Gender roles among the Indigenous peoples of North America
Traditional gender roles among Native American and First Nations peoples tend to vary greatly by region and community.
Gender roles exhibited by Indigenous communities have been transformed in some aspects by Eurocentric, patriarchal norms and the perpetration of systematic oppression.
All children traditionally learn how to cook, follow tracks, skin leather, sew stitches, ride horses, and use weapons.
[7] Narragansett men in farming communities have traditionally helped clear the fields, cultivate the crops, and assist with the harvesting, whereas women hold authority in the home.
Whether gained by hunting, fishing, or agriculture, older Lenape women take responsibility for community food distribution.
[9] Historically, a number of social norms in Eastern Woodland communities demonstrate a balance of power held between women and men.
Traditionally, the Clan Mother has held the ultimate power over all decisions, though her specific role has varied by Nation.
[20] Kalapuya males usually hunted while the women and young children gathered food and set up camps.
As the vast majority of the Kalapuya diet consisted largely of gathered food, the women supplied most of the sustenance.
[21] The food hunted by men usually consisted of deer, elk, and fish from the rivers of the Willamette Valley, including salmon and eel.
They follow the tradition of kipijuituq, which refers to instances where predominantly biologically male infants are raised as females.
[27] Children would later go on to choose their respective genders in their pubescent years once they have undergone a rite of passage that includes hunting animals.
[30] Similar to other Indigenous cultures, Navajo girls participate in a rite of passage ceremony that is a celebration of the transformation into womanhood.
Historically, it is recorded that Navajo cultures respected the autonomy of women and their equality to men in the tribe, in multiple spheres of life within their society.
[35][36][37] Nez Perce women in the early contact period were responsible for maintaining the household which included the production of utilitarian tools for the home.
Women also regularly participated in politics, but due to their responsibilities to their families and medicine gatherings, they did not hold office.
[38] Despite hunting itself being more commonly a male task, women also participate by building lodges, processing hides into apparel, and drying meat.
[41][42] In such tribes, hereditary leadership would pass through the male line, while children are considered to belong to the father and his clan.
If a woman marries outside the tribe, she is no longer considered to be part of it, and her children would share the ethnicity and culture of their father.
