Talk:Native American Music Awards

"Self Indentifying" Native Americans

Important Note: "Nammys" is a slang term and not officially used by the Native American Music Awards Inc. When The Native American Music Awards was formed, the attorneys for the corporation consulted with several other organizations including the US department of Interior regarding the Indian Arts & Crafts Act and the Nashville Music Awards which were called the "Nammies". It was determined at that time that the Native American Music Awards would not use officially use "Nammys" or make any effort to be identifiable in that manner. Additionally, the department of Interior stated that music, any form or type, could not be regulated nor by the Indian Arts & Crafts act. Other awards programs have since attempted to imitate the Native American Music Awards but have not been as successful.

When the Native American Music Awards were consulted on the Grammy category for Native American music, the Grammy organization expressed that their category could not exclusively represent Federally recognized musicians. The category was not solely a traditional based category and did allow for contemporary forms of music with some traditional instrumentation. Several years later, the only category for Native American music was disssolved by the Grammys.

The concept of who is and who is not a Native American is not just a controversy related to the Native and Indigenous Awards programs. The United States Government and the Bureau of Indian Affairs only recognize enrolled citizens and members of the 563 Federally Recognized Indian Tribes and Alaskan Native Villages and Bands as Native Americans. There have been many incidents in the past where people that are not enrolled citizens or members of Federally Recognized Tribes but members of State Recognized tribes and have won Awards. Most “Self Identifying” Native Americans are however of European decent. They, and others like them that have won Awards, but are not enrolled members of Federally Recognized tribes, are people that “Self Identify” as Native American but do not have ancestors on any tribal rolls. It should be noted that there are cases however where someone might have an ancestor on tribal rolls, but are not eligible for Citizenship in a Federally Recognized Tribe. This is not the case however with Douglass Blue Feather nor with Chief Red Hawk (deceased). Blue Feather’s only proof of Native American ancestry is a DNA test that he says he has done that shows positive proof. This is in itself controversial, and in some cases not accurate. And regardless of its accuracy, this cannot tell a person what tribe he belongs to. Douglass Blue feather claims to be Cherokee as does Chief Red Hawk, but neither of them can prove it. And there are other cases where someone just simply “Self Identifies” as Native American because they say that information has been passed down to them through the family and this is the most common case. While there were many cases throughout the United States, of Indians that were not documented in the 1800s and early 1900's, such as in the case of the 300 or so Cherokees that were never heard of again after they left for Arkansas, there is simply no way to prove or disprove as to whether or not someone who “Self Identifies” as Indian, Cherokee or Native American is in fact Indian, Cherokee or Native American. This is because of all the intermarriages and intermixing that have taken place over the centuries. And many enrolled tribal members of Federally Recognized Tribes are themselves mixed blood. Many enrolled tribal members who because of low Native American blood quantum, look more white, black or Asian then they do Native American. Blacks, Whites, Asians, and other racial and ethnic groups do not have this problem because of physical appearance, and in the case of Hispanics and Latinos because of surnames, language, and the ability to trace an ancestor to a Latin American country. However, Native Americans are not only a racial group but a political group as well, meaning they are citizens of sovereign nations. This is the reason for Tribal Identifications and Certificates of Degree of Indian Blood Quantum Cards. It should be noted that studies have been done on the number of possible descendants of the undocumented Indians, and in particular the Cherokees. In the example of the Cherokees, estimates have been taken of the number of people who have claimed Cherokee heritage, and that number was compared with a reasonable estimate of possible decedents today of the Cherokees who were not documented, and there clearly seems to be many more people claiming Cherokee heritage then possible. Claiming Cherokee heritage has been an American pastime since the Colonial Days. In conclusion, there is no way to prove or disprove Native American heritage today. That is why many tribes only recognize enrolled Tribal Members of Federally Recognized tribes as Native American. If not, then anyone by using the “Self Identifying” definition would be classified as Native American, and the distinction between what is and is not “Authentic” begins to become blurred. Many Indians of Federally Recognized Tribes an especially the ones that live on reservations and tribal lands, feel that their heritage is being stolen form them. Heritage cannot be stolen. Songs are copyrighted and owned by their owners. Most traditional songs are now in public domain where anyone can legally record them. On the other hand, many would argue that whether or not one is a Federally Recognized Indian is not the issue, but the issue is to promote Native American music in general. And by including “Self Identifying” Indians in Awards programs, they may argue that this is better for everyone because it expands and exposes a greater number of people to experience the genres of Native American music. --—Preceding unsigned comment added by LightingBug (talk • contribs)

As this page is devoted to discussion regarding improving this article, what are your ideas about improving the article? Whatever is added must be properly sourced. Badagnani (talk) 21:28, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

I beleive to improve the article, one must explain how the Nammys were formed, and who the founding members were that started it. And maybe even talk about some winners from years past. And maybe adding a seperate section explaining the different catagories for nomination. The controversy regarding the Nammys in the above paragraphs should also be mentioned briefly. LightingBug (talk) 22:54, 17 August 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by LightingBug (talk • contribs) 22:49, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

I Intend to work on this :)

Aquai! As a degreed Librarian, I turned to the Native American Music Awards list of winners as a good source for my collection development at my Library and also to provide people that inevitably asked what respected sources in my Community were. I agree that it would be helpful to improve citations on this page, but this organisation is what I would call a primary source. It is okay to cite the RIAA. It is okay to link to the Grammys. These are as close to our Grammys as people get. So what do we do with that?

I'm trying to go through and create music pages for American Indian artists that are lucky enough to be so major that I've heard on reputable programmes, like NPR, CBC, et cetera. While I reviewed the criteria for inclusion in wikipedia, things seemed out of line with the spirit of Wikimania. I realise that we don't want our cousin's uncle's sister's roomates' MySpace band on wikipedia for quality reasons, but a lot of the criteria are systematically exclusive for minority communities. We want the sum of all human knowledge, right? Could another tenet be that if an artist's music is available for download through iTunes or summat be a principle? This would allow for many independent artists while partially patrolling for quality.

Yep, this can definitely be organised better, and I definitely want to help improve the page. I know that I'm not as good or diligent as other editors, so I only try and edit pages on wikipedia once in a while when I have a good amount of time at my disposal to cite properly, et cetera. But I want to volunteer and try and improve things little by little. :) As the Māori say "Nāu te rourou, nāku te rourou, ka ora te manuhiri."Abesottedphoenix (talk) 22:26, 18 September 2012 (UTC)