• One of the ways to treat people is indirectly.
When I go to see people we talk about their corn and their lives and they talk about my corn and my life and then we get down to the reason why I am there. They don’t tell me their physical symptoms. One of the things we’ve realized is that sick- ness isolates people from other people and the sickness has separated the person from the community and from his family. So we automatically try to make him or bring him back out of that isolation and one of the ways we do that is to include the family and friends in the HEALING process.
• In my tribe we have knowledge of about 500 different plants and use about 350 of them on a pretty regular basis. We see the plants as other life forms, but the commonality between all life forms is this spiritual aspect. We believe that each thing that is alive has a spirit and its spirit has a personality, so I use the spirit of the plant to cure another spirit—when the spirit of the sickness is not compatible with the spirit of the plant, the disease dissipates. We call the plants, plant people. My people’s medicine started off as a trial and error, like most medicine did, using the plants. If you had a sickness that reminded them of a rabbit, for example, a plant that reminded them of a fox would be used to treat it.
• I think the solution to Indian problems is for Indian people to start identify- ing themselves. I see as a traditional person that one of the steps on this long journey is to gain pride and dignity in oneself. Naturally, I believe it is in traditionalism. Traditionalism is a philosophy, a way of life and living, a holistic sort of thing that we’re a part of.
Source: Crowe, T. (2001). “Hawk Littlejohn embraced the old ways in the modern world. SMN Archives/Regional News, 1/17/01. Retrieved from http://www.smokymountainnews.com/ issues/1_01/1_17_01/front_littlejohn.shtml, April 16, 2012.