University Research
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1
Academic department
Department of History
Description
The striking tool as a concept has existed since time immemorial. Once Europeans began colonizing the North American continent, Indigenous striking tools became conflated with the word “tomahawk.” The meaning of tomahawks and other striking tools is distorted in history, because western scholars and artists saw them from a limited worldview. This distortion made its way into archaeological reports, museum displays, and digital collections’ metadata. Some typologies that collectors and museum staff make for tomahawks continue to limit how the public may see them. Professionals working in the material culture fields should consider how this occurs. This article demonstrates these issues and briefly suggests ideas for how material culture fields may begin to solve them. It is an ongoing research project that intendeds to build upon the knowledge of contributors from the community in later editions.
Publisher name
The University of Akron
Grant Information
NA
Funding Status
N/A
Data Management
NA
File Format(s)
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
Fall 10-16-2026
Issue
1
First Page
1
Last Page
56
Recommended Citation
Martin, Wesley. 2026. Striking Tools of Indigenous North America: Rethinking their Representations in Media, Literature, and Collection Systems. The University of Akron Idea Exchange.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
Included in
Cultural History Commons, Other Arts and Humanities Commons, Other Languages, Societies, and Cultures Commons, Public History Commons
Comments
If you have knowledge about the subject that you would like to contribute, check out the "Revision Suggestion Form" PDF in the "Additional Files" folder, and email [email protected]. This is an ongoing work in progress, and you are encouraged to be a part of it!