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61.  Brown, “Resurrecting 1918 Flu Virus.”

62.  Radin, Life on Ice; Jenny Reardon, Race to the Finish: Identity and Governance in an Age of Genomics (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005); TallBear, Native American DNA.

63.  Taubenberger, Hultin, and Morens, “Discovery and Characterization,” 9.

64.  Brown, “Resurrecting 1918 Flu Virus”; Carroll, “Alaskan Village Holds the Key.”

65.  See, for example, Tumpey et al. “Pathogenicity of Influenza Viruses.”

66.  Jordan, Tumpey, and Jester, “Deadliest Flu.”





4   Twisting Strings: Hopi Ancestors and Ancient DNA

Stewart B. Koyiyumptewa and Chip Colwell

Loloma, a Hopi leader of the Bear Clan (Honwungwa) from the Third Mesa village of Orayvi in Arizona who lived a century ago, used to compare the collision of Hopi and European cultures to that of a weaving made from different strands of cotton or wool. Loloma would take one string and say that this represents all the good things of Hopi peoples: a rich and beautiful homeland, a reciprocity system, industriousness, respectfulness, stewardship. Above all, humility. Then, he would take another string and say that this represents all the things of European people: education, technology, science.

Loloma would then twist the two strings together and ask why we can’t see and adopt the good in both. When two strands are brought together as one, they become stronger. If the Hopi people can learn to do this—to bring the wisdom they have gained over millennia to Western ways of doing things—then they would be stronger people, twice as strong.

In this chapter, we consider two strands of knowledge about ancestry and ancestors. We explore Hopi concepts of ancestry and compare these traditions with the ways that paleogenetics constructs and makes definitive claims about Native American ancestry in ancient DNA studies.1 Notably, the paleogenetics framing of ancestry captures only a fraction of Hopi conceptions of ancestry. Given that many Indigenous peoples hold similarly complex and expansive understandings of ancestry, we must seriously consider Loloma’s question of whether these differences can be reconciled. We argue that if the field of paleogenetics is to speak meaningfully about the relations of Indigenous peoples, it needs to be woven much more tightly with Indigenous knowledge. Twisting Western scientific and Indigenous ways of knowing together will require geneticists to make a much stronger commitment to collaboration with descendant communities, to adopt more nuanced understandings of what it means to be related, and to leave behind their “molecular chauvinism”—the tendency to privilege genetic data as more trustworthy and accurate than other forms of knowledge.2 While this may be challenging to achieve, what is at stake here is whether paleogenetics can truly offer the insights it claims, and whether Native peoples come to see paleogenetics as a tool of self-empowerment or a new weapon of colonial science.

The Ancestry Concept in Paleogenetics

Over the last fifteen years, the development of new laboratory techniques and DNA sequencing technologies has stimulated rapid advancements in the field of paleogenetics. Numerous studies have sought to reconstruct and describe the ancestry and population histories of peoples around the world, and aDNA studies have helped elucidate the genetic ancestries of present-day Indigenous groups and their ancestors in the Americas. While some scientists have celebrated paleogenetics as having the power to resolve questions about Indigenous ancestries and relations, it is critical to consider what kinds of ancestries and relations paleogenomic studies actually speak to, and what they do not.3

As a science based on the study of genetic material, paleogenetics provides insights only into genetic ancestries and biological relations. Researchers can trace a person’s direct maternal ancestors and matrilineal relationships by sequencing and analyzing the maternally inherited mitochondrial DNA, and they can also assess the direct paternal ancestry and patrilineal relationships of anyone with a Y-chromosome (typically males). These methods of analysis can therefore shed light on the mother’s mother’s mother’s … line and father’s father’s father’s … line, respectively, but not on any other ancestral relationships. Nor do they tell us the exact degree of relatedness between two people: two individuals might share a specific mitochondrial DNA sequence and thus a matrilineal ancestor, but this analysis cannot say if that shared ancestor lived one or many generations ago.

