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Historical photo of Navajo man and woman
Source: World Wide Web
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The roles we exist as in the Dine' (Navajo) ways of life, of being are so very important.
This innate assignment was given to use on the day of our birth. We were either made to be a male or female via our physical, mental and emotional state. The distinct roles as distinct genders in Navajo culture is like an act of sacred prayer. Existence of either the male or the female concerns not only to our identity as Dine' people, as asdzaa, woman or as hastiin, man, but also to the specific roles we inhabit in our cultural ways. To be sure, the 21st century has plagued our Dine' ways of being with many social ills, and new foreign practices of living and thinking which concerns American assimilation. Though there are a plethora of examples, present (Euro American) society which includes philosophers and educators, are stating that gender does not exist or does not matter. This is blasphemy against Indigenous epistemology, our Indigenous knowledge is who we are, it is our truth. Our communal knowledge of male and female is how we were divinely made by Creator God. He made us distinct in our genders, for the Dine' it is asdzaa and hastiin.
This innate assignment was given to use on the day of our birth. We were either made to be a male or female via our physical, mental and emotional state. The distinct roles as distinct genders in Navajo culture is like an act of sacred prayer. Existence of either the male or the female concerns not only to our identity as Dine' people, as asdzaa, woman or as hastiin, man, but also to the specific roles we inhabit in our cultural ways. To be sure, the 21st century has plagued our Dine' ways of being with many social ills, and new foreign practices of living and thinking which concerns American assimilation. Though there are a plethora of examples, present (Euro American) society which includes philosophers and educators, are stating that gender does not exist or does not matter. This is blasphemy against Indigenous epistemology, our Indigenous knowledge is who we are, it is our truth. Our communal knowledge of male and female is how we were divinely made by Creator God. He made us distinct in our genders, for the Dine' it is asdzaa and hastiin.
We as unique genders 'balance' ourselves out, we compliment one another and that is an extension of what we as Dine' express as "hozho." Here in the desert southwest, gender roles are held to the highest esteem by many tribal members, such roles are necessary and relevant in keeping our ceremonial and social activities in tact and pure.
We as Indigenous need to hold on steadfast to our ancestral ways of being and stop being fooled by the trends of Euro-American society. This conscious way of living as an Indigenous person in modern urban life is what is expressed as "decolonizing."
Bless each other by speaking the truth of who we are as Indigenous, we are not "Them" - we are sacred Indigenous.
In a good way.
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