🦃 Wampanoag

Who Are the Wampanoag?

The Wampanoag are an Algonquian-speaking people of southeastern Massachusetts and eastern Rhode Island. Two tribes have federal recognition: the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe (~2,700 members) and Wampanoag Tribe of Gay Head/Aquinnah (~1,200 members on Martha's Vineyard). Their name means "People of the First Light" or "People of the Dawn"—referring to their eastern homeland where the sun rises. They speak Wôpanâak, an Algonquian language that became dormant in the mid-19th century but is now being revived. The Wampanoag are famous for their role in the Thanksgiving story—though the actual history is more complex and tragic than the myth.

Thanksgiving Reality

The 1621 harvest gathering between Wampanoag and Plymouth colonists was not the "First Thanksgiving" of American myth. Massasoit, the Wampanoag sachem, allied with the colonists for strategic reasons—his people had been devastated by epidemic disease (possibly introduced by earlier European contact), and alliance offered protection against rival nations. This diplomacy was practical, not friendship. Within 55 years, the colonists' descendants would wage King Philip's War (1675-76), killing or enslaving most Wampanoag. The Thanksgiving myth obscures this colonial violence—a reality Native people have highlighted since the first National Day of Mourning (1970).

Language Revival

Wôpanâak (Wampanoag language) died as a spoken language around 1900, but extensive written records survived—including the Eliot Bible (1663), the first Bible printed in North America. In 1993, Jessie Little Doe Baird began reviving the language using these historical documents. The Wôpanâak Language Reclamation Project has created new speakers, including Baird's daughter—the first native speaker in over a century. This "linguistic miracle" proves that dormant languages can be revived; Baird received a MacArthur "Genius Grant" for this work. The revival demonstrates Wampanoag determination to reclaim what colonization nearly destroyed.

Contemporary Wampanoag

Modern Wampanoag fight for sovereignty and recognition. The Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe achieved federal recognition in 2007 but faced a Trump administration attempt to disestablish their reservation (2020)—reversed by the Biden administration. The Aquinnah Wampanoag on Martha's Vineyard pursue gaming development on their small reservation. Both tribes participate in annual events that counter Thanksgiving mythology with honest history. Language revitalization continues expanding. Environmental protection of ancestral waters is a priority. How the Wampanoag maintain sovereignty against legal challenges while reviving language and correcting historical narratives shapes this people of the first light's ongoing story.

References

• Silverman, D. J. (2019). This Land Is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving
• Brooks, L. (2018). Our Beloved Kin: A New History of King Philip's War
• Baird, J. L. D. (2000). Wôpanâak Language Reclamation Project Documentation