Paleogeneticists can gain a broader picture of genetic ancestry and relatedness by analyzing variation in nuclear DNA, which is inherited from both parents, and assessing the extent of similarity or difference with other individuals. These analyses can detect the contributions from more ancestors, not just the direct maternal and direct paternal lines. They are capable of determining the degree of biological relatedness for very closely related individuals—they can, for example, identify a parent and child, or first cousins—based on the percentage of the nuclear genome that is shared between the two individuals and as long as a substantial amount of the genome can be sequenced. However, this degree of specificity breaks down with more distant relationships; in those cases, researchers can say only that an individual is more or less genetically similar to another individual or group of people.

Furthermore, it should be noted that even this single line of investigation in paleogenetics—tracing genetic relatedness—can be complicated and fraught with problems. Like genomics more generally, paleogenetics relies on comparisons with preexisting reference data (i.e., genomic data already collected from other populations) to infer and characterize the ancestry of newly studied individuals or communities. In other words, assessing the ancestry of these individuals or communities involves comparing their DNA to DNA from those who have been previously sampled, and evaluating which of the previously studied individuals or groups are most genetically similar. Researchers then infer that the newly studied individual or community belongs to, or shares ancestry with, the people(s) who are most genetically similar. Ancestry inferences therefore depend entirely on whose DNA happens to be in the comparative reference dataset. Descriptions and understandings of genetic ancestry can change when different reference groups are included in the comparison.4 Because many communities are not represented in existing genetic databases, inferring genetic ancestry and relatedness must be understood as a relational science based on incomplete datasets.

It should also be noted, as cultural geographer Catherine Nash has pointed out, that genomic science is situated within broader social contexts.5 Thus, even as genetic inferences are derived from biological evidence, they are made and interpreted within the powerful social frames of gender, nation, ethnicity, and race. These frames influence how individuals are grouped for comparative analysis and how those groups are named, which in turn influences our understanding of genetic ancestry and biological relatedness. For example, if individuals living in Paris and Berlin are to be included in a reference database for comparative genetic analyses, should they be grouped together and identified as “Europeans” or treated as separate populations? If the latter, should they be considered representative of the French and German peoples and named accordingly, or representative only of more local populations (e.g., north-central France and the North German Plain, or even just Paris and Berlin)? And if people who lived in these locations 5,000 years ago are also being included in the analysis, should they too be named according to present-day geopolitical boundaries or to the continental/racial categories that are deemed meaningful today? Should they be grouped together with the present-day inhabitants of these regions or considered separate populations by virtue of the temporal divide? These decisions will determine how genetic variation in Europe is categorized and represented in the analysis and thus how the genetic ancestry of any newly studied individual is identified and named if they share variants with any of these individuals or reference populations.

Furthermore, as Nash has argued, it is important to recognize that results from genetic tests and genetic studies don’t merely reflect historical kinship ties, they also generate genetic kinships as people reimagine themselves as related through their DNA.6 Kim TallBear, the scholar in Indigenous Peoples, Technoscience, and Society at the University of Alberta, has warned that this is a particular risk of genomic research for Native Americans, since technologies that claim to offer merely a biological map in fact have the power to rearrange and dictate social relationships in ways that may threaten tribal sovereignty. Claims of identity, belonging, and relatedness can all be altered and reconceptualized as a result of DNA testing.7

The science of genetic ancestry must therefore be understood not simply as an investigation of biological relatedness and how molecules are passed down from one generation to the next but as an endeavor that lies at the intersection of nature and culture, as it both shapes and is shaped by the social worlds in which we live.8 Indeed, it would be misguided to suggest that paleogenetics merely purports to explain biological relationships, when nearly all aDNA research on the human past is driven by larger questions of human migration, kinship, interaction, health, and more—all of which are necessarily cultural and historical questions. This is why paleogeneticists often collaborate with archaeologists, historians, and other scholars in the social and human sciences (even though they rarely choose to include Indigenous peoples in their circle of collaborators).

