Project: Native Americans

Categories: Native Americans | Native Americans Project | North American First Peoples | Pre-1700 Projects

Contents

About the Native Americans Project

WikiTree's Native Americans Project, as named, covers the lower 48 states of the current United States plus Alaska. The time frame covered by this project includes pre-colonial times through the present. The project has a number of Teams, according to tribe or nation, event, or other area of historical or cultural interest. For background on the project's beginnings and evolution, see this historical discussion thread on G2G.

Mission

The mission of the project is to add and improve profiles of the first peoples of the land now bounded by the United States.

To accomplish our mission project members take primary responsibility for relevant profiles or family groups and work on merging duplicates, cleaning up profiles, adding sources, removing incorrect information and offering research assistance as needed.

How to Join

We ask everyone who wants to join the project to meet the following requirements before they request to join:

  1. Be an honor-code-signing member of WikiTree for at least 30 days.
  2. Make at least 100 contributions to WikiTree profiles.
  3. Successfully complete the Pre-1700 Quiz
  4. Find a Natives Americans Project Team you'd like to join, and express your interests when you request to join the project.
  5. Identify a profile you've created or edited that demonstrates your understanding of WikiTree editing generally, and Native American profiles guidelines, research and sourcing. Be sure to include your example profile when you request to join the project.

To request to join the project, post your interest to the project's join thread in G2G. Be sure to include an example profile and your specific team interest(s) in your answer post.

Are you interested in the Native Americans Project?native_americans.gif


Goals

Our project goals are:

  • To bring together WikiTreers interested in improving profiles and connecting Native American families to the Global Family Tree.
  • To improve profiles of the descendants of the people who resided in what are now the United States of America prior to the arrival of Europeans.
  • To create accurate, culturally-sensitive, and documented profiles for Native Americans.
  • To provide and maintain a logical and organized structure to help individuals identify their ancestors and celebrate their history.
  • To identify and mark profiles that are mythical or fictional.

Native American profiles should strive to:

  • have information from reliable sources
  • include documentation for facts
  • strive for historical accuracy
  • avoid stereotyping
  • present material in a non-biased, culturally-sensitive manner
  • separate fact from fiction

Other activities in support of these goals include:

  • All duplicates should be merged
  • Appropriate categories should be added
  • Biographies should be written using the WikiTree Style Guide, and citing the best available sources
  • Track edits to profiles managed or watched by the project through the Native Americans Project Activity Feed
  • Track and respond to questions posted to the G2G discussion forum that are marked with the native_americans tag

To-Do List/Tasks

To participate in the project, we have a list of tasks that we need accomplished. To see details about the task, volunteer, participate in the discussion, or ask questions about it, click on the link, which will take you to the G2G thread about the task. Be sure to post on that thread if you complete the task so we can take it off the list!

Coming soon!

Teams

WikiTree Native Americans Project members organize into teams based on their more specific interests. Everyone who wants to join the project is asked to find a team they'd like to join, and express their interests when requesting to join the project. See our Native Americans Project Teams List to find a team.

For an index of all pages of teams and other sub-projects, see the Native Americans Project Teams Category Page. This collection has a number of inactive teams, and we seek volunteers to activate or reinvigorate them.

Project Guidance & Resources

Terminology

We recognize that the term "Native Americans" is not accepted by all people descended from the original peoples of what is now the United States. Respecting that no one term will ever be acceptable to all, members of the project and others using WikiTree are encouraged to use the terminology that is most appropriate to their identity or culture.

Name Fields Guidelines

Last Name at Birth (LNAB)

WikiTree's underlying technology requires an entry in the "Last Name at Birth" field. It is the policy of WikiTree's Native Americans project to use this field to record the tribe or nation name for those individuals born before the introduction of surnames. For example, Pocahontas was a member of the Powhatan people. Her profile is Powhatan-3.

Tribe & Nation Names

We sometimes encounter differences in tribe names.

  • For modern tribal entities, we seek to use the name as it is officially recorded in the Bureau of Indian Affairs Federal Register.
  • For historical tribes, we seek to use the name that is most often used in historical records, understanding that these names are not necessarily what members of that tribe would have used; and that it’s often impossible to connect a person to a specific band, clan, or other smaller grouping so we use broader terminology.

If you have a question about tribal names being used, please start a discussion in G2G's Discussion Forum; be sure to add the native_american tag.

Sources

Oral Tradition

WikiTree places a strong emphasis on sources, especially for vital statistics and relationships. We realize that this emphasis sometimes conflicts with oral tradition often associated with Native American ancestry. We try to reflect oral tradition in the narrative while at the same time following WikiTree's standards for sourcing when it comes to relationships and vitals.

Project Pages

WikiTree Help

Templates

Profile Stickers

Native American Sticker:

... was Ojibwe.

Use the Native American Sticker for profiles not requiring Native Americans Project Protection:

  • Anyone can add the Native American sticker to profiles of documented Native Americans as long as there is at least one reliable source included in the profile that identifies the person as Native American. See our Reliable Sources page for help with sources.
  • Please use the Native American Sticker template only on profiles of people who were (or are) associated with a tribe. You can use the Heritage sticker (see below) for descendants who no longer associate as Native American.
  • To place the sticker: add text like what you see in the "Code used" column in the Native American Sticker Examples table anywhere below the == Biography == heading and above the == Sources == heading. For example, the sticker shown above is generated by placing this text below the == Biography == heading: {{Native American Sticker|tribe=Ojibwe}}.
  • Note that we do not use the word "Tribe" or "Nation" in the sticker tribe parameter. Because this sticker generates a category, please include the tribe or nation name.

Heritage Sticker:

Tree silhouette
... has Native American ancestors.

If tribal affiliation is not known, or on profiles of descendants of Native Americans who no longer associate with a tribe, consider using the Heritage Sticker template instead:

  • The Heritage Sticker does not generate a category.
  • To place the sticker add this text below the == Biography == heading: {{Heritage Sticker|ancestors=Native American|imagetext=Tree silhouette}}. You could also use a particular tribe or nation in place of "Native American" for the ancestors parameter.

Project Boxes

The Project Box is intended for Project Managed Profiles, co-managed by the project (along with existing profile managers), any profile needing Project Protection. All other Native American profiles should use the Project Sticker (see above).

Note that 1) we do not use the word "Tribe" or "Nation" in the project box tribe parameter; and 2) the Project Box generates a category.

Project Boxes should only be added to profiles by Project Leaders and Coordinators. If you are Profile Manager for a profile you feel needs Project Protection, please contact our project leadership by email to wikitree-native-americans-project@googlegroups.com.



This page was last modified 02:34, 5 October 2024. This page has been accessed 54,109 times.