Turtle Island
The name is based on a creation myth common to several indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands of North America.
Nanapush then decided the turtle needed to be bigger for everyone to live on, so he asked the animals if one of them would dive down into the water to get some of the old Earth.
[5] According to the oral tradition of the Haudenosaunee (or "Iroquois"), "the earth was the thought of [a ruler of] a great island which floats in space [and] is a place of eternal peace.
[8] According to Converse and Parker, the Iroquois faith shared with other religions the "belief that the Earth is supported by a gigantic turtle.
This is a representation of the Haudenosaunee beliefs of death and chaos as forces of creation, as we all give our bodies to the land to become soil, which in turn continues to support life.
This concept plays out again when the Mature Flower's daughter dies during childbirth, becoming the first person to be buried on the turtle's back and whose burial post helped grow various plants such as corn and strawberries.
Some tellings do not include this expanded edition as part of the Creation Story, however, these differences are important to note when considering Haudenosaunee traditions and relationships.
The name Turtle Island has been used by many Indigenous cultures in North America, and both native and non-native activists, especially since the 1970s when the term came into wider usage.
Snyder argues that understanding North America under the name of Turtle Island will help shift conceptions of the continent.
[12][13] The Canadian Association of University Teachers has put into practice the acknowledgment of indigenous territory and claims, particularly at institutions located within unceded land or covered by perpetual decrees such as the Haldimand Tract.
At Canadian universities, many courses, student and academic meetings, as well as convocation and other celebrations begin with a spoken acknowledgement of the traditional Indigenous territories, sometimes including reference to Turtle Island, in which they are taking place.
Many animals try but most fail, until the otter dives down for days before finally surfacing, passed out from exhaustion, clutching mud in its paws.
Charm creates land from the mud, magic, and the turtle's back and gives birth to twins which keep the earth in balance.
All the animals congregate to help find dirt for the sky woman so that she can build her habitat, some giving their lives in the search.
Finally, the muskrat surfaces, dead but clutching a handful of soil for the Sky Woman, who takes the offering gratefully and uses seeds from The Tree of Life to begin her garden using her gratitude and the gifts from the animals, thus creating Turtle Island as we know it.
Through the Sky Woman story, Kimmerer tells us that we cannot "begin to move toward ecological and cultural sustainability if we cannot even imagine what the path feels like.
"[16] Christopher B. Teuton book provides a comprehensive look into Cherokee oral traditions and art to bring them into the contemporary moment.
Notably, this telling of Turtle Island has the water beetle dive for the earth necessary for the sky woman, where often you will see a muskrat or otter.
We Are Water Protectors is a children's storybook written by Carole Lindstrom in 2020 in response to the building of the Dakota Access Pipeline, represented as a large black snake in the book.
