Essay On Gender Roles In Native American Culture

Improved Essays
Throughout the semester we have learned about indigenous people and we have also looked at women’s roles in different religions. In some of my other classes, we have been talking a lot about women and their place in the world along with gender roles that have been created. This got me very curious about women’s roles in other religions. I decided to look into Native Americans and Ojibwe women.
The article “Yes, I’m Brave”, talks about the women in Native American culture that are considered extraordinary and why they are considered extraordinary. It is not who they appear to be but rather what they do and what is on the inside.
The Native American view of sexuality and gender is a little different than Europeans view of sexuality. The idea
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Here in the United States, it has taken us a long time to even start to view sexuality on a continuum. We look at people as either male or female and the gender roles associated with that gender. Women who take on the male roles in the Native American culture are not looked at differently and are not considered less because of it. The United States is getting a lot better about this, but we haven’t always been good about it. We place people in boxes according to their gender and expect every female and every male to act in similar ways. If someone is not acting according to their gender roles they are considered odd and looked down upon many times. I really like the idea that Native Americans don’t force a gender on a baby. The baby is allowed to become its’ own person based on the experiences and interests that they have. It just amazes me that the Native Americans have been doing this for so long and as Westerners we changed that for them. They conformed to the western society and started to use more gender roles than they had in the past. Now, many years later, we are trying to give people more freedom with their sexuality and how they fit into this world. I loved learning about the women who did not play the ordinary role of a women and how they were still

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