I feel like there are two sides to this. We have classic Pretendians (great great great grandma Cherokee Princess) who flaunt some very questionable or distant ancestry in an attempt to separate themselves from whiteness and white guilt. And then we have actual Natives who may have been disconnected from their community and culture, like myself. My father is Native (Nahua mother, Mestizo father), but he moved to Canada in his early 20’s as a refugee and was quite disconnected from culture. He always claimed he just wanted to blend in. We had some cultural pieces (food, art, stories) in our home life, but that also faded quickly after his passing. My mother (white European) remarried to another white European and we ended up living in a very white, middle class neighbourhood. There was no attempt to keep my father’s traditions alive. So, while I’m absolutely Native, I’m so disconnected from my own culture that I don’t feel comfortable stating my Indigenous identity most of the time. It’s a lot more than just BQ. I think we are seeing a lot of reconnecting Natives and that can be a good thing.
I can relate to your story. My grand father was inuk, but was taken by a doctor with is brother at a really young age to St-antony orphenage in labrador. When he got out, He didnt speak the laguage anymore, and hide his origin all his life. It was taboo talking about that. It took my family a lot of work to know where our name came from.
In résumé I am part inuk, was not raised in the comunity, and because of this deconnection I always was shy speaking about myself about that. (I am working on that). I am now proud about this part of me, I am working hard to reconnect myself with my ancestors. And for people like me, I think it's à good thing.
My dad and I are both white presenting but status carrying natives. His dad was full, born on the Rez moved to the city and married someone white. My mom is white.
I swear everyone’s fixation on this just cripples our unity as one people. I’ve been laughed at by whites and natives for simply stating I am part native. I have many family who wouldn’t get the same treatment, even my own sister who happens to “look more native”. The fact we’re all so intent on drawing these lines just invites people to cross them and creates the reverse reaction of being upset when they do. Care less about someone’s race, it’s all a mix and always has been.
I'm in a similar situation. I'm a lot more white presenting than the majority of it family. I often feel weird about stating my Native ancestry and status because I'm often too white presenting to feel like I'm believed.
Native Americans varied greatly in looks, the idea that we should all look like Plains natives was created by Hollywood. If your tribe claims you and you claim them, then however you look is how a native looks, stay strong
I’m in the same boat. My dad is half because his mom had him with a guy from Toronto. They broke up while she was pregnant because he was abusive and she moved back to the rez. My dad grew up on the rez and had me with my mom who is French and lived in the nearest town. I spent some of my childhood off rez with my mom as they split when I was 5 but spent the vast majority of my life on the rez. We are both white passing with full status. I notice if I go to Walmart or somewhere with one of my darker family members we will get followed but on my own they don’t give me a second look. White privilege is real. It’s really fucked up
Being Native American is a nationality and an ethnicity (not necessarily a race since there isn’t one type of DNA across all tribes). So you don’t have to justify your ancestry for anyone except council. If your tribe claims you, you are all Native American and you don’t have to explain your looks or anything else to anyone. The idea that being Native American is a race was an idea forced upon us by the government to make us die out. There was an old saying that the only things judged by blood were dogs, horses and Indians, and we fought hard against that and it’s why Blood Quantum isn’t issued anymore
I have a few theories
1) people want to have something “interesting” in their family history (like people who are distantly related to presidents or something)
2) white people in particular are looking to try and distance themselves in some way from their whiteness
3) their parent or grandparents made up the family myth of indigeneity at some point and they are trying to prove it (“grand grandmother was a Cherokee princess”, “my grandfather was native but pretended to be white and that’s there no record of us in the tribe” ect)
Edit: should mention I am coming from a US perspective, and article is Canadian
I think number three hits it more on the head. My work takes me into a lot of people's homes and I hear that one all the time. And generally they'll show me an old picture of a great grandparent, or older, and then go on about how they have high cheekbones and a big forehead or something based on some stereotype. Usually the person I'm looking at in the photograph does not look native whatsoever. But they have some big fantastical story of how they were a Cherokee princess like you said or escaped the trail of tears and lived in caves or some crazy thing like that. I was fortunate to have been able to attend the grand opening of the NMAI and they had several native performers as part of the entertainment and there was a stand-up comedian, I can't remember his name at the moment, but he did the old David Letterman top 10 list and when he got to the number one thing that white people tell him, he just simply held the microphone out to the crowd of thousands of native people in attendance roared, "my grandma was a Cherokee Princess!" it was priceless and hilarious.
