Native American Stereotypes Essay

Over the past week we have seen how Native Americans face the never-ending barrage of racial stereotypes and misconceptions. As well we have seen their cultures and traditions used and misinterpreted by people outside of their culture in an attempt to make a profit from these unique practices. Native Americans have been persecuted ever since White men stepped on to their land. As we will see in this paper Native Americans have been misconstrued as a savage group of feather wearing and horse riding Indians. In the end this paper will look into how Native American culture and identity have been taken advantage of by whites and transformed the many different tribes and their uniqueness into one large group full of many different stereotypes. It is through the false replication of art and artifacts as well as how Indians have been portrayed in

Museums are the most common place where these images can be seen, but sometimes they do not reflect the truth behind the events being displayed. Once again non-native people are exploiting the history and traditions of Native Americans in the hopes of making a profit off of their trials and tribulations. “Native American art has long been mined as a resource by non-native artists and for commercial enterprises, just as Native American land was mined as the first act of dispossession and appropriation” (Berman 392). Again these non-native artists don’t fully understand the history of how an event took place and instead are creating the art in a way that will help better sell their piece. This damages the traditions and cultures of Native Americans as these events and people are being portrayed in a manner that is false and deceiving. This artwork is then sold on a global scale and artists who have no understanding of the truth behind and event being recreated are falsely portraying