The Wild Rice Gatherers of the Upper Lakes - A Study in American Primitive Economics #271965

This memoir was begun with the hope that eventually other some what similar studies of American primitive economics might be made which would throw light from an almost new direction on the culture status of the North American Indians. As the economic motive is so dominant among the foremost peoples of to-day, its ascendence must mark a new stage in the measurement of culture. It has been very interesting to find, through this study, three distinct steps in the development of the motive for production, beginning with myth founded belief and rising to an incipient state of economic consider ation. For example, the Menomini Indians absolutely refuse to sow wild rice — their motive is simply that of belief; the Dakota Indians do not sow the grain, but apparently have no myth-founded scruple against it; while among the Ojibwa no such belief seems likely ever to have existed, for they sow the grain from purely economic motive, though such motive is not so dominant as among many maize-producing tribes.