on the Diné Nation and live the culture and hear the oral stories from the grandparents but the children are not able to take the symbolism of the stories and culture to an understanding level. This is where I want to take a story and evaluate the meaning and symbolism. By doing so, I can parallel the ideas behind the stories with good character traits. It is these character traits that matures a young person into a disciplined individual. And hopefully the Dine symbolism from the stories will translate to Diné identity.
As stated I categorized how the interviewees understood and found their Identities. Using the two types of identity, it was clear that most of the interviewees clarify their identity through life events. I collected interviews from siblings from my hometown and another set of siblings from a place that was 50 miles away. These interviews had striking results. They indicate that identity was associated more with current parents’ teaching. However, at the same time identity learned weighted more on life’s experience. I interviewed two children of my hometown siblings. Although the siblings knew of the oral cultural stories and Diné philosophy, the children viewed their parent’s teaching and modeling assisted in their self-identity. It is also striking that the second set of siblings remembered their learning through their father’s traditional teaching. Although the father was a medicine man, the father taught his children through daily affirmations and daily chores. It is later in life, one person out of two siblings identified himself through the traditional ceremonial stories. This sibling had access to his father’s traditional prayers that had the deities’ names and ceremonial chants. The chants had the deities’ purpose of life and attributes. It is these attributes that he sang that made true connection of self-identities. One song illustrates the strength that our body is equipped with armor and one could overcome challenging situation or physical barriers. Our body is designed to survive anything bad because of the spiritual presence of deity. It is taught in our blessing ceremonies that a deity is asked to protect and lead us into a life of rightful living. The songs are sung in patterns to help us understand the chants beyond the rhythm. The rhythm resonated the meaning that all is possible by following your prayers and songs from the deities. This is where the oral stories of deities and their wrong doing can be explained. The deities once lived in a world before Earth and did some bad things. To make right and correct the troubles created by them, the deities had to call on the other deities and animals to make right through actual rituals that correct the bad things. Once the bad events were corrected, the balance of life came to be. It is through these types of stories that ceremonies and ritual were in place for humans to use. Today a few Diné use the ceremonies and rituals to balance their life. It is the few that teaching the use of cultural stories to teach wrong or right behaviors are helping us find self-identity. Some natives understand the rightful acts and practices can help us stay in balance and persevere in life. It is this teaching that the interviewees relate to and use it to teach their children. So, it is this strand of cultural teaching that our Diné children do not understand. Often we as parents ask ourselves why our children are not connecting the teaching of kinship. The explanation between the meaning and purpose are disconnected. The relevancy of clan stories to self-identity does not make sense to our children. The culture teachers at school and parents at home tell their children to memorize their clan for identity but we don’t give the symbolic meaning of the clan and its origins. If we illustrate and study the meaning of how the deities created the clans, the children would understand their parents’ oral stories of the clan and how it relates to identification of the family origin. Therefore, with this unit, I wish to capture many interesting moments in the oral stories and relate it to today’s understanding of self-identity. I may have to make an exception to our cultural rules of when to tell these stories. Typically these oral stories are told in the winter but mini stories can be told to help Dine children of why we, native teachers emphasize clan at the beginning of the school year or why we have to express our clan identity when we meet new people. The kinship teaching will help convey self-discipline, and the use of traditional creation stories can make someone humble and respectful.
Scanning the results of interviewees, it was interesting that some individuals selected their father’s side of the family’s teaching over their mother‘s side of the family. It is known that the Diné normally live and follow the mother side of the family. I say this because our native children have learned that identity can also be influenced by social media instead of cultural teaching and oral stories. Social media‘s influence is another reason that our children have deficiency in understanding the connection of creation story and how it ties into identity. Why do I say this? One of the interviewees was my niece. She shared that her self-realization began recently. She thought about her sibling’s good traits and interests. She had to make a statement for herself. In her interview she mentioned the coloring of her hair. Coloring her hair blue helped her make a statement that an individual can express themselves and not be afraid to be different. Yet she knows that her family is the foundation of her existence and identity. Through such interviews one can understand that young people are setting and reevaluating their identity through fashion and it is unique. Unique expression but they can still differentiate that style alone is not the defining factor of identity.
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