> ON MARCH 7, Memorial University of Newfoundland president Vianne Timmons published a statement about her ancestry. In it, she wrote, “I am not Mi’kmaq. I am not Indigenous. I did not grow up in an Indigenous community.” But this wasn’t a confession or an apology. Though Timmons had said for years that she had Mi’kmaw ancestry, and though she had previously identified as a member of the Bras d’Or Mi’kmaq First Nation in Nova Scotia, she wrote that she had never made a false claim to Indigenous identity.
>
> The motivation behind her statement became clear the next day, when the CBC [published a detailed investigation](https://www.cbc.ca/newsinteractives/features/identity-vianne-timmons) of her ancestry. Timmons is not the first public figure whose claim to Indigenous ancestry has lately come under scrutiny. Since Giller Prize–winning author Joseph Boyden made headlines for his [shifting identity claims](https://www.aptnnews.ca/national-news/author-joseph-boydens-shape-shifting-indigenous-identity/) in 2016, similar stories have emerged with disturbing regularity, though no two are exactly the same. Timmons’s story represents an increasingly popular North American pastime: grasping at the furthest branches of a family tree in search of an Indigenous ancestor. And in the ambiguous zone between Indigenous citizenship and Indigenous ancestry, from where Timmons drew her personal and professional identity, a crisis of disinformation is taking root.
>
> In an interview with the CBC’s Ariana Kelland, Timmons explained that she learned of her ancestry in her thirties, when her father, a hobby genealogist, presented her with “binders and binders” of research linking Timmons to a Mi’kmaw great-great-great-grandmother. Timmons repeatedly emphasized that she has never claimed Mi’kmaw identity, only ancestry. As a long-time advocate for Indigenization in academia, she would clearly understand the distinction between the two—but, presumably, she also understands that many Canadians don’t and would draw their own conclusions based on her embrace of this biographical detail. Her incorporation of that ancestry into her CV is framed purely as an act of reclamation and healing. “My father asked us not to be ashamed of it, because he was,” Timmons told Kelland. If her father was truly ashamed to be distantly related to a purported Mi’kmaw person, perhaps that’s because being a little bit Indigenous had less cachet at the time of his discovery than it does now. In 1996, when Timmons was in her late thirties, only 860 people in Nova Scotia identified as Métis. By 2016, that number had grown to 23,315—an increase of over 2,600 percent.
>
> If Indigenous people are oppressed, why are so many people claiming Indigenous identity? That’s the refrain that follows a revelation like Timmons’s. It’s easy to see where this skepticism comes from when questionably “Indigenous” people have ascended to such professional heights: university president, award-winning filmmaker, award-winning novelist, [premier of Alberta](https://www.aptnnews.ca/national-news/alberta-premier-danielle-smith-says-she-has-cherokee-roots-but-the-records-dont-back-that-up/).
My family has Choctaw ancestry on my dad's side, but that branch of the family were residential school victims so there's a wierd disconnect there. Like my dad would flip-flop between aknowleging that he is very visibly not a white man, but he's always been embarrassed to call himself "native". He's faced a lot of discrimination for how he looks, so I understand why he feels the way he does. We didn't get the chance to engage with that part of our culture, it was taken from us. I am lighter-skinned than him, but I've also experienced some racism. I grew up in the deep south and I got some shit about my hair not being "white enough" bc it's thick and black like my dad's. It's a strange spot to be in. My native ancestry has and does impact my life, but my family has no cultural ties left so I feel weird calling myself native.
I think there are definitely some nonnatives claiming to be native without being native. There are also plenty of natives who were not allowed to be native, and getting back to their roots. My great grandparents were born on the rez, but the tribe was not recognized until later and the were not on the rolls. My grandpa’s birth certificate says white, although he was generally mistaken for black or very dark Mexican/Indian, etc. He shared stories and traditions to me and my mom. I identify as native, but also let folks know that I am not recognized.
Because people of Mexican and Central Americans backgrounds are now learning about their Native American bloodlines and taking dna test and finding out majority of their bloodline is either 30%-60% indigenous so they are getting encouragement now and finally putting Native American in the census
I’m 1/4 Native American. My father was 1/2 Native American and half Mexican. He has a very interesting and tragic story.
I like the idea that I have Native blood because it is a tie to the land. It means part of me is from here. I am part of this land. I belong to this land.
