Can this Pocahontas quote be traced back to a source?

The quote is from the song "Colors of the Wind" from Disney feature film Pocahontas:

You think all the people who are people, are the people who look and think like you. But if you walk the footsteps of a stranger, you'll learn things you never knew you never knew.

Song writers are talented people but I believe they often get inspiration for text from somewhere else. Who might have inspired this?

reference pocahontas

Best Answer

I don't have any special knowledge of the authors, but my grandparents (one part Cherokee, the other part Osage) used to have a hanging in their house in the 70's that read, "Never judge a man until you've walked a mile in his moccasins."

There are many, many references online to this being an old Native American proverb. I'm skeptical^*, but for our purposes here the story of it being a Native American saying may have been an influence. The lyrics in question seem to be saying roughly the same thing.

^{* - This story, of it being written by Methodist minister Mary T. Lathrap in 1895 is one possible source.}