Reading Diary Week 10: Myths and Legends of British North America

This week I am continuing on the Native American Mythology and Folklore theme with the unit British North America. I am excited for this unit because it talks about creation stories and themes from the first nations of North America. I chose this unit because it works well with the Pacific NW unit I read last week. I am excited to have the opportunity to study the culture of the Pacific NW in this new Unit!

Reading A:

How the Earth was Formed - I found this story to be a very interesting explanation of how the Earth formed! The story starts out with a human trying to catch a beaver. At first his attempts do not succeed so he decides he will destroy the dam and then when the water has drained from the lake he would then catch beaver. So the human went to the damn and poked at it with a stick, but instead of the lake draining of water the water level rose. It rose last his ankles and kept rising. The human made a raft and then made medicine from moss. The human then asked the wolf to run around the raft with the moss in its mouth and after a week of running in a circle land formed beneath the raft. The wolf kept running until he ran around the Earth and never came back. this is how the Earth was formed. 

Creation of Light - A tale of trickery! I like it. So this is the tale of how light came to be in the world. The story starts out by saying that in the beginning all of the world was dark, all but the old chiefs tepee. The old chief refused to give any of the animals light so the animals decided to take the light by craft. The animals gather and went to sing and dance at the chief tepee. They sang, “light, light, light” and soon light was stolen from the old chief and drew upwards into the sky. It was faint, so they continued to dance and sing. More and more light was stolen up into the sky until the chef in his confusion said... “let there be - light.” Now all the animals owned the light even though the old chief did not mean it. 

Reading B: 

The Making of Lakes and Mountains - Interesting story! It starts out with a women being kidnapped by bears. The women after some time wanted to escape so she devised a plan. Each morning she combed her hair she saved her hair combings and the hair oils. She also kept a whetstone. When she ran away she through the hair oils and this became a great lake. When the bears caught up with her she threw her hair combings down and these suddenly became great fallen trees that the bears struggled to get through. Next, the bears almost caught the women so she breaks a piece of whetstone and throws it. This then created the great mountains! And this is how the lakes and mountains formed. 

Kwagulth the Salmon

The Coming of the Salmon - Awesome story. It begins with a man that wished his river was full of salmon. He had a dream that with the help of all the animals he defeated the salmon people and bring their children back to the river to populate it. So the man and the animals set out to defeat the salmon people. When they arrived they found that the salmon people could not see them, but they could see their children being taken away. The man and the animals put the children into their canoe and went home to populate their rivers.