Essay On Iroquois Woman

Despite countless numbers of stories told about how women were disrespected and unappreciated, although that might be true in some cases, it isn’t for the Iroquois. The Iroquois women were very well respected and honored and loved in their society. They had skills and wisdom that were valued in their communities and always were given a lot of power in decision making in what goes on in their society. Females had the right to vote for which men they want to see in “The Great Council”, which is a council that men control and is in charge of the area they are living in. They can also vote on the chief they want to see in charge of their community, or they can vote a chief out if they find he isn’t performing properly. The women also had a position called “The Clan Mother”. She is the wisest, eldest, and most respected woman of the area, she also got to remove or choose the sachem.
Women and men in Iroquois society helped each other out greatly, sometimes even doing one another’s
jobs and that was the key to their society functioning efficiently. When men and women marry, the man has to move into the woman’s family’s house, and the houses they resided in are called longhouses. Although the females had roles in the community such as political and economical roles, like not supplying food for their men if they feel like the journey they want to take on is difficult, yet they also have duties to accomplish in the house.
First off, they owned the land they were settled on and therefore had to tend the crops (usually squash, corn and beans) that the men aided in planting by preparing the soil.
The Iroquois were, as a community, hugely dependant on agriculture since the land they lived on was fertile. The land needed to be taken care of because if otherwise, the clan mother could just easily take away their land and could be given to another clan (family). They also used parts of plants not only for food, for example the corncob was used as a fuel for meat being cooked and as a brush for cleaning and scrubbing. The dried leaves of the corn were used to make toys for children such as dolls; it was also used to make the filling for a pillow and ropes. Since the Iroquois were living in a forest, they depended on nature around them. Women grew and gathered vegetable, berried, nuts and fruit. During the winter they collected wild rice and maple sugar, which they stirred on an open fire to eventually create
sugar.
Women were also in charge of the house work, teaching their daughters as they grew older. For the clothing, the men gathered many types of animal skins that the females used to make leather for clothes by drying and tanning the skin. During the winter, the ladies wore long skirts and leggings with vests from deerskin on top and tied their hair in two braids. Women also had to prepare food for their men after the men hunt for game and had to clean the house and make sure everything was the way the man and the children liked it to be. Blankets, gardening tools, baskets and many more were produced and owned by the women of the house. Women have many major roles in society since they are valued and aren’t treated differently just because they are women, but major proof of an Iroquois woman’s value in her community is that the her family’s name is passed down, not the man’s, this shows how respected and appreciated females were for the Iroquois people. Both men and women were equally cherished and had equal amounts of hard work, and social equality was a quality that was a main factor in determining whether they will have a successful lifestyle that is smoothly operating, or if they would always fight due to inequality and imbalances amongst each other.