In the context of aDNA studies, it seems clear that paleogenetics can reveal much about the genetic composition, biological histories, and genetic relations of past populations. However, we must be cognizant that there is often an overreliance on the “truths” that emerge from this biology-based research, without sufficient consideration being given to the many relevant sociocultural contexts that influence our inferences about genetic ancestry and how we apply and make use of those inferences. We must also keep in mind that paleogenetic inferences are limited to genetic ancestry—which, as we will see below, is significant when we consider Hopi ancestors. The Hopi trace their ancestry through both biological and social relations, as well as through experiences and interactions with nonhumans and places.

Hopi Ancestor Concepts

To understand Hopi culture and Hopi conceptions of ancestry, it is important to recognize that Hopi culture emerged gradually over thousands of years across the southwest of the United States, a vast region that the Hopi consider their historic homeland. About 1100 AD, different groups of ancient people began to converge on the Hopi Mesas in northeastern Arizona. For centuries, the Hopi people lived in adobe and stone village apartments, thriving as desert farmers. After US colonization, millions of acres were taken from the Hopi and given to the Navajo Nation and surrounding non-Native communities. Today, the Hopi Reservation lies in present-day northeastern Arizona and is home to nearly 15,000 tribal members. The Hopi Tribe is sovereign and federally recognized, composed of twelve villages on three distinct mesas (First Mesa, Second Mesa, and Third Mesa).

Hopi conceptions of ancestry include both social and biological components. Everything that came before an individual—all that was involved in the migration and survival of Hopi ancestors—factors into what it means to be Hopi. In other words, ancestry is not confined just to human relatives, but includes plants, animals, and landscapes. It can be traced through oral histories, places, and objects.

For paleogenetics to be better informed by Hopi knowledge and ancestry concepts, researchers must keep three key issues in mind: biology, material culture, and Hopi philosophy. Biology involves descent traced through matrilineal clan membership; here, paleogenetics can align. Material culture is understood through created items that people use to identify who they are; here, archaeology can align. Left out too often in the academic study of Hopi history, though, is the incorporation of Hopi philosophy about ancestors and ancestry.9 Critically, for many Hopi people, their connections to the past go far beyond their genes or things, to incorporate the land itself, the world of spirits, and the practices that maintain ancestral connections.

Biology: Hopi Clans

Like geneticists, Hopis rely on biological connections in enacting ancestry and relations. Clan membership, which is necessary for knowing one’s ancestry, is passed down matrilineally—meaning traced through the female line. While Hopi people recognize relations from both one’s mother and father, matrilineal relations define clan membership. Blood relations can help trace ancestry, but those that come from the mother define Hopi social obligations, such as a person’s roles in religious ceremonies. Thus, Hopi concepts in a way parallel how paleogeneticists trace biological descent through the mother’s line (using maternally inherited mitochondrial DNA), father’s line (using paternally inherited Y-chromosome DNA), and both parents (using biparentally inherited autosomal DNA). In particular, tracing biological descent through mitochondrial DNA parallels how the Hopi trace descent through matrilineal clans. While Hopi recognize the role of genetics, even if not always defined as such, not all biological relationships are equal.

Clans are groups of people who trace descent from a common original ancestor. Each Hopi clan has a wuuya, a totem or symbol derived from animals, plant, beings, or objects that played a significant role in the clan’s founding. These totems emerged on each group’s unique journey to Tuuwanasavi, the Earth Center of the Hopi Mesas, over thousands of years.10 Clans are related and grouped in different ways, with some originating in the north (Motisinom) and some in the south (Nùutungkwisinom).11 About nine hundred years ago, these clans began to coalesce on the Hopi Mesas. Each clan arrived at the Hopi Mesas bringing with it ritual knowledge or other benefits to contribute to the conglomeration of people that became the Hopisinom, the Hopi people.

