Monday, September 29, 2008

Native American naming rituals

There are many different groups of First Nations peoples in North America, so it stands to reason that there would be many different naming rituals.

According to http://understandingoccults.com/category/naming-rituals-rites/ and http://www.garynull.com/documents/nativeamerican.htm here are a few:

The Delaware: A person's true name is a sacred gift, and only visionary name-givers are allowed to choose it.

The Shawnee: Two name-givers ponder various possibilities during a night vigil. The next morning each name-giver offers one name to the parents, who choose the one they will give to the child.

And this story describes choosing for a grown person who has already "made a name for himself":

"Legal names are given, but Native American names are earned. Gabriel Horn gives a personal account of why and how his Indian name was chosen: "By the time I graduated from college, I had already done my battles for the people. I had protested against stereotypes of Native Americans, I had fought for a Native American literature course on campus, and I had asked for participation in the United Nations. My immediate family believed that I had earned a name. The name came to my uncle, a traditional Cherokee man, who had a vision of a white deer coming to him and singing my name. He knew it was to be White Deer."

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