Ruth Hopkins: Western science catches up to Native traditions

Systematic Botany is the study of plant diversity and the relationships between them. More broadly, Systematics delves into the phylogeny of every living organism and traces their evolutionary lineages. Here, the principle of common ancestry forms what geneticists call, The Tree of Life.

Yes, that Tree, my Natives. What western scientists don’t know is Natives have been in the presence of the Tree of Life for thousands of years. It stands in the middle of our Sundance grounds, bedecked in prayer ties fashioned lovingly by the hands of elders, women and children. Kings and Queens in Crowns of Sage hang from it and offer flesh, dancing and praying for four days without food or water every summer. This Tree, that we teach connects all life on Earth to the Heavens above, is what scientists have Columbused (the art of ‘discovering’ something that’s not new and stripping it of cultural context), through many decades of complex study and with the aid of computer programs.

Scientists have known for quite some time that we’re all composed of the same stuff. Everything on Ina Maka (Mother Earth) is composed of the same atomic particles found in stars and supernovas, and all life here shares the same genetic base pairs (adenine-thymine and guanine-cytosine in DNA, adenine-uracil and guanine-cytosine in RNA).

The study of genomics has enabled science to take this theory a step further, and tabulate relatedness through DNA analysis. In short, Genetics is being used to map out the details of what our Native ancestors already knew: from microscopic bacteria to prairie sage; four legged beasties to two legged homo sapiens (humans), we are all related.