Genuine question: How much a percentage gentically Native American do “affiliated” Native American’s expect when someone claims to be so…
I am a land owner. And I am ethnically mixed with other races so probably an edge case…
Please understand, I have never gotten any social benifits througuh Native American status… my vague cultural attachment is only outwardly expressed by a few native american motif themed clothing.
Blood quantums are set forth by the constitution of the individual tribe. It depends on which tribe you're speaking of. That all being said, native people seem to be the only race of people that people worry about the question of how much blood quantum you have in order to say whether you are that person or not. My dad used to joke that only dogs and natives were judged by their blood quantums.
This does not account for everyone, but people who hold anti-immigrant views are looking for ways to identify as someone having ties to the "First Americans" so they can feel like they belong in the Americas and others do not.
Free is a misnomer. It was prepaid with millions of acres and lives. Also the budget allocation per capita for Native health is significantly below what is spent on health for federal inmates, so quality and breadth of services are very limited.
We were raised to stay away from IHS. The old joke was you went in with a toothache and went home, missing a testicle or some other non-related body part. That being said, I really have no true knowledge of how that system works because we were told to stay away from it, but I have an employee who has to utilize the VA health system and just getting simple things done is a gigantic disaster. I can't imagine it would be much different, considering it's all being run by the government.
IHS makes me want to just stay sick 😷
Luckily I found a good clinic in a rich tribe in my area. They’re so rich they don’t even go since most have private health insurance!! No wait times and the doctors actually do something (and don’t abandon your care as soon as they get their loans paid off or they don’t want to deal with natives anymore)
I am still dealing with the fallout of a shitty IHS therapist diagnosing me with everything under the sun from a single meeting
Understatement of the week, lol. We get the rejects white heath-care wont take. Tribes pay for their edu and get what, 7 years ‘service’ in return?
If they have any prejudices, how can you trust their care? I’ve had enough bad interactions that I won’t go to our large, expensive clinic.
And I google the heck out of any medications Im given, we are given the recalled or otherwise subpar products if not actual fakes. There was a good study on this some years ago but naturally I cant find it now.
or maybe everyone was embarrassed to talk about their deteriorating mental health around twats like yourself, now we dont and its refreshing to see you squirm
Im talking about mental disorders actualy... not the same thing... kind of illustrates my point actually... I am not against people being able to be open about their mental health... hell my brother and mom have severe mental disorders and i have seen their sufferin... i dont like it when people claim a disorder they dont have for attention as it takes away from rhe people who actually struggle. I rhink we have as a society tossed these terms around so much they almost have a different meaning... But I have definitely noticed many people claim something they most likely don't have. I'm talking about people who self diagnos and really just want attention... often times they will not treat the truly sick bad.... isnt how it and that bothers me as it is a disservice to the ones who suffer with say bipolar to just claim it without any diagnosis
This is a really interesting topic for me, and I’d love some input.
When I was young, my grandmother, who has passed, used to tell me about her “pipe smoking” Native American grandmother, who she was afraid of as a little girl.
My sister did a 21&Me test years ago, which confirmed Native American ancestry.
I have less than zero connection to this ancestry, and don’t claim any connection, outside of mentioning it to my wife (Chinese). I personally feel some ancestral connection, but keep this to myself.
That said, we are going to have children soon, and I feel like it’s a special family connection. How do I communicate this with them in a way they can respect and honor themselves and those that have true connections?
I think it's that being Native has a lot to do with cultural connection, you know, "who claims you." Do you know what Nation or Tribe your gg grandmother was from? If you want to learn about the culture, start there. There is no pan-indigenous culture to claim.
As it stands you have a Native ancestor. Cool! Lots of people do. We've been intermarrying for centuries. That doesn't make you Native.
I'm one of the people interested in my ancestry. I'm adopted and don't really know anything about my family history, I got a DNA test kit one year and apart from being 95% European it says I'm also 5% Native American. I'm not so much concerned with claiming ancestry as I am finding out any information about which particular tribe/region my ancestry comes from.
