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The Shawnee Sun (Shawnee: Siwinowe Kesibwi) was a newspaper published in the Shawnee language in Kansas from 1835 to 1844. The paper was founded by Baptist missionary Jotham Meeker, who created his own script for Shawnee, an Algonquian language. It was a missionary newspaper and attempted to convert the Shawnee to Christianity. It was the first newspaper published entirely in a Native American language.

Background

Jotham Meeker was a Baptist missionary from Cincinnati, Ohio, who moved to modern-day Kansas in 1833.[1] He attempted to convert the Shawnee—recently removed to Kansas by the Indian Removal Act of 1830—to Christianity, and he developed a script for transcribing the Algonquian languages (specifically the Shawnee language) to more quickly convert them.[A][3] While their motivations are not clear, many Shawnee aided Meeker in his transcription work.[4]

Publication and contents

The Shawnee Sun (Shawnee: Siwinowe Kesibwi; given as Sauwa-noe Ke-sawthwa by historian Doug C. McMurtrie in 1933[5]) was first published in 1835, written entirely in Shawnee.[B][1] It was the first newspaper written entirely in a Native American language[5]—its predecessor, the Cherokee Phoenix, was written in both English and Cherokee—and it was the first published in the modern-day state of Kansas.[7] Meeker relied on the writings of both the Shawnee and white settlers in the publication.[8] It was a missionary text, and most Shawnee (around 80 percent) were not Christian.[9]

In its first issue, Johnston Lykins wrote in the style of the Genesis creation narratives about the importance of Christianity and conversion.[1] In one of its surviving issues is a Solomon-like narrative about living in accordance with God's wishes.[10] For the Sun's writers, the Great Spirit of Shawnee culture and God were similar, and in an attempt to relate the two, they used the Shawnee word Tapalamalikwa for God; they used miceminatoke (bad snake place) for Hell.[11]

Only two pages of the paper survive, and both have been translated by George Blanchard, an elder in the Absentee Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma.[12] Its dimensions were 6 3⁄4 inches across by 10 3⁄4 inches tall.[5]

Demise and cultural legacy

The paper was published irregularly—first monthly, and then sporadically[5]—and it dissolved in 1844.[C][13] According to his review of the Shawnee Sun's history in 1933, McMurtrie concluded that it had a limited readership, and printed perhaps only "two hundred copies to an issue".[5] A second Baptist publication for Native Americans, the Cherokee Messenger, appeared in 1844.[14]

One of its issues is located at the University of Missouri–Kansas City's archives.[15] Following Blanchard's 2008 translation of the extant issues, the Shawnee have been better able to understand the paper.[16]

Notes and references

Notes

  1. ^ Meeker used the English alphabet to represent Shawnee phonemes, unlike the Cherokee syllabary of Sequoyah.[2]
  2. ^ One historian gives the language as Sioux.[6]
  3. ^ A note attached to one of the surviving issues says the paper dissolved in 1842, though the Baptist Missionary Magazine mentions its publication until 1844.[5]

Citations

  1. ^ a b c Beatty 2008, p. 243.
  2. ^ Beatty 2008, p. 249.
  3. ^ Beatty 2008, pp. 243–244.
  4. ^ Beatty 2008, p. 244.
  5. ^ a b c d e f McMurtrie 1933.
  6. ^ Murphy 1976, p. 4.
  7. ^ Beatty 2008, p. 243; Kansas Historical Society.
  8. ^ Beatty 2008, p. 245.
  9. ^ Beatty 2008, p. 258.
  10. ^ Beatty 2008, p. 251.
  11. ^ Beatty 2008, pp. 256, 258.
  12. ^ Beatty 2008, p. 254.
  13. ^ Beatty 2008, p. 252.
  14. ^ Gardner 2014, p. 67.
  15. ^ Beatty 2008 gives its location as being in the Jotham Meeker collection at the Kansas State Historical Society, but this is incorrect. Kansas Historical Society 2009, p. 87.
  16. ^ Hansen 2018, p. 51.

Bibliography

  • Beatty, James K. (2008). "Interpreting the Shawnee Sun: Literacy and cultural persistence in Indian Country, 1833–1841". Kansas History. 31 (4): 243–259.
  • Gardner, Robert G. (2014). "Baptists and the Indians of North America, 1674–1845". Baptist History and Heritage. 49 (2): 62–72.
  • Hansen, Rose (October 2018). "Talk the talk: A native speaker works to keep the Shawnee language alive". Missouri Life. pp. 48–53.
  • McMurtrie, Doug C. (1933). "The Shawnee Sun: The first Indian-language periodical published in the United States". Kansas Historical Quarterly. 2 (4): 338–342. Retrieved 12 September 2022.
  • Murphy, Sharon (1976). Native American newspapers: Selected vignettes (PDF). Association for Education in Journalism. College Park.
  • "Shawnee Sun (Siwinowe Kesibwi)". Kansas Memory. Kansas Historical Society. Retrieved 12 September 2022.
  • "Errata, volume 31, number 4". Kansas History. 32 (1): 87. 2009.
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