Trump a liar again: "Pocahontas" really is Native American

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... and not just any Cherokee, but a Cherokee Princess, no doubt!

I can only claim some Cree and/or Ojibwe from about 6 or 7 generations ago.

I find it hard to believe that virtually every white person (or so it seems) has Indian ancestors. Like I said, with my family it's supposed to be Sioux. Most likely some rumor passed down from one generation to the next. Everybody has a great-great-great-great grandfather pioneer who married a "squaw".

The Cherokee had intermixed with non-Native Americans for some time, both whites and blacks.

To that large of a degree? It seems like something that would be somewhat rare rather than extremely common.

Not at all. The Cherokee had hoped to live peacefully with whites, and they had , till Old Hickory set them on the Trail of Tears. But in that time before, there had been much exchanging of genetic material. Also, in order to prove that they could fit into the white world, they had adopted slavery, though unlike white society, the Cherokee tended to treat those Cherokee racial mixed with blacks a lot better.

There are a great many stupid people out there.

For what it's worth, I'm part Indian but I have never claimed it on any form. However, at one job more than 20 years ago, I happened to mention that in a casual conversation to my boss. My boss pulled my file and changed my race on the form to that of Native American. As far as I was concerned, it was meaningless -- I just shrugged and went on.

In my case, I'm 25% Norwegian. The other 75% is just about everything else, mostly British/Scottish/Irish, but some Native American and maybe other things as well. Even though I'm much more Britsh/Scottish/Irish than I am Norwegian, I pretty much only identify with the Norwegian side.

One problem for determining ancestry by census, the census forms didn't really have a place to mark whether one was Native American or to fill in the tribe. Years later, that has come back to bite many people because their Native American ancestors don't show up on the census records as being Native American.

The Cherokees quite readily mix in with everyone.

There are three federally recognized Cherokee tribes. As I understand it, the chief of the biggest tribe of Cherokee, the Cherokee Nation which was disbanded in the early 1900s and then reformed in 1976 or so is 1/32 Cherokee.

Warren had reportedly said that her great great great grandmother was part Cherokee. The DNA results said that she is 6 to 10 generations away from being full blooded Cherokee. If it is 6 generations and she is correct, then her grandmother was 1/2 Cherokee. If 7, then 1/4 Cherokee. And so on.

One issue with the DNA is that there is relatively little Native American DNA available from American Indians. A large part of this is apparently because tribal leaders have discouraged people from donating DNA to the project.

Consequently, the geneticists have tried to build up what they could based on the DNA from Native peoples in Central and South America. This is very reasonable because there is every reason to believe that they migrated down from North America.

So those Native Americans headed south and those Native Americans who remained behind were from the same general pool of Native American DNA as of that time. Over time, there were mutations in the DNA of those who went South and there were mutations in the DNA of those who remained and so there was some divergence between the two.

However, if you find someone with genetic markers that are found in the native people in Central and South America, it is possible that those genetic markers were also found in the pool of the DNA of those who remained in North America.

If anything, this could result in the ancestry of those who stayed behind being underrepresented somewhat since there are far fewer Native Americans to identify mutations that occurred after the two groups diverged.

That would mean that Warren's 6th to 10th generations since fulled blooded Native American should be a pretty strong claim.

My maternal grandmother's maiden name was Abramovski, and yet I hardly consider myself to be Jewish in any significant way. Besides, whoever had converted, it was so long ago that my grandmother's people considered themselves to be German (Prussian) Lutherans, despite their family name. I also have a bit of Polish and Swedish ancestry on my dad's side, though most of his people had been Russian (Black Sea) Germans originating from the Kraichgau/Kurpfalz region which is today northwest Baden-Wurttemberg. Long before I am a son of Abraham, I am a son of Arminius, a German American through and through.

The Cherokee Nation tribe isn’t taking too kindly to Ms. Warren’s claims:

http://amp.kjrh.com/2948480746/cherokee ... sults.html

I think that their position is that if you aren't a member of the tribe, you shouldn't be able to claim to have had Cherokee ancestors.

There's another point at all. The DNA test can only determine, within bounds, whether you are part Native American. A DNA test cannot determine your tribe. Consequently, no tribal authorities recognize DNA results in determining whether or not one is a member of their tribe.

I still remain sceptical that such a seemingly vast number of white people had a Cherokee ancestor.

My guess is most people who think they do were told that by a parent or grandparent who were also told that and so on generation to generation. Pssst you're part Cherokee, pass it on.

I bet no one knows the name of their Cherokee ancestor, when and where they were born, when/where they died etc. It's just some mystical unknown ancestor.

Warren didn't seem to know any specifics and was just basically going by family folklore.

Last edited by EzraS on 16 Oct 2018, 1:32 am, edited 1 time in total.

What do you base that on, other than a gut reaction?

It's just an opinion for now. As far as Warren goes she said she knows about it based on tales from her relatives. If she knew for sure, she would say who her Cherokee ancestor is. The whole science of geology is pretty extensive so it should be doable.

I'm currently researching the phenomenon.

Last edited by EzraS on 16 Oct 2018, 2:07 am, edited 1 time in total.