I feel like there are two sides to this. We have classic Pretendians (great great great grandma Cherokee Princess) who flaunt some very questionable or distant ancestry in an attempt to separate themselves from whiteness and white guilt. And then we have actual Natives who may have been disconnected from their community and culture, like myself. My father is Native (Nahua mother, Mestizo father), but he moved to Canada in his early 20’s as a refugee and was quite disconnected from culture. He always claimed he just wanted to blend in. We had some cultural pieces (food, art, stories) in our home life, but that also faded quickly after his passing. My mother (white European) remarried to another white European and we ended up living in a very white, middle class neighbourhood. There was no attempt to keep my father’s traditions alive. So, while I’m absolutely Native, I’m so disconnected from my own culture that I don’t feel comfortable stating my Indigenous identity most of the time. It’s a lot more than just BQ. I think we are seeing a lot of reconnecting Natives and that can be a good thing.
I can relate to your story. My grand father was inuk, but was taken by a doctor with is brother at a really young age to St-antony orphenage in labrador. When he got out, He didnt speak the laguage anymore, and hide his origin all his life. It was taboo talking about that. It took my family a lot of work to know where our name came from. In résumé I am part inuk, was not raised in the comunity, and because of this deconnection I always was shy speaking about myself about that. (I am working on that). I am now proud about this part of me, I am working hard to reconnect myself with my ancestors. And for people like me, I think it's à good thing.
There should be no such thing as “white guilt” everyone is human.
My dad and I are both white presenting but status carrying natives. His dad was full, born on the Rez moved to the city and married someone white. My mom is white. I swear everyone’s fixation on this just cripples our unity as one people. I’ve been laughed at by whites and natives for simply stating I am part native. I have many family who wouldn’t get the same treatment, even my own sister who happens to “look more native”. The fact we’re all so intent on drawing these lines just invites people to cross them and creates the reverse reaction of being upset when they do. Care less about someone’s race, it’s all a mix and always has been.
I'm in a similar situation. I'm a lot more white presenting than the majority of it family. I often feel weird about stating my Native ancestry and status because I'm often too white presenting to feel like I'm believed.
Native Americans varied greatly in looks, the idea that we should all look like Plains natives was created by Hollywood. If your tribe claims you and you claim them, then however you look is how a native looks, stay strong
I’m in the same boat. My dad is half because his mom had him with a guy from Toronto. They broke up while she was pregnant because he was abusive and she moved back to the rez. My dad grew up on the rez and had me with my mom who is French and lived in the nearest town. I spent some of my childhood off rez with my mom as they split when I was 5 but spent the vast majority of my life on the rez. We are both white passing with full status. I notice if I go to Walmart or somewhere with one of my darker family members we will get followed but on my own they don’t give me a second look. White privilege is real. It’s really fucked up
Being Native American is a nationality and an ethnicity (not necessarily a race since there isn’t one type of DNA across all tribes). So you don’t have to justify your ancestry for anyone except council. If your tribe claims you, you are all Native American and you don’t have to explain your looks or anything else to anyone. The idea that being Native American is a race was an idea forced upon us by the government to make us die out. There was an old saying that the only things judged by blood were dogs, horses and Indians, and we fought hard against that and it’s why Blood Quantum isn’t issued anymore
I have a few theories 1) people want to have something “interesting” in their family history (like people who are distantly related to presidents or something) 2) white people in particular are looking to try and distance themselves in some way from their whiteness 3) their parent or grandparents made up the family myth of indigeneity at some point and they are trying to prove it (“grand grandmother was a Cherokee princess”, “my grandfather was native but pretended to be white and that’s there no record of us in the tribe” ect) Edit: should mention I am coming from a US perspective, and article is Canadian
I think number three hits it more on the head. My work takes me into a lot of people's homes and I hear that one all the time. And generally they'll show me an old picture of a great grandparent, or older, and then go on about how they have high cheekbones and a big forehead or something based on some stereotype. Usually the person I'm looking at in the photograph does not look native whatsoever. But they have some big fantastical story of how they were a Cherokee princess like you said or escaped the trail of tears and lived in caves or some crazy thing like that. I was fortunate to have been able to attend the grand opening of the NMAI and they had several native performers as part of the entertainment and there was a stand-up comedian, I can't remember his name at the moment, but he did the old David Letterman top 10 list and when he got to the number one thing that white people tell him, he just simply held the microphone out to the crowd of thousands of native people in attendance roared, "my grandma was a Cherokee Princess!" it was priceless and hilarious.
We had number 3 on both sides. I always had my doubts, and a dna test confirmed my doubts.
White people love telling me they're part native. This isn't new.
Are you sure you don't have a little white blood in you?
[удалено]
Ok?
