The Limited Times

Now you can see non-English news...

News from yesterday - the history newsletter: Beyond Winnetou

2023-01-26T16:10:15.795Z


Why American indigenous people never say "Howgh", why Germans are so sensitive to Karl May, why "the Indians" were never as close to nature as the cliché says - that's what the SPIEGEL HISTORY newsletter is all about.


have you read and loved Karl May?

Or do you think Winnetou and Old Shatterhand don't go anymore today?

The emotions that the Apache leader still arouses became apparent last summer when a publisher withdrew a children's book that told the story of Karl May's heroes from adolescence, on the grounds that it was too clichéd.

"During the discussion, it became clear that the relationship between the Germans and the North American indigenous people is obviously a special one," says history editor Martin Pfaffenzeller.

In the new issue of SPIEGEL HISTORY, which Martin conceived, we tell you why that is and what the story of »the Indians« really looked like, apart from the clichés.

SPIEGEL employee Frederik Seeler met a member of the Apsáalooke: Kendall Old Elk from Montana mediates between reality and Winnetou fiction every day in a Wild West amusement park in Brandenburg.

Old Elk says he is grateful to Karl May because his books made Germans curious.

“People just have to understand that these are fairy tales.” It starts with what is perhaps the most well-known “common knowledge”: According to Old Elk, he has never heard the famous “Howgh” as a greeting.

Nor do you put your hand in front of your mouth and cry.

"Noble savages" who are particularly close to nature - this image is still stuck in many people's minds to this day.

Recent research shows that the civilization of the first Americans made nature usable, for example through targeted fire clearing - and in some places exploited it to such an extent that habitats literally had to be given up.

Boarding motto: »Kill the Indian in the child«

However, it was the European settlers who upset the fabric of the »New World« after their arrival and decimated many indigenous groups through massacres and expulsions.

For example in California, where research today speaks of regional genocides.

The horses, which only came back to America through the Spaniards, changed the living environment of the indigenous people massively - not for everyone positively.

A collection in Berlin's Humboldt Forum, of all places, shows how ambivalent the relationship between European colonialists and indigenous peoples was at times: there are numerous everyday objects of the Omaha nation.

Unlike so many other objects from colonies, they were not looted, but collected by Francis La Flesche on behalf of the museum between 1894 and 1898.

The ethnologist was an Omaha himself and bought whistles, moccasins and hair brushes from other members of the group.

Until 2017, the Omaha didn't even know this collection existed.

In 2018, some Omaha traveled to Berlin and helped develop the exhibition in which the objects can be seen today.

And what else is the new magazine about?

For example, about “Two Spirits”, indigenous people who have long lived apart from dual gender.

About the terrible experiences of many children in Christian boarding schools, where the motto was: »Kill the Indian in the child«.

About a Swiss activist who fought for Sitting Bull in 1890.

Or about Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland, the first indigenous minister in the United States.

You can read these and other texts digitally here, you can get the booklet on paper in well-stocked newsagents or have it sent to you via mail order bookshops.

We wish you exciting reading and will be in touch in two weeks with the next newsletter, which you can order here.

Please let us know how you found the magazine. We can be reached at spiegelgeschichte@spiegel.de.

The editors of SPIEGEL HISTORY recommend

  • Holocaust survivor Rachel Hanan: "I was a skin-and-bones null person" 

  • Looted colonial art in German living rooms: where to put grandpa's sword from the Boxer War? 

  • Anniversary of the satirical magazine »Pardon«: sex and politics 

  • Family pieces from wartime: »My mother always carried the knife in the fold of her skirt« 

  • Jewish resistance in National Socialism: »Fight with everything you can find« 

Source: spiegel

All news articles on 2023-01-26

You may like

News/Politics 2024-02-19T04:12:25.380Z
News/Politics 2024-02-18T19:50:32.067Z
News/Politics 2024-02-19T12:41:20.543Z

Trends 24h

Latest

© Communities 2019 - Privacy

The information on this site is from external sources that are not under our control.
The inclusion of any links does not necessarily imply a recommendation or endorse the views expressed within them.