Post by Okwes on Dec 28, 2007 13:13:54 GMT -5
Passamaquoddy medicine man receives honorary degree Posted: June 06,
2007
by: Gale Courey Toensing
<http://www.indiancountry.com/author.cfm?id=552> / Indian Country Today
www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096415151
<http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096415151>
Click to Enlarge <http://www.indiancountry.com/pix/1096415151_large.jpg>
<http://www.indiancountry.com/pix/1096415151_large.jpg> Photo
courtesy Tina Shute/The Village Soup -- Fredda Paul, a Passamaquoddy
elder, medicine man, healer and storyteller, received an honorary degree
in environmenal science from Unity College in Unity, Maine, on May 12.
Unity College President Mitchell Thomashow, left, and Julie Johnson
performed the ''hooding'' for Paul. UNITY, Maine - Fredda Paul, a
Passamaquoddy elder, medicine man, healer, storyteller and living
encyclopedia of the uses of indigenous plants, was recognized for his
knowledge and practice with an honorary degree in environmental science
at Unity College's commencement ceremony May 12.
Unity College President Mitchell Thomashow paid tribute to the long
history of Maine's coastal tribes in presenting Paul with the honorary
degree.
''I know that Fredda is receiving an honorary degree in botany. The
knowledge that he has about native New England and Maritime plants and
their medicinal properties is extensive and based on knowledge spanning
thousands of years of his ancestors using and refining the use of these
plants for medicines. He learned from his grandmother, in the oral
tradition that she learned, to look for medicinal plants. The name that
scientists use to describe Fredda's kind of particular knowledge is
ethnobotany,'' Thomashow said.
Ethnobotany is the study of how people of a particular culture and
region make use of indigenous plants, Thomashow explained.
''Ethnobotany has its roots in botany, the study of plants. Botany, in
turn, originated in part from an interest in finding plants to help
fight illness. Fredda has been studying plants and their healing
properties since he was about 9 or 10 years old,'' Thomashow said.
Paul, who has been associated with Unity College for years, is the only
American Indian on record to be given an honorary degree at Unity,
Alumni Officer Kate Grenier said.
''His work has touched many of our students' lives. He comes to campus
to teach herbal medicine and herbal uses,'' Grenier said.
Reached by phone at his Pleasant Point home, Paul, 60, declined to
comment because, as a traditional medicine man, he avoids telephones and
other machines.
A biographical sketch of Paul put together by Unity researchers was read
by Thomashow at the commencement.
Paul was kidnapped as a toddler and spent most of his first 13 years in
an Indian residential school in Canada, Thomashow said.
These schools operated both in Canada and the United States under the
guise of ''assimilation'' - an essentially racist policy intended to
wipe the ''Indianness'' out of Indian children by forbidding them to
speak their languages or display any signs of Native culture.
Yet, in many ways, residential school became for Paul a vision quest for
strength and survival, Thomashow said.
When Paul was found and brought home from residential school, he was
driven by the language and traditions of the Passamaquoddy to find his
place in the world. The speech of his elders provided entertainment,
knowledge, life lessons and sacred stories that are the foundation of
Passamaquoddy culture, Thomashow added.
Paul first learned medicine from his grandmother. As a teenager, he
would be given descriptions or sketches and sent out to gather the
plants she needed. During these years, every family used the traditional
medicine of their heritage - balsam, cedar, flagroot, cow parsnip -
known in their language as puhpukhawihq [boo-pook-HAH-weekw], kakskus
[GAHK-skooz], kiwhosuwasq [geew-H'-zoo-wahskw] and paqolus
[BAH-gw'-looz].
It was the teaching of Paul's grandmother and other elders that planted
in him the desire to make traditional medicine his life work. Nearly
half a century of learning about and working with the plants has given
Paul a keen awareness of the importance of this tradition, Thomashow
said.
Like other aspects of indigenous culture, much of the tribe's collective
knowledge of Native medicine is at risk of being lost. That's why Paul
and his wife are working so hard to teach and preserve the knowledge.
''As the elders taught him, he is sharing - teaching classes and
workshops to students of all races throughout Maine, including young
members of the Passamaquoddy Tribe. With generosity and wisdom, he tells
the stories, and his wife Leslie writes them down. Because of Fredda's
farsightedness and his willingness to share, the medicine of the
Passamaquoddy is being recorded for the first time to be kept alive for
future generations,'' Thomashow said.