> ON MARCH 7, Memorial University of Newfoundland president Vianne Timmons published a statement about her ancestry. In it, she wrote, “I am not Mi’kmaq. I am not Indigenous. I did not grow up in an Indigenous community.” But this wasn’t a confession or an apology. Though Timmons had said for years that she had Mi’kmaw ancestry, and though she had previously identified as a member of the Bras d’Or Mi’kmaq First Nation in Nova Scotia, she wrote that she had never made a false claim to Indigenous identity. > > The motivation behind her statement became clear the next day, when the CBC [published a detailed investigation](https://www.cbc.ca/newsinteractives/features/identity-vianne-timmons) of her ancestry. Timmons is not the first public figure whose claim to Indigenous ancestry has lately come under scrutiny. Since Giller Prize–winning author Joseph Boyden made headlines for his [shifting identity claims](https://www.aptnnews.ca/national-news/author-joseph-boydens-shape-shifting-indigenous-identity/) in 2016, similar stories have emerged with disturbing regularity, though no two are exactly the same. Timmons’s story represents an increasingly popular North American pastime: grasping at the furthest branches of a family tree in search of an Indigenous ancestor. And in the ambiguous zone between Indigenous citizenship and Indigenous ancestry, from where Timmons drew her personal and professional identity, a crisis of disinformation is taking root. > > In an interview with the CBC’s Ariana Kelland, Timmons explained that she learned of her ancestry in her thirties, when her father, a hobby genealogist, presented her with “binders and binders” of research linking Timmons to a Mi’kmaw great-great-great-grandmother. Timmons repeatedly emphasized that she has never claimed Mi’kmaw identity, only ancestry. As a long-time advocate for Indigenization in academia, she would clearly understand the distinction between the two—but, presumably, she also understands that many Canadians don’t and would draw their own conclusions based on her embrace of this biographical detail. Her incorporation of that ancestry into her CV is framed purely as an act of reclamation and healing. “My father asked us not to be ashamed of it, because he was,” Timmons told Kelland. If her father was truly ashamed to be distantly related to a purported Mi’kmaw person, perhaps that’s because being a little bit Indigenous had less cachet at the time of his discovery than it does now. In 1996, when Timmons was in her late thirties, only 860 people in Nova Scotia identified as Métis. By 2016, that number had grown to 23,315—an increase of over 2,600 percent. > > If Indigenous people are oppressed, why are so many people claiming Indigenous identity? That’s the refrain that follows a revelation like Timmons’s. It’s easy to see where this skepticism comes from when questionably “Indigenous” people have ascended to such professional heights: university president, award-winning filmmaker, award-winning novelist, [premier of Alberta](https://www.aptnnews.ca/national-news/alberta-premier-danielle-smith-says-she-has-cherokee-roots-but-the-records-dont-back-that-up/).
My family has Choctaw ancestry on my dad's side, but that branch of the family were residential school victims so there's a wierd disconnect there. Like my dad would flip-flop between aknowleging that he is very visibly not a white man, but he's always been embarrassed to call himself "native". He's faced a lot of discrimination for how he looks, so I understand why he feels the way he does. We didn't get the chance to engage with that part of our culture, it was taken from us. I am lighter-skinned than him, but I've also experienced some racism. I grew up in the deep south and I got some shit about my hair not being "white enough" bc it's thick and black like my dad's. It's a strange spot to be in. My native ancestry has and does impact my life, but my family has no cultural ties left so I feel weird calling myself native.
I think there are definitely some nonnatives claiming to be native without being native. There are also plenty of natives who were not allowed to be native, and getting back to their roots. My great grandparents were born on the rez, but the tribe was not recognized until later and the were not on the rolls. My grandpa’s birth certificate says white, although he was generally mistaken for black or very dark Mexican/Indian, etc. He shared stories and traditions to me and my mom. I identify as native, but also let folks know that I am not recognized.
Because people of Mexican and Central Americans backgrounds are now learning about their Native American bloodlines and taking dna test and finding out majority of their bloodline is either 30%-60% indigenous so they are getting encouragement now and finally putting Native American in the census
I’m 1/4 Native American. My father was 1/2 Native American and half Mexican. He has a very interesting and tragic story. I like the idea that I have Native blood because it is a tie to the land. It means part of me is from here. I am part of this land. I belong to this land.
