Abstract
The use of tobacco (Nicotiana sp.) and other smoking plants has been a feature of Native American traditions for thousands of years, or since “time immemorial” according to some oral histories. These powerful plants have served in social, spiritual, and economic roles that have made them central to cultures around the world. However, the abuse of tobacco has led to disease epidemics that have killed millions around the world and represents an extremely damaging health risk that disproportionately effects Native American populations. This chapter will discuss the implications of tobacco use on contemporary physical, mental, and community health and the impact of traditional cultural knowledge loss around tobacco use. Furthermore, I will discuss current efforts to mitigate the harmful effects of tobacco abuse and why archaeological pipe, tobacco, and smoking research is an important element of efforts to address the epidemic of tobacco-related illness being experienced by Native Americans today.
When we conduct a Sacred Pipe ceremony we fill the pipe with sacred tobacco and offer it to Grandfather, the Great Spirit, then to the spirits of the East, South, West and North and finally to Earth Mother. Taking part in this ceremony allows a individual to become centered in this life.
—Adam Fortunate Eagle, Ojibway Pipe holder, Bear Clan (Schinke 1995)
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
American Cancer Society. (2014). Secondhand smoke. Retrieved December 11, 2014, from http://www.cancer.org/cancer/cancercauses/tobaccocancer/secondhand-smoke
Bennett, C. (1995) Visions of a sacred tree. Retrieved December 11th, 2014 from http://www.cannabisculture.com/articles/1050.html
Best, D. (2009). Secondhand and prenatal tobacco smoke exposure. Pediatrics, 124(5), e1017–e1044. doi:10.1542/peds.2009-2120.
BlueEye, L. (2004). Use of Native American imagery to sell tobacco. The Journal of the Oklahoma State Medical Association, 97(5), 195.
Brave Heart, M. Y. H. (2003). The historical trauma response among Natives and its relationship with substance abuse: A Lakota illustration. Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, 35(1), 7–13.
Brave Heart, M. Y. H., Chase, J., Elkins, J., & Altschul, D. B. (2011). Historical trauma among indigenous peoples of the Americas: Concepts, research, and clinical considerations. Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, 43(4), 282–290.
Brave Heart, M. Y. H., & DeBruyn, L. M. (1998). The American Indian holocaust: Healing historical unresolved grief. American Indian and Alaska Native Mental Health Research, 8(2), 56–78.
Carson, K. V., Brinn, M. P., Peters, M., Veale, A., Esterman, A. J., & Smith, B. J. (2012). Interventions for smoking cessation in Indigenous populations. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, 18(1), CD009046.
CDC Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System. (2015). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. High school risk behavior survey, 2013. Washington, DC: United States Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Controls and Prevention.
Choi, W. S., Daley, C. M., James, A., Thomas, J., Schupbach, R., Segraves, M., et al. (2006). Beliefs and attitudes regarding smoking cessation among American Indians: a pilot study. Ethnicity and Disease, 16(1), 35.
Choi, W. S., Faseru, B., Beebe, L. A., Greiner, A. K., Yeh, H.-W., Shireman, T. I., et al. (2011). Culturally-tailored smoking cessation for American Indians: Study protocol for a randomized controlled trial. Trials, 12(1), 126.
Daley, C. M., Cowan, P., Nollen, N. L., Greiner, K. A., & Choi, W. S. (2009). Assessing the scientific accuracy, readability, and cultural appropriateness of a culturally targeted smoking cessation program for American Indians. Health Promotion Practice, 10(3), 386–393.
Daley, C. M., James, A. S., Barnoskie, R. S., Segraves, M., Schupbach, R., & Choi, W. S. (2006). “Tobacco has a purpose, not just a past”: Feasibility of developing a culturally appropriate smoking cessation program for a pan-tribal Native population. Medical Anthropology Quarterly, 20(4), 421–440.
Erdoes, R., & Ortiz, A. (2013). American Indian myths and legends. New York: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group.