2007
by: Gale Courey Toensing
<http://www.indiancountry.com/author.cfm?id=552> / Indian Country Today
www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096415151
<http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096415151>
Click to Enlarge <http://www.indiancountry.com/pix/1096415151_large.jpg>
<http://www.indiancountry.com/pix/1096415151_large.jpg> Photo
courtesy Tina Shute/The Village Soup -- Fredda Paul, a Passamaquoddy
elder, medicine man, healer and storyteller, received an honorary degree
in environmenal science from Unity College in Unity, Maine, on May 12.
Unity College President Mitchell Thomashow, left, and Julie Johnson
performed the ''hooding'' for Paul. UNITY, Maine - Fredda Paul, a
Passamaquoddy elder, medicine man, healer, storyteller and living
encyclopedia of the uses of indigenous plants, was recognized for his
knowledge and practice with an honorary degree in environmental science
at Unity College's commencement ceremony May 12.
Unity College President Mitchell Thomashow paid tribute to the long
history of Maine's coastal tribes in presenting Paul with the honorary
degree.
''I know that Fredda is receiving an honorary degree in botany. The
knowledge that he has about native New England and Maritime plants and
their medicinal properties is extensive and based on knowledge spanning
thousands of years of his ancestors using and refining the use of these
plants for medicines. He learned from his grandmother, in the oral
tradition that she learned, to look for medicinal plants. The name that
scientists use to describe Fredda's kind of particular knowledge is
ethnobotany,'' Thomashow said.
Ethnobotany is the study of how people of a particular culture and
region make use of indigenous plants, Thomashow explained.
''Ethnobotany has its roots in botany, the study of plants. Botany, in
turn, originated in part from an interest in finding plants to help
fight illness. Fredda has been studying plants and their healing
properties since he was about 9 or 10 years old,'' Thomashow said.
Paul, who has been associated with Unity College for years, is the only
American Indian on record to be given an honorary degree at Unity,
Alumni Officer Kate Grenier said.
''His work has touched many of our students' lives. He comes to campus
to teach herbal medicine and herbal uses,'' Grenier said.
Reached by phone at his Pleasant Point home, Paul, 60, declined to
comment because, as a traditional medicine man, he avoids telephones and
other machines.
A biographical sketch of Paul put together by Unity researchers was read
by Thomashow at the commencement.
Paul was kidnapped as a toddler and spent most of his first 13 years in
an Indian residential school in Canada, Thomashow said.
These schools operated both in Canada and the United States under the
guise of ''assimilation'' - an essentially racist policy intended to
wipe the ''Indianness'' out of Indian children by forbidding them to
speak their languages or display any signs of Native culture.
Yet, in many ways, residential school became for Paul a vision quest for
strength and survival, Thomashow said.
When Paul was found and brought home from residential school, he was
driven by the language and traditions of the Passamaquoddy to find his
place in the world. The speech of his elders provided entertainment,
knowledge, life lessons and sacred stories that are the foundation of
Passamaquoddy culture, Thomashow added.
Paul first learned medicine from his grandmother. As a teenager, he
would be given descriptions or sketches and sent out to gather the
plants she needed. During these years, every family used the traditional
medicine of their heritage - balsam, cedar, flagroot, cow parsnip -
known in their language as puhpukhawihq [boo-pook-HAH-weekw], kakskus
[GAHK-skooz], kiwhosuwasq [geew-H'-zoo-wahskw] and paqolus
[BAH-gw'-looz].
It was the teaching of Paul's grandmother and other elders that planted
in him the desire to make traditional medicine his life work. Nearly
half a century of learning about and working with the plants has given
Paul a keen awareness of the importance of this tradition, Thomashow
said.
Like other aspects of indigenous culture, much of the tribe's collective
knowledge of Native medicine is at risk of being lost. That's why Paul
and his wife are working so hard to teach and preserve the knowledge.
''As the elders taught him, he is sharing - teaching classes and
workshops to students of all races throughout Maine, including young
members of the Passamaquoddy Tribe. With generosity and wisdom, he tells
the stories, and his wife Leslie writes them down. Because of Fredda's
farsightedness and his willingness to share, the medicine of the
Passamaquoddy is being recorded for the first time to be kept alive for
future generations,'' Thomashow said.