Keith Bassos Wisdom Sits in Places Essay -- American History Western

Keith Bassos Wisdom Sits in Places in that location is a deep relationship amongst the surround and Western Apache hatful. The bonds between the both are so strong that it is embedded in their purification and tarradiddle. Keith Basso, author of Wisdom Sits in Places expanded on this theory and did so by divulging himself into Western Apaches life. He spent fifteen years with the Apache heap studying their relationship with the environment, specifically c at oncentrating on Place-names. When Basso source began to guide with the Apache people, one of his Apache friends told him to learn the names, because they held a finicky meaning with the community. (Cruikshank 1990 54) Place-names are special names given to a specific locality where an event took enthrone that was signifi brush asidet in history and crucial in shaping ethics and beliefs. Through the use of place-names, the environment became a teaching tool for Apache people. inflammation Lake, Minnesota is an O jibwa place-name. The area dates back 9000 yeas ago when the Stone Age peoples first inhabited the region that is now known as northwestern Ontario. These aboriginals were autochthonal people familiar with the properties of the surrounding plants and wild animals. They brookd along the waterways and treated their environment with respect and celebrated its bounties through their biographyuality. (Web Site 1) According to Ojibwa legend, thousands of years ago, two hunters came across a very large moose standing beside a beautiful clear blue lake. The Hunters thought the moose was an evil spirit named Matchee Manitou and they tried to kill it. One of the hunters shot the animal with an arrow entirely wounding it. The grand and majestic animal escaped by plunge into the water and disappearing forever. A large pool of blood dark the water red, masking the once beautiful blue lake. A prick so huge was never to be seen again. The hunters named the lake Misque Sakigon meani ng Color of phone line Lake. Years later it became known as Red Lake. (Web Site 1)When I heard this story, 12 years ago, it came from the mouth of my fathers honorable friend, an Ojibwa man, named Henry Meekis. I still remember everyone sitting in expect of him while he told the story. His passion for the story permeated the room and we were all capture by it.The importance of place-name study lies in the light it sheds on the cultural... ...lace-names can be seen in the following quote given by an Apache named BensonLewis. I think of the mountain called White Rocks Lie Above In a Compact Cluster as it were my own grandmother. I recall stories of how it once was at that mountain. The stories told to me were uniform arrows. Elsewhere, hearing that mountains name, I see it. Its name is like a picture. Stories go to work on you like arrows. Stories make you live right. Stories make you replace yourself. (38)When I read Wisdom Sits in Places I could feel the importance of place-names through the words of the Apache peoples stories. Events that took place many years ago in a specific areas reiterate the morals and beliefs the Apache people hold near to them. To say that they are anything but relevant to Apache history and culture would be a mistake.Works CitedBasso, Keith 1999 Wisdom Sits in Places. Albuquerque University of parvenu Mexico Press.Cruikshank, Julie 1990 Getting the Words Right Perspectives on Naming and Places in Athapaskan oral exam History. Artic Anthropology 27 52-65. 1. www.red-lake.com/museum