It is important to distinguish this history from mere “myth,” such as in Norse folklore, which may be seen as cosmological. While Hopi oral tradition definitively includes cosmological dimensions, it purports to track real events, including the movement of people across the landscape, ancestral villages and cultural landscapes, and kin relations.12 Although some skeptics limited to Western Enlightenment philosophy and settler logics might insist that “real” history can be known only if it is written—a position that leads to the conclusion that Hopi history cannot have existed before the word “Hopi” was used by a Spanish colonial stenographer—such a viewpoint ignores the expansive research that demonstrates the truth value of traditional knowledge in general and Hopi traditional knowledge in particular.13 Scientists gain little by assuming false dichotomies between myth/history and oral/written histories when seeking to illuminate the past and pathways of Indigenous peoples.14

Today, there are thirty-four clans among the Hopi people. A clan is a relatively fixed, matrilineal category. Although the Hopi people know both their biological parents’ clans, it is the mother’s clan that is the most significant. Hence, even if a child has a biological mother who is Hopi and a biological father who is not Hopi, the child is Hopi because they are part of a clan that is traced through their mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, and on. Conversely, a child whose biological father is Hopi and whose biological mother is non-Hopi is traditionally not recognized as Hopi, due to the strict matrilineal and clan responsibilities to the ceremonial calendar. A child with this lineage does not have or can never hold responsibilities of the clanship and the ceremonies that the clan holds to the overall village.

A Hopi person’s clan membership defines many social roles and religious responsibilities in his or her life. Clans do not merely care for particular sacred objects, they also control particular areas for farming and traditional activities like gathering eagles.15 One’s clan is one’s family. A mother’s brother (a matrilineal uncle) can therefore be as important a figure in a child’s life as their biological father. Clan membership brings with it a web of relations to people, places, and things, which serves as the rules and privileges of Hopi clans. While clan membership is highly important, Hopi identity and responsibilities are shaped by one’s village, mesa, and broader membership to the Hopi Tribe.16

Because of the centrality of clans in the Hopi way of life, to say that an ancient person is a Hopi ancestor means that they were a member of a clan traced through the matriline. These are people who were on the millennia-long journey to the Hopi Mesas. All these ancestors contributed to the formation of Hopi culture. Wherever they fulfilled their life, it is because of them that the Hopi people have traditional lands across the southwest United States. Because of their sacrifices—in their search for the Hopi Mesas, clans faced many hardships, such as flooding, droughts, and war—when the Hopi people think of ancestors they first provide thanks. It is because of their ancestors that the Hopi people have a beautiful home, a rich language, powerful ceremonies, religious beliefs, and a profound philosophy. To be on the rural Hopi Mesas is to be a safe distance from the fast-paced life of cities. And to travel along clans’ migration routes and to their traditional lands is to enter their spiritual realm, so that Hopi today can continue the work of protecting their heritage and continuing their way of life. While the description above may seem irrelevant to Hopi biological concepts of ancestry, it is important. It shows how the biological concept of clan membership feeds into the real, lived experiences of ancestral kin and their descendants and creates the emotional connection that the living have to those who passed, who made life today possible through their sacrifices.

While geneticists may be able to trace descent through the matriline (and patriline), as the Hopi people do, merely tracing one’s descent in this way leaves out all of the most important dimensions of what clan membership means in lived experience. It is science without humanity. Knowing one’s biological ancestors is only the beginning point for a sweeping, even all-consuming, sense of belonging and identity that defines everything from one’s farming plot and one’s potential marriage partners to one’s religious duties.

Material Culture: Hopi Things

Like archaeologists, the Hopi people have had to create terms based on material culture to map onto specific regions and times—particularly as Hopi people have learned from archaeological science and have been forced to make claims for objects and lands required through federal laws such as the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act.17 The two main categories are the Motisinom and the Hisat.sinom. The Mostisinom is used to describe northern clans, but also refers to the “First People,” and thus describes ancient people who lived in a way that predates the Pueblo lifestyle of corn agriculture and living in adobe and stone villages (i.e., groups that archaeologists would describe as hunter-gathering Paleoindians and Archaic people).18 Once the southern clans migrated from Mexico or deeper into Mesoamerica, and the distinct Pueblo lifestyle emerged as they joined with the northern clans, all of these people became the Hisat.sinom, a person of the remote past or ancient times. In this framework, Hisat.sinom refers to nearly all people living in the southwest United States from about 2,000 years ago to the arrival of Spanish invaders in the mid-sixteenth century. Hopi cultural leaders use material evidence such as painted pottery, above-ground adobe or masonry architecture, and sites of particular ritual practices, such as the ceremonial chambers called kivas, to identify where and when their ancestors lived.