Evans-Campbell, T., Lindhorst, T., Huang, B., & Walters, K. L. (2006). Interpersonal violence in the lives of urban American Indian and Alaska Native women: Implications for health, mental health, and help-seeking. American Journal of Public Health, 96(8), 1416–1422.
Fu, S. S., Rhodes, K. L., Robert, C., Widome, R., Forster, J. L., & Joseph, A. M. (2013). Designing and evaluating culturally specific smoking cessation interventions for American Indian communities. Nicotine & Tobacco Research, 42(6), 852–886.
Glasgow, R. E., Boles, S. M., Lichtenstein, E., & Strycker, L. A. (1996). Tobacco policy rating form: a tool for evaluating worksite and tribal smoking control policies. Tobacco Control, 5(4), 286–291.
Glasgow, R. E., Lichtenstein, E., Hall, R., Meyers, G. B., Wilder, D., & Gilbert, M. (1993). Indoor smoking policies of Indian tribes in the northwestern United States. Tobacco Control, 2(1), 35.
Glasgow, R. E., Lichtenstein, E., Wilder, D., Hall, R., McRae, S. G., & Liberty, B. (1995). The tribal tobacco policy project: working with northwest Indian tribes on smoking policies. Preventive Medicine, 24(5), 434–440.
Godlaski, T. M. (2013). Holy smoke: Tobacco use among Native American tribes in North America. Substance Use & Misuse, 48(1–2), 1–8.
Goodspeed, T. H. (1954). The genus Nicotiana: Origin, relationships and evolution of its species in the light of their distribution, morphology and cytogenetics (Chronica botanica, Vol. 16). Waltham, MA: Chronica Botanica.
Greene, Allister. (2015) Cannabis in Native American’s culture and religion. Retrieved December 11th, 2014 from http://cannabisdigest.ca/cannabis-native-americans-culture-religion/
Haberman, T. (1984). Evidence for aboriginal tobaccos in eastern North America. American Antiquity, 49(2), 269–287.
Hawk, B., Patterson, J. B., & LeClair, A. (1916). Life of Ma-ka-tai-me-she-kia-kiak or Black Hawk. New York: Penguin Publishing.
Hoffman, W. J. (1890). Mythology of the Menomoni Indians. American Anthropologist, 3(3), 243–258.
US Health and Human Services (1998) Statement of the Indian Health Service on the tribal provisions contained in proposed tobacco legislation. Retrieved October 14, 2014, from http://www.hhs.gov/asl/testify/t980212a.html
Indian Health Service (2015), US Department of Health and Human Services. Retrieved December 11th, 2014 from Disparities. http://www.ihs.gov/newsroom/factsheets/disparities/
Kohrman, M., & Benson, P. (2011). Tobacco. Annual Review of Anthropology, 40, 329–344.
Law, M. R., & Hackshaw, A. K. (1996). Environmental tobacco smoke. British Medical Bulletin, 52(1), 22–34.
Linton, R. (1924). Use of tobacco among North American Indians. Chicago: Field Museum of Natural History.
Margalit, R., Watanabe-Galloway, S., Kennedy, F., Lacy, N., Shirt, K. R., Vinson, L., et al. (2013). Lakota Elders’ views on traditional versus commercial/addictive tobacco use; Oral history depicting a fundamental distinction. Journal of Community Health, 38(3), 538–545.
Moerman, D. E. (1998). Native American ethnobotany. Portland, OR: Timber Press.
Mooney, J. (1900). James Mooney’s history, myths, and sacred formulas of the Cherokees. Fairview, NC: Bright Mountain Books.
Myhra, L. L. (2011). “It runs in the family”: intergenerational transmission of historical trauma among urban American Indians and Alaska Natives in culturally specific sobriety maintenance programs. American Indian and Alaska Native Mental Health Research, 18(2), 17–40.
