The Resilience of Native American Elders

Abstract

This article focuses on the lived experiences of resilience in eight Native American elders. Although resilience has not been conceptualized among this group, findings revealed five unique attributes. The study design fostered the culturally relevant use of story telling, which allowed the authentic voices of the elders to be heard.

Resilience exists among these Native American elders, but it is uniquely enmeshed into the seamless fabric of their culture, worldview, and connectedness expressed as Oneness with all creation. This finding of a unified cosmology suggests an extension to Bronfenbrenner's ecological theory to include the cosmosystem as a new systemic level.