Episode 117: Native American Baskets

This is a basket from the Klamath people, woven of natural materials like tule and adorned with Porcupine quills.

Welcome to Episode 117 of Ramping Up your English, where we explore the making of Native American baskets and the making of sentences with subordinate clauses.

Watching Episode 117

Episode 117 Summary

Indian Baskets are the content focus of this episode. While essential to so many vital tasks of Native American life, Indian baskets stand as an art form that reflects Native American culture as well as a reflection of the artists and craftspeople who made them, and continue doing so. Host John Letz explains how a small basket shattered negative stereotypes that were perpetuated by movies and TV programs when he was a Cub Scout.

This episode also features a grammar introduction to subordinate clauses, and how they can function as adverbs.

Featured Video

In this episode, we featured a video about Native American baskets. Click here to watch the video on archive.org. (Remember to click on MPEG4 to play the video.)

Links to Related Videos

Many Viewers enjoyed the previous episode about American Indians in Southern Oregon. This was on the Episode 116 page. Below are links to other videos about similar content.

Click here to watch a video about the Tribes of Southern Oregon, and their struggles to survive and regain recognition. The video is titled Standing Strong The Tribal Nations of Western Oregon. It includes the stories of the Takelma and other Native American people, and parts of it were featured in Episode 117.

Tragic and violent events in Southern Oregon are explored from an archeologist perspective in this video from Mark Tveskov of Southern Oregon University. Parts of this presentation were featured in this episode. Click here to watch the entire presentation by the Jackson County Library Services and the Southern Oregon Historical Society..

Learn more about the Kalapuya in the western valleys of Oregon. Click here to see a presentation by Dr. Todd Conolly from the University of Oregon.

Click here to see a Zuni trail crew improve a path to Humpfrey”s Mountain near the San Francisco Peaks.

Learning Materials Used

In Episode 117, we offered some direct instruction on using adverbial dependent clauses to add information about actions and events. Here are some of the materials we used:

Next Episode

Episode 118 in now running on RVTV’s Public Access Channel. Click here to visit the Episode 118 Page.