National Native Network. (2014). Retrieved December 11, 2014, from http://www.keepitsacred.org/network/
Pego, C. M., Hill, R. F., Solomon, G. W., Chisholm, R. M., & Ivey, S. E. (1995). Tobacco, culture, and health among American Indians: A historical review. American Indian Culture and Research Journal, 19(2), 143–164.
Phillips, P. W. (2015). History and modern use of sacred tobacco on the central and southern Oregon coast. In E. Bollwerk & S. Tushingham (Eds.), Perspectives on the archaeology of pipes, tobacco, and other smoke plants in the ancient Americas. New York: Springer.
Rafferty, S. M. (2002). Identification of nicotine by gas chromatography/mass spectroscopy analysis of smoking pipe residue. Journal of Archaeological Science, 29(8), 897–907.
Repace, J. L., Jiang, R. T., Acevedo-Bolton, V., Cheng, K. C., Klepeis, N. E., Ott, W. R., et al. (2011). Fine particle air pollution and secondhand smoke exposures and risks inside 66 US casinos. Environmental Research, 111(4), 473–484.
Robert, J. C. (1967). Story of tobacco in America. Retrieved December 12, 2014, from http://agris.fao.org/agris-search/search.do?recordID=US201300588270
Schinke, S. (1995). The tobacco chronicles: tobacco in the US 1880–1995. New York: Columbia University School of Social Work.
Shorty, L. (2007). Reclaiming health as an act of self-determination: Tobacco addiction resistance. In U. Wiethaus (Ed.), Foundations of first peoples’ sovereignty: History, education and culture. New York: Peter Lang Publishers.
Soto, C., & Baezconde-Garbanati, L. (2009). Culture and tobacco among American Indian adolescents: Final report. Los Angeles: University of Southern California, Institute for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Research.
Tushingham, S., Ardura, D., Eerkens, J., Palazoglu, M., Shahbaz, S., & Fiehn, O. (2013). Hunter-gatherer tobacco smoking: earliest evidence from the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America. Journal of Archaeological Science, 40(2), 1397–1407.
US Surgeon General. (2006). The health consequences of involuntary exposure to tobacco smoke: A report of the surgeon general | Surgeongeneral.gov. Retrieved August 21, 2013, from http://www.surgeongeneral.gov/library/reports/secondhandsmoke/index.html
Wagner, G. (2000). Tobacco in prehistoric North America. In J. C. Winter (Ed.), Tobacco use by Native North Americans: Sacred smoke and silent killer (pp. 185–204). Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.
Winter, J. (2000a). Introduction to the North American tobacco species. In J. C. Winter (Ed.), Tobacco use by Native North Americans: Sacred smoke and silent killer (pp. 3–8). Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.
Winter, J. (2000b). Traditional uses of tobacco by Native Americans. In J. C. Winter (Ed.), Tobacco use by Native North Americans: Sacred smoke and silent killer (pp. 9–58). Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.
Winter, J. (2000c). Food of the Gods: Biochemistry, addiction, and the development of Native American tobacco use. In J. C. Winter (Ed.), Tobacco use by Native North Americans: Sacred smoke and silent killer (pp. 305–328). Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.
Winter, J., Solomon, G., Hill, R., Pego, C. M., & Victoria, S. (2000). Native Americans and tobacco. Deer person’s gift or Columbus’s curse? In J. C. Winter (Ed.), Tobacco use by native North Americans: Sacred smoke and silent killer. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press.
CDC Wonder Database (2015) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. United States Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Controls and Prevention. Retrieved February 28, 2015, from http://wonder.cdc.gov/
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2016 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Snyder, C.M. (2016). Restoring Traditional Tobacco Knowledge: Health Implications and Risk Factors of Tobacco Use and Nicotine Addiction. In: Bollwerk, E.A., Tushingham, S. (eds) Perspectives on the Archaeology of Pipes, Tobacco and other Smoke Plants in the Ancient Americas. Interdisciplinary Contributions to Archaeology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-23552-3_10
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-23552-3_10
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-23551-6
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-23552-3
eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)