The Sacred Hoop: Recovering the Feminine in American Indian Traditions

childbirth (“rope baby”), 258
Taboos, 28, 47, 75, 197. See also Sacred ritual
Talcot, Major (defeats Narragansetts), 33
TallMountain, Mary Randle, 156, 172–73, 175, 264
Tawa, see Maseo or Tawa
Thought Woman, see Spider Old Woman/Thought Woman
Thunder (god or symbol), 41, 109
Tiamuni Hotchin, see Cacique
Tibetan culture, 5
Timberlake, Lt. Henry, 36
Time: perception of, 59, 147–54; ritual, 94, 233, 238, 240
Tinotzin, see Guadalupe, Our Lady of/La Virgin de
Tlingit Indians, 108, 197
Tobacco, 24, 25
Tradition: American Indian valuation of, 210–11; and gender
change of goddesses, 19–20, 41, 269–70n3; and identity, 210,
224; rejection of, 210, 211 (see also Colonization; Cultural
bias); women disregarded in, 263. See also American Indian
history; American Indian literature; Oral tradition
Tribal systems: centrality of relationship in, 59, 60;
Christianization effect on, see Christianity; “democracy”
substituted for, 41; dual/complementary structure within, 18–
22, 31–32; family/“household” in, 33, 42, 49–50, 247–52,
256 (see also Children; Marriage); gay males and lesbians
within, see Homosexuality; kinship within, 23, 212, 251,
278n12; longhouse (or clan), decline in importance of, 33,
201; nuclear family replacing, 33, 42; patriarchal, see
Patriarchy; ritual centers of, 80; “stasis” of, 56; Western
misunderstanding of, 4 (see also Western/non-Indian thought);
woman-centered, see Gynocracy/gynarchy; women’s needs
disregarded by, 203; worldwide culture shared by, 5–6
Trickster tales, 74, 97–98. See also American Indian literature;