Wearing this vintage Native American Bracelet?

Hey all I picked this nice vintage Native bracelet up at an antique store. It is a very nice piece, missing two beads and missing the toggles that secured it. However, I had someone tell me that only Native American people can wear a bracelet of this design? I am by no means Native American but I really appreciate the art and their jewelry. Are they correct in stating this? Would it be cultural appropriation? Looking forward to hearing your guys' opinion on it!!

Also, is this Navajo or Zuni? Any way to date a piece like this?

 

Spart, are you positive it is NA made?

Neither, this is not a Navajo or Zuni style.

 

Hmm yes I am fairly certain it is NA made. The person I bought it from has lots of Native American things for sale

 

I will leave the ID to others, but in general: Native Americans make so many beaded bracelets to be sold to non-Natives and even exported abroad, that I wouldn't worry about whether or not you should wear it. Just enjoy it.

 

Eh, I made a lot of similar bracelets, chokers, and headbands for myself and friends when I was a kid in the late '60s-early '70s. My loom, which I still have, was like this one, though not as old (similar 'Indian' patterns for bead- weaving can be found in century old publications):


https://www.ebay.com/itm/3141364014...mAisROlRvq&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

~Cheryl

 

I still have my beading loom too, but mine is all wood. Making NA style beadwork used to be fashionable here in the 60s too, and even later.
I mostly copied old Dutch beading patterns though, which people thought highly unusual.

 

Nice! I was pretty well addicted, usually did my own designs on 10/1 graph paper, including one that was just endless yellow smiley-faces - believe it's packed away with the loom, and since the elastic warp thread I sometimes used has deteriorated, it's a mess...

~Cheryl

 

I made them as a child in the 1970s, too. Making these "Indian" beaded bracelets was very popular then and OPs bracelet looks like the stuff we made.
This is the type of loom I had:



Walco was the popular maker of these kits. There were several versions over the years.

 

Agree. A little hippie era craft item.

Debora

 

Agree, that's why I asked if he was positive it is NA made. It looks so much like the beading kit stuff of the period.
Nowadays those ready-made patterns have a lot of red-orange-yellow shaded diamonds and arrows on a turquoise ground.

 

wear it
enjoy it..

 

but....personal opinion here.....for a 27 year old guy.......I'd suggest something a tad more heavy , leather backed & masculine .......

 

Boy, that brought back memories of a beaded coin purse I had when I was a kid back in the 1960s!

 

Cultural appropriation should not be confused with cultural appreciation. Cultural "appreciation" results in allowing traditional cultural crafts to continue, through sales to others, and provides income to the people producing items from their culture, to people from other cultures.

Cultural "appropriation," on the other hand, usually involves a larger group profiting from the culture of a smaller group, by an inappropriate use of ideas and images associated with the other culture.

In other words, it generally involves money, and intention (the latter sometimes being difficult to determine.) But, I agree with Komo, it might be better to wear an item actually made by the culture it was representing, if financially possible. You thought you were, but maybe didn't realize the background of this particular type of beaded item. (Examples are also imported from China.)

The editors of Encyclopedia Britanica have a very good explanation of what cultural appropriation is, giving instructive examples, at: https://www.britannica.com/story/what-is-cultural-appropriation

To quote from the above website:
"Cultural appropriation takes place when members of a majority group adopt cultural elements of a minority group in an exploitative, disrespectful, or stereotypical way."

I wouldn't say the bracelet is "disrespectful," but some might consider the images border on "stereotypical." It's, again, a fine line that determines what is traditional and what is stereotypical. And it's a life-long learning experience.