Title: Who's a Native American? It's complicated – In America - CNN.com Blogs
Headings: Who's a Native American? It's complicated
May 14th, 2012
Who's a Native American? It's complicated
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Content: "If my children do not have family with a Nez Perce, I won’t have any Nez Perce grandchildren," Holt said. " And there’s a sadness there, there's a hopeless feeling that it's ending with me; it's going to end with them. I tell my children, 'You must be with a Nez Perce'…When you start thinking like that, you're going crazy." Good Fox said the popular perception of Native Americans is rooted in stereotypes – the idea that a "real Indian" looks and acts a certain way, and that anyone who doesn't conform to that image is somehow "less Indian." But the truth is more diverse – different tribes can have different physical characteristics, and intermarriage among other ethnic groups mean that Native Americans often have a multiracial background. "I think people still have this perception that all American Indians look like this image of Plains Indians from the 1800s," said Good Fox. " We don’t look like how we would have 200 years ago either, so to expect Indians to look the same (as they did then) makes no sense. "There’s this ignorance about Native American citizenship," said Good Fox. " And what are we learning about American Indians grades K-12?