As pointed out by this article in the New York Times by Angela R. Riley, artwork by Neil Swaab,  the Quileute people are get lost in all the Twilight mania.   We hear a lot about the effect of Twilight on the town of Forks, but how has their new found fame affected the Quileute Tribe?

ALL the world, it seems, has been bitten by “Twilight.” Conservative estimates place revenue generated from Stephenie Meyer’s vampire chronicles — the books, movies and merchandise — in the billion-dollar range. Scarcely mentioned, however, is the effect that “Twilight” has had on the tiny Quileute Nation, situated on a postage stamp of a reservation, just one square mile, in remote La Push, Wash.

To millions of “Twilight” fans, the Quileute are Indians whose (fictional) ancient treaty transforms young males of the tribe into vampire-fighting wolves. To the nearly 700 remaining Quileute Indians, “Twilight” is the reason they are suddenly drawing extraordinary attention from the outside — while they themselves remain largely excluded from the vampire series’ vast commercial empire.

Just last month, MSN.com issued an apology to the Quileute for intruding on its territory while videotaping a “Twilight” virtual tour in September. MSN.com sought permission from the Chamber of Commerce in nearby Forks, Wash., but didn’t pay the same courtesy to the Quileute. The video team trespassed onto a reservation cemetery and taped Quileute graves, including those of esteemed tribal leaders. These images were then set to macabre music and, in November, posted on MSN.com. The tribe quickly persuaded MSN.com to remove the Quileute images.

Read the rest of the article here.

From Dazzled by Twilight’s website:

When Jacob says “kwopkalawo’li” (pronunced quo-p-kah-lah-WOH-oh-lee) to Bella, he is saying “I Love You” in Quileute.

Listen here:

i-love-you-in-quileute

Listen to the end for a Christmas wish from Dazzled by Twilight and CBA as well!  (Dazzled by Twilight is a wonderful shop in downtown Forks.)

The Quileute legends in Twilight have a basis in the actual tales, Quileute stories do included descending from wolves – but definately not werewolves. In order to give fans a taste of the true culture, the tribe has begin to have storytelling on special fan weekends and events such as weekly healing drum circles (Wednesdays at 5:30 p.m. at the Community Center) to entertain and teach. If you get to Forks, you don’t want to miss that.
From the Peninsula Daily News

Chris Morganroth III was raised by his grandmother, who spoke the Quileute language, told the stories and made baskets and food in traditional ways.
He tells the story of the origin of the Quileute:

Quileute beginnings

If you begin to look into the stories and how we got to be here, they go back to the beginnings of time.
Before that, Spirit beings could transform themselves into animals or people at will. There were even living beings in outer space, such as the sun. They called those people the fire sky people.
After some time, the Spirit beings had to choose what they would be and were no longer able to transform.
After this, K’wati came into the area of LaPush and found that there were no humans. He went to the mouth of the river and there were wolves, timber wolves.
Now these wolves always travel in pairs and they mate for life.
K’wati saw that there were no people in this area near LaPush. So he transformed that pair of wolves into the Quileute people.

K’wati is a supernatural figure in Quileute stories who transforms people or objects. K’wati wasn’t a “sorcerer” or “witch king,” as Meyer’s has it.  “He wasn’t really a god, but a transformer — he was put on Earth to make things better,” Morganroth said.   Although Meyer’s teen werewolves are not part of Quileute legends, she draws from the tribal connection to wolves.

Even in present times, the wolf is often referred to as a brother of the tribe, as is the orca — which also is said to have descended from the wolf, Morganroth said.

The New Moon werewolves aren’t your average, hairy-faced cross between a man and a wolf. The boys “phase” into bear-sized wolves with enough superpowers to kill vampires.  And they developed out of a need to protect the people of Forks and LaPush from vampires.  The Quileute have no such legend.

Morganroth said it doesn’t bother him much when he hears how the stories are changed and used in the books.

“People are always telling me how my stories are not the real way things happened — science is the main one — but I think of them as ways to explain things that happened,” Morganroth said.  “We have stories in LaPush that explain events going back to the Ice Age, but science and history people claim that we came across the land bridge much later than that.

“And her book is a work of fiction. If she needed to make some changes to make it more exciting that is up to her.”

He went on to say that one legend talks about the fire of the sun being captured in leaves and used to keep the plant living — a legend which perfectly parallels the scientific process of photosynthesis.  “So we have our story to explain how that works,” he said.

“If Ms. Meyer wanted to make up a story about werewolves, that is her thing — it helped make the characters more interesting.”

Source

Here is a second clip of ReelzChannel’s Quileute special on Twilight Weekly: Spotlight. This clip features actress Tinsel Korey as she talks about the time she spent with the tribe to both learn from them and give back to the community.

See Part 1 here.

Source

Here is the first clip made available from last night’s episode of ReelzChannel’s Twilight Weekly: Spotlight- Quileute Nation. In it, a tribal elder tell the true creation story of the Quileute Nation.

ReelzChannel will be airing a special on the Quileute Nation, TOMORROW. Quoting from their news release:

REELZCHANNEL – TV About Movies® today announced that the Quileute Nation has granted permission to the show “Twilight Weekly: Spotlight” to gather footage and imagery within tribal lands. This unprecedented access is the first-ever for a television network and was granted to REELZCHANNEL in recognition of the network’s commitment to authenticity and the opportunity to educate those who have taken an interest in the Quileute Nation from their exposure to the culture through the Twilight saga of books and movies.
“The ‘Twilight phenomenon’ gives the Quileute Nation the opportunity to educate the world about their true history, traditions, culture and creation story,” said Quileute spokesperson Jackie Jacobs. “It was very important to this Nation to partner with an organization that we felt understood that the non-fictional Quileute story is more complex, multi-dimensional and sacred than [the one] everyone has been exposed to. We have been inundated with requests from various outlets to tell the story but felt that REELZCHANNEL embodied the authentic direction we wanted to explore while keeping it fun and interesting for the fans.”
This episode captures the sweeping landscapes of the tribal lands, giving viewers an exclusive look at the locations recreated for the film including the beach where Jacob tells Bella about the Cullen vampire legend, the cliffs that Bella leaps from to draw Edward back to her, and the school that Jacob attended as described in the “New Moon” book. Viewers are then transported to the celebrations of the culture through intimate ceremonies of the drum circle and tribal dances. The sights of the Quileute Nation come to life in the voices of its people in interviews with tribal elder and storyteller Chris Morganroth III and Roy Black known to the tribe as “Jacob’s Grandfather.” Actress Tinsel Korey, who portrays the character of Emily in the films, also shares her experience.

The Quileute Nation episode premieres this Monday, September 28th at 10pm Eastern/7pm Pacific.

REELZCHANNEL TV is carried via cable and satellite on DirectTV (Channel 238) and DISH Network (Channel 299) reaching more than 46 million homes nationwide. Local channel information is available on the website’s home page through a zip code look-up.