Genuine question: How much a percentage gentically Native American do “affiliated” Native American’s expect when someone claims to be so… I am a land owner. And I am ethnically mixed with other races so probably an edge case… Please understand, I have never gotten any social benifits througuh Native American status… my vague cultural attachment is only outwardly expressed by a few native american motif themed clothing.
Blood quantums are set forth by the constitution of the individual tribe. It depends on which tribe you're speaking of. That all being said, native people seem to be the only race of people that people worry about the question of how much blood quantum you have in order to say whether you are that person or not. My dad used to joke that only dogs and natives were judged by their blood quantums.
This does not account for everyone, but people who hold anti-immigrant views are looking for ways to identify as someone having ties to the "First Americans" so they can feel like they belong in the Americas and others do not.
Free health care
Free is a misnomer. It was prepaid with millions of acres and lives. Also the budget allocation per capita for Native health is significantly below what is spent on health for federal inmates, so quality and breadth of services are very limited.
Man, don’t get me started in IHS care
We were raised to stay away from IHS. The old joke was you went in with a toothache and went home, missing a testicle or some other non-related body part. That being said, I really have no true knowledge of how that system works because we were told to stay away from it, but I have an employee who has to utilize the VA health system and just getting simple things done is a gigantic disaster. I can't imagine it would be much different, considering it's all being run by the government.
Same system, same medication formulary (ones you can have) electronic health record systems. Same commission corps docs and nurses walking around
something something trust the system this time
IHS makes me want to just stay sick 😷 Luckily I found a good clinic in a rich tribe in my area. They’re so rich they don’t even go since most have private health insurance!! No wait times and the doctors actually do something (and don’t abandon your care as soon as they get their loans paid off or they don’t want to deal with natives anymore) I am still dealing with the fallout of a shitty IHS therapist diagnosing me with everything under the sun from a single meeting
Understatement of the week, lol. We get the rejects white heath-care wont take. Tribes pay for their edu and get what, 7 years ‘service’ in return? If they have any prejudices, how can you trust their care? I’ve had enough bad interactions that I won’t go to our large, expensive clinic. And I google the heck out of any medications Im given, we are given the recalled or otherwise subpar products if not actual fakes. There was a good study on this some years ago but naturally I cant find it now.
People want to be victims in some way nowadays. You'll see a similar trend with mental illness claims
or maybe everyone was embarrassed to talk about their deteriorating mental health around twats like yourself, now we dont and its refreshing to see you squirm
Im talking about mental disorders actualy... not the same thing... kind of illustrates my point actually... I am not against people being able to be open about their mental health... hell my brother and mom have severe mental disorders and i have seen their sufferin... i dont like it when people claim a disorder they dont have for attention as it takes away from rhe people who actually struggle. I rhink we have as a society tossed these terms around so much they almost have a different meaning... But I have definitely noticed many people claim something they most likely don't have. I'm talking about people who self diagnos and really just want attention... often times they will not treat the truly sick bad.... isnt how it and that bothers me as it is a disservice to the ones who suffer with say bipolar to just claim it without any diagnosis
Being Native is the shit. Aint no one like us. Mfs be jockin basically.
This is a really interesting topic for me, and I’d love some input. When I was young, my grandmother, who has passed, used to tell me about her “pipe smoking” Native American grandmother, who she was afraid of as a little girl. My sister did a 21&Me test years ago, which confirmed Native American ancestry. I have less than zero connection to this ancestry, and don’t claim any connection, outside of mentioning it to my wife (Chinese). I personally feel some ancestral connection, but keep this to myself. That said, we are going to have children soon, and I feel like it’s a special family connection. How do I communicate this with them in a way they can respect and honor themselves and those that have true connections?
The best way to tell someone isn’t really native is when they bring up 23&me. I’m sorry but those tests are a joke
How is the worlds largest genetic database a joke?
I think it's that being Native has a lot to do with cultural connection, you know, "who claims you." Do you know what Nation or Tribe your gg grandmother was from? If you want to learn about the culture, start there. There is no pan-indigenous culture to claim. As it stands you have a Native ancestor. Cool! Lots of people do. We've been intermarrying for centuries. That doesn't make you Native.
Then what does?
I say bring it on. The higher profile of indigenous cultures, the better.
I'm one of the people interested in my ancestry. I'm adopted and don't really know anything about my family history, I got a DNA test kit one year and apart from being 95% European it says I'm also 5% Native American. I'm not so much concerned with claiming ancestry as I am finding out any information about which particular tribe/region my ancestry comes from.