Educational Media Reviews Online

Kinaalda', the puberty ceremony, is a fundamental rite of the Blessingway ceremonial practice, which encompasses all forms of human excellence and implies an ideal of wholeness and harmony (Wyman, p. 7). By offering the person spiritual guidance and the collective power of community in every phase of life, Blessingway is central to the Navajo belief system. When a girl first receives her menses, a four-day ceremony is conducted to mark this stage of her life and to prepare her for future motherhood.

Kinaalda' originated with the First Woman, Changing Woman, who is considered the spiritual mother of creation and the deity associated with this ceremony, to enable her to create a new race and to transmit the new race the power of generation (Frisbie, p. 348). In this video, producer/director Lena Carr, who was unable to experience her own, documents the Kinaalda´ ceremony of her niece Tanya Shepard. The technical production quality of the video is good: the sound and imagery clear. The content is easy to understand and follow. Overall, the medium is appropriate for the subject matter; however, the main criticism is the lack of reference and explanation on the Blessingway ceremonial practice and its relationship with the Kinaalda´ rite. It was only after doing some research that this reviewer was able to fully understand the meaning and reasoning behind this practice. Kinaalda´: A Navajo Rite of Passage can be used to support a variety of subject areas across the disciplines, such as: American Studies, Anthropology, Native American Studies, Multicultural Studies, and Women Studies. School, public, and academic library collection programs, alike will be enhanced by this purchase.

Works Cited:

Frisbie, Charlotte Johnson. Kinaalda': A Study of the Navajo Girls Puberty Ceremony. Middletown, Connecticut: Wesleyan University Press, 1967.

Wyman, Leland C. Blessingway. Tucson, Arizona: The University of Arizona Press, 1970.