Blessingway, central ceremony of a complex system of Navajo healing ceremonies known as sings, or chants, that are designed to restore equilibrium to the cosmos.
The Kindaalda is the Navajo coming of age ceremony for women. The ceremony takes place after a girl's first menstrual cycle and lasts four days. ' According to myth, the 'Changing woman' performed the Kinaalda ceremony at puberty, and thus became the first woman to bear children.
The Diné believe there are two classes of beings: the Earth People and the Holy People. The Holy People are believed to have the power to aid or harm the Earth People.
The Night Way (Yébîchai in Navajo) is a healing ceremony that lasts for nine days and nights and is performed only in the winter months. The ritual, perhaps the most complex in the Navajo repertoire of healing chants, includes praying, sacred dancing, pollen blessing, and sandpainting.
NAVAJO traditionally received treatment for illness from native healers or "medicine men." As in a conventional medical care system, many different types of practitioner exist; these range from diagnosticians such as hand tremblers, crystal gazers, and "listeners," to individuals who perform healing ceremonies
Traditionally, most rites were primarily for curing physical and mental illness. In other ceremonies there were simply prayers or songs, and dry paintings might be made of pollen and flower petals. In some cases there were public dances and exhibitions at which hundreds or thousands of Navajo gathered.
Today, the Navajo uses the sand to make a painting for the crowds who have come to the Heard Museum in Phoenix to learn more about his tribe's customs. He prepares the ground, covers it with the fine, clean riverbed sand and slowly, evenly, creates pictures known as sand paintings.
This ceremony involves five steps: molding into Changing Woman, running, hair washing, painting, and the making of the corn cake.
- Molding into Changing Woman. Changing Woman is a Navajo deity who embodies all of the ideals of a Navajo woman.
- Running.
- Hair Washing.
- Face Painting.
- Making of the Corn Cake.
A Secret ProgramOne reason that Navajo Code Talkers were not recognized until much later is because the program was secret and classified by the military. The Navajo were ordered to keep their wartime jobs secret. It wasn't until 1968 that the Navajo Code Talkers program was declassified by the military.
Upon returning to the US after the war, some Native American servicemen and women suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and unemployment. Following the war, many Native Americans found themselves living in cities, rather than on reservations.
It is, as the name implies, a blessing ceremony and is used to ensure good luck and prosperity. The Enemyway ['Anaa'jí] is used to exorcise the ghosts of aliens, violence and ugliness and is derived from old ceremonials used to protect warriors from the ghosts of those they had killed.
After World War II, most American Indian Code Talkers returned to communities that were having difficult economic times. Jobs were scarce, and so were opportunities for education or job training.
: a round dance of the Plains Indians and Navajo in which the girls select partners.
In the past, Navajo musicians were corralled into maintaining the status quo of traditional music, chants and/or flute compositions. Today, Navajo bands span the genres of punk, metal, hardcore, hip hop, blues, rock, death metal, black metal, stoner rock, country, and even traditional.
The Navajos are speakers of a Na-Dené Southern Athabaskan language they call Diné bizaad (lit. 'People's language'). The term Navajo comes from Spanish missionaries and historians who referred to the Pueblo Indians through this term, although they referred to themselves as the Diné, meaning 'the people'.