The development of terms like Motisinom and Hisat.sinom from material evidence of ancient peoples is perhaps possible for Hopis because their identities are often bound up with objects. According to Hopi cosmology, in the beginning, when the ancestors emerged onto this world—the Fourth World—they were met by a spirit-being named Màasaw, who told them they would go on a long journey to find the Earth Center. He gave these people the use of his land, seeds, a planting stick, and a water gourd—objects that would define the Hopi people as farmers and also serve as simple instruments that are symbols of the Hopi virtue of humility. When Hopi tribal representatives visit archaeological sites, they often pay attention to the artifacts found there as indicators of ancestral relationships. For instance, the intricate rain and cloud symbols found on pottery can be seen not only as resonating with the power of water as an ancestral lifeforce for the Hopi but also as indicators of the southern clans’ migration after surviving a flooding event at a place/epoch (meaning that it is traditionally viewed as both a location and a period of time) called Palatkwapi.

Another example of how Hopis draw connections of identity through things is the famous black and white designs on mugs of the Ancestral Pueblo sites found in the Four Corners area (where Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, and Arizona meet). As an illustration, we might consider a recent consultation in which Hopi cultural advisors were examining artifacts from a museum collection. While surveying the collection, they found a mug similar to one that had been found at the ancestral region of Chaco Canyon. This particular collection came from the site of Cliff Shadow Springs, much closer to the Hopi Mesas and associated with the Badger Clan’s migration to the mesas. This was thus interpreted as material evidence of the mug tradition arriving at the Hopi Mesas, and thus historically and spiritually interlinking the Hopi Mesas to Cliff Shadow Springs to Chaco Canyon to the Badger Clan. In other words, by seeing the same type of mug in three different places, the Hopi advisers understood the people in these places to be connected—though separated by hundreds of miles and perhaps by centuries—and having ancestral relations.

What is key to understand here is how Hopis traditionally use objects not merely as functional utensils but as emblems and expressions of identity. This holds true for everyday items like woven objects and pottery, which are made with stylistic choices that demarcate the mesa and even village where the maker comes from. It is also true for ritual objects, which are at the heart of clan identities. For example, when ancestral spirits known in English as Katsina Friends come to visit the Hopis in ceremonies, they bring gifts for children. In the village of Hotvela, they bring bows and arrows for boys, whereas in the village of Soongopavi they bring “lightning sticks.” On Third Mesa, girls receive wicker baskets, which they are given through the years until they are initiated, whereas on Second Mesa girls receive a coil basket at birth. Similarly, the size of ceremonial smoking pipes indicates which village these were made in.

What do these objects have to do with ancestry? Made through clan-based knowledge, they reflect the ancestral lineage and can be made only by the clans that own them—items are often even made with a clan symbol imprinted on them. Furthermore, in Hopi society, clans are organized around particular ritual objects and responsibility over specific ceremonies, which serve to substantiate their existence and claims. In this way, each clan’s legitimacy is traced through the performance of rituals with its objects at the different places that the clan journeyed through on its way to the Hopi Mesas.19 Without these clan objects, there would be no clans. And without clans, Hopi concepts of ancestry would collapse. Hopi clans structure ancestry, and Hopi clans are made through things.

Paleogenetics often relies on material culture markers when genetic and archaeological data are combined. Additionally, paleogenetics often uses “archaeological cultures” (in the American Southwest, cultures like Hohokam, Salado, and Ancestral Pueblo) as labels to define and analyze specific populations. This practice of creating contemporary labels for ancient people is shared by Hopis, as demonstrated by the terms Motisinom and Hisat.sinom. For Hopis, however, identity-based concepts of material culture go far beyond the material-based cultural labels that paleogeneticists borrow from archaeologists. For Hopis, direct ancestral lineages can be derived from material culture, such as mugs. Things are emblems of one’s mesa and village, which are composed of ancestral groups. It is through things that clans are legitimized.

Philosophy: Hopi Life

Are sens

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