An Introduction to Intercultural Communication. Fred E. Jandt
understandings of legal theory and the rights and responsibilities that individuals should have in a legal system. In the case of a true co-culture, both understandings of the law would be recognized.
See Focus on Culture 1.3 for a discussion of New Zealand struggling with the concept of co-culture.
Focus on Culture 1.3 The Māori of New Zealand
Māori celebrate the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, New Zealand's founding document, on a public holiday every February 6.
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The original inhabitants of what is today known as New Zealand were Polynesians who arrived in a series of migrations more than 1,000 years ago. The original inhabitants' societies revolved around the iwi (tribe) or hapū (subtribe), which served to differentiate the many tribes of peoples. In 1769, Captain James Cook claimed the entire land for the British Crown. It was only after the arrival of the Europeans that the term Māori was used to describe all the tribes on the land. Those labeled Māori do not necessarily regard themselves as a single people.
The history of the Māori parallels the decline of other indigenous peoples in colonized lands, except for the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840 by more than 500 chiefs. The treaty was recorded in Māori and in English. The Māori and the English may have had different understandings of the terms governance and sovereignty. In exchange for granting sovereignty to Great Britain, the Māori were promised full exclusive and undisturbed possession of their lands, forests, fisheries, and other properties and the same rights and privileges enjoyed by British subjects. The terms of the treaty were largely ignored as Māori land was appropriated as settlers arrived.
Activism in the late 1960s brought a renaissance of Māori languages, literature, arts, and culture, and calls to address Māori land claims as the Treaty of Waitangi became the focus of grievances.
New Zealand's population by descent is approximately 14% Māori and 71% Pākehā (European). New Zealand is governed under a parliamentary democracy system with two separate electoral rolls: one for the election of general members of parliament and one for the election of a small number of Māori members of parliament. Pākehā can enroll on the general roll only; people who consider themselves Māori must choose which one of the two rolls they wish to be on.
The following article appeared in an August 1999 edition of the newspaper The Dominion.
Map 1.2 New Zealand
What Makes a Māori?
The definition of Māori for voting purposes … is entirely one of self-definition. Nigel Roberts, head of Victoria University's School of Political Science and International Relations, says such self-identification is appropriate: “I think that ethnicity is very largely, in the late 20th century, a matter of identification—it is a cultural matter. The world has moved on from classifying people by blood, which was a meaningless definition.”
Source: Milne (1999, p. 9)
American Indians
The Census Bureau uses the term American Indian. That term is derived from a colonizer’s worldview—that is, Columbus thought he was going to India—and the land was named for another Italian navigator. It is a label applied to people by someone other than themselves. During the civil rights movements of the 1960s and 1970s, the term Native American came into common use as it was considered to represent historical facts more accurately (“native” predated European colonization). Yet that term as well is a label applied by outsiders and for some has the pejorative meaning from the colonial era of “primitive.”
To use the labels that people apply to themselves would be to use labels such as Cherokee, Seminole, and Navajo. However, in many cases, these labels are actually derived from names created by the groups’ neighbors or enemies. Mohawk is a Narragansett name meaning “flesh eaters.” Sioux is a French corruption of an Anishinabe word for “enemy.” Navajo is from the Spanish version of a Tewa word. A survey reported in 1997 showed that 96% of high school and college youth with American Indian or Native American heritage identified themselves with the nation name (e.g., Cherokee, Seminole).
In Canada, the term Indian is generally considered offensive. The term First Nations is now the preferred term. At the United Nations, the term indigenous peoples was first used in documents in 2002. Objections to this term include that it puts all peoples under one label.
In a 1977 resolution, the National Congress of American Indians and the National Tribal Chairmen’s Association stated that in the absence of a specific tribal designation, the preferred term is American Indian and/or Alaska Native. In a 1995 survey, 50% preferred the term American Indian to 37% for Native American. Some activists such as Russell Means publicly are said to prefer American Indian to Native American (“People Labels,” 1995, p. 28). In the belief that people should be referred to by the term they prefer, this text uses the label of specific nations or, when referring to all nations within the United States, the term American Indian.
Can one nation have two legal systems? Can two legal systems coexist equally? Some 573 distinct nations exist by treaty within the territorial limits of the United States. One is the federal government in Washington, D.C. The remaining 572 are American Indian nations recognized by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs that enjoy some areas of complete sovereignty and some areas of limited sovereignty. By treaty, the American Indian nations have their own territory, governmental structure, and laws; collect their own taxes; and are protected by U.S. federal law in the practice of their culture and religion (Dudley & Agard, 1993). The American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1978 proclaimed “to protect and preserve for American Indians their inherent right to believe, express and exercise the traditional religions.”
Tribal sovereignty refers to the ability of tribes to govern themselves (Pevar, 2012). The U.S. Constitution gives Congress rather than the states exclusive authority over American Indian affairs. The 1832 Supreme Court decision in Worcester v. Georgia ruled that the state could not impose its laws on a Cherokee Indian reservation. In modern times, it is the issue of gaming that has further defined the relationship between tribes and the state and federal governments. A 1987 Supreme Court decision in California v. Cabazon Band of Mission Indians ruled that the state has no authority to regulate tribal gaming if the state otherwise allows any form of gaming. The following year, Congress adopted the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, which requires states to negotiate gaming compacts with tribes who wish to establish gaming operations. The states and tribes are to negotiate as distinct sovereigns, thus acknowledging shared sovereignty while retaining the authority to legislate all matters for the tribes including the form of government (United States v. Wheeler, 1978).
Global Voices
“The fact remains that our nations were here before any Europeans came. We gave people permission to settle here in exchange for recognition of our tribal sovereignty. If that troubles people, they can move.”
Source: David Treuer, the Ojibwe author of The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee, quoted in Time, February 4–11, 2019, p. 104. Treuer's mother was an Ojibwe; his father an Austrian Jewish survivor of the Holocaust.
When nations adopt one system of laws,