Navajo Traditions

12. The Basket

Belief: Do not place an upside down woven basket or even a dish on top of a child's head.

Rationale: Anything placed in a Navajo wedding basket when in the upright position will grow, expand, and multiply, similar to the basket of plenty. But when the basket is turned upside down it represents enclosure which limits growth. Therefore, if you placed an upside down basket on a child's head it will enclose and limit his total entity, such as his physical growth, his psychological development, his intellectual development, his ability to gain materially.

Recommendation:
Health lessons on physical and mental growth and development will help eliminate cultural conflict in this area.

Other ideas:

• The basket must not be sued as a drum outside of a ceremony.
• The basket must not be spun; otherwise, the person is vulnerable to spells of dizziness.
• The basket should not be punctured through the center coil. You puncture your own thought processes.
• Never work on the basket during one's period. Purify yourself before resuming work.
• 
  A rug must not be perfected. There must be an opening left so that the creativity of the Holy People may have the freedom to move and breathe.
• Pictorial weavers of cermonial symbols and characters such as Ye'ii must be sanctioned by a ceremony in order to be able to reproduce them in design, and thereafter periodically have a prayer over them.