POST4: RELIGIOUS BELIEF OF YUROKS

                                                                                             YUROK 

                                             

             The ancestral home of Yurok was on the the northwest California pacific coast. The remaining  contemporary. Yuroks live throughout California as well as in their ancestral territory. The name Yurok was derived from the language of their neighbors, the Karok who referred to this people has Yurok, meaning "downriver." It appears that Yuroks don't have name for themselves but rather use names of towns when matter of affiliation were concerned. As of 1970, it was reported that few blood Yuroks were very few, though persons of direct ancestry numbered between three thousand and forty five hundred. The 2000 U.S census list 4,084 people who identify themselves solely as Yurok and 5,793 as Yurok or part-Yurok. Subsistence tasks involved fishing, hunting, and gathering. Salmon was the most important food source. Yurok families often had  a ton of dried salmon hanging from the house rafters. They also hunted sea lions and prized the meat from stranded whales.

          A Yurok menstruating woman is told to isolate herself because it is believed that this is time she is at the height of her power. Thus, the time should not be wasted in mundane task and social distractions nor one's concentration be broken by concerns with the opposite sex. Rather, all of ones energies should be applied in concentrated meditation on the nature of one's life, "to find out the purpose of life" and towards the accumulation of spiritual energy. The blood that flows serves to purify the women, preparing her for spiritual accomplishment. 

                                                          

                                                                                         Works Cited

                     Hester, Thomas R. 2011. “Culture Summary: Yurok.” New Haven, Conn.: Human Relations Area Files. https://ehrafworldcultures-yale-edu.northernkentuckyuniversity.idm.oclc.org/document?id=ns31-000.

               Buckley, Thomas. “Menstruation and the Power of Yurok Women: Methods in Cultural Reconstruction.” American Ethnologist 9, no. 1 (1982): 47–60. http://www.jstor.org/stable/644311.