Empathy between Cultures
Knowledge of the world in which humans are a part of has been a coveted trait since the beginnings of humanity. As one, human beings have turned their eyes to the world around them and sought to organize and define it. What happens when the natural state of humanity turns inward and analyzes the culture that has been self-created and self-sustained since humanity’s first steps from the cesspool of primordial life? This process of self-analysis creates a rapport between different cultures, allowing people to find the similarities between their beliefs and draw from them in order to create pleasantly symbiotic relationships with each other. Most importantly, the complete lack of ignorance about other cultures leads to the recognition that despite differences, humans all share the same base characteristics, all experience emotions and pain in the same way. A significant importance of the origin stories of Native American tribes is that they provide a humanising effect that is crucial to maintaining symbiosis between other cultures. The lack of this harmony can be devastating.
By providing knowledge of another culture, origin stories allow foreigners to the aforementioned culture to glimpse into the lives and beliefs of indigenous members to the culture. Experiences such as this are a cornerstone to creating empathic, healthy relationships to a certain people or culture. Cultures that do not have healthy relationships to others are often the target of organized hate, bias, and violence in extreme cases by ignorant parties. Being unaware of a culture or it’s beliefs is a segue into the dehumanization of the culture’s members. Human nature is to overcome insubordinates, and when viewed as such, other human beings become no obstacle. By viewing a group of people as a lower tier to others allows for systematic oppression on large scales. A large scale example of this is the degrading and dehumanizing propaganda endorsed by Adolf Hitler during the Third Reich. This propaganda made his targeted groups seem lower or worse than human, leading into the mass genocide the Holocaust is known for. By utilising origin stories and other related Native American legends and mythos, an understanding that these people are actually people is established.
The significance of Native American origin stories lies in their ability to provide a common understanding for the humanity of another person. Widespread reading and understanding of these stories would lead to a larger scale of people with empathic biases towards the Native American cultures, which is a hugely important factor in the continued survival of any culture.