Cultural Reference

Named after the gun manufacturer Roy Weatherby, the Weatherby Hunting and Conservation Award was established in 1956 and is presented annually to an individual hunter for his or her hunting accomplishments, character and sportsmanship, and contribution to conservation and education. The selection committee defines an award winner as a "hunter who has ethically taken the most varied, difficult, and largest number of species in the world, and who has not already won the award." In Hillerman's People of Darkness, the character of B.J. Vines has won the Weatherby Trophy twice. It is unclear whether this discrepancy has to do with Hillerman not confirming the rules of the award, or if the rules have changed over the years. B.J. Vines supposedly won the award in 1962 and 1971. The actual winners for those years were Prince Abdorreza Pahlavi (Iran), and Juan Naude Cordova (Mexico) respectively.

The heads of the big-game animals, preserved through the process of taxidermy, mounted on the wall by the hunter as a display of hunting prowess and accomplishments.

Also known as hatałii in Navajo, singers, like medicine men, perform traditional ceremonial healing cures targeted at body, mind, and spirit, and call on the patient, his kin, the singer himself, and divine people to restore an individual's harmony with the world. Before a singer, or medicine man (they are seldom women), is called, a hand trembler (ndilniihii), often a woman, will diagnose the source of illness. Through prayer, concentration, and sprinkling of sacred pollen, her hand will tremble and pinpoint the cause, which then determines the proper ceremonial cure. Then a singer who knows the proper ceremony is called and preparations for the sing are set in motion.

There are nearly 100 Navajo sings, or chants, of varying range and intricacy. Originating from the Navajo Creation Story, they are so nuanced and complex that a singer learns only one or two sings over many years of apprenticeship. Sings last anywhere from one to nine days and include chants, songs, prayers, lectures, dances, sweat baths, prayer sticks, and sand paintings. In order for a sing to be effective, everything must be done as prescribed in the legends.

A term used as a general reference to an indigenous community's spiritual leader or traditional healer. Such a person has the skills and knowledge to perform rituals, heal sick or injured individuals, communicate with ancestors and the otherworld, prepare traditional medicine, and provide spiritual counseling.

The Navajo (Diné) tribe is comprised of more than forty family lineages--or clans--that claim common ancestry. There is no indication that there is an actual Navajo clan by the name of Standing Rock. Tony Hillerman might have invented the name, or there is a possibility that translations vary. The closest real clan is probably Tséikeehé , which literally means "Two Rocks Sit."

The Navajo (Diné) tribe is comprised of more than forty family lineages--or clans--that claim common ancestry. According to traditional lore, the Áshįįhi, or Salt People, was formed after a young girl from a different tribe was captured at a place called Salt Extends Out.

The Navajo (Diné) tribe is comprised of more than forty family lineages, or clans, that claim common ancestry. While various other clan names Hillerman mentions in his novels do correspond to actual, existing Navajo lineages, there are not records showing that the Slow Talking Dine is a real one. Hillerman might have invented the name in order to provide a fictional background to the fictional character of Jim Chee, who is, in the novels, a member of the Slow Talking clan.

A social, cultural, and political category that refers to the "dominant" culture of the U.S., a category primarily understood as a racial construction that expresses the legacies of Western European hegemony. Many critiques of "whiteness" exist. General analysis suggests that whiteness has functioned since the early Enlightenment period in Europe (the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries) as an expression of increasingly dogmatic, or strict, white supremacist, patriarchal, heteronormative, and classed biases. Although since at least the 1960s critical racial and comparative ethnic frameworks, in addition to versions of feminist and queer theories, have challenged the privileges that have inhered in "whiteness," critical indigenous critiques comprise a burgeoning field of scholarship and activism that also challenge the colonial settler histories and contemporary practices associated with whiteness.

In traditional Navajo stories about Grandmother Spider, the figure who taught weaving to First Woman, the Season when the Thunder Sleeps refers to Winter and Spring when there are no thunderstorms. It is during this time that the Navajo believe it is safe to speak of dangerous spirits. This means that the Season when Thunder Sleeps is the only time that certain teachings, healings, and ceremonials can occur, because to participate in these events at other times would be dangerous and inappropriate.

An informal reference to persons who habitually ignore or violate the law, especially in regard to paying fines or debts.