Closed Captions Audio Described

A Native American speaker discusses the creation and significance of traditional dance regalia, including feathers, beadwork, and paint made from natural materials. He explains ceremonial practices like smudging, the spiritual importance of eagle feathers and animal claws, naming traditions, and mourning ceremonies. The speaker also addresses Native American representation in media and sports mascots, emphasizing the importance of cultural consultation.

Transcript

0:07 [Music]
0:29 yeah [Music]
0:44 [Applause] where
1:03 [Music]
1:29 they [Music]
1:52 [Laughter] now [Music] [Laughter]
2:15 [Music] we're going to open up for some questions now so please just ask any question you want I mean don't be shy there's there it's like a picture step can you show [Music]
2:40 you're got it tied in so it won't fall out had a hard time getting through the airport with that we check all our stuff in on the bag what were they saying what were the song saying it was a praise I was it praise to the animals praise to the light to
3:04 Circle Of Life each one of our songs there's nothing more than a small song sang over four times that's why during that song they had one stop that was the end of one the whole song sing once and they did it again we had a second stop that was two what we call push-ups two beats then the third one they sang
3:29 through it they didn't stop and then they stopped on the last one so same little song s over four times and each one of the songs are made in a ceremony they're made out of a a prayer each one of our songs are a what is what do the hawk
3:53 swings what do the excuse me what do the hawk swings wings wings that we carry right here these are fans air conditioning one of the best air conditioners you could ever have but they were also an extension of our hand for instance long
4:16 ago in the in the lodge I was unable to speak to my mother-in-law or any other women I could only speak to my wife my sisters and my mother so for some reason I was sitting in the lodge and my wife wife had left only way I could maybe get the attention of my mother-in-law was to touch her with my
4:38 feathers and point to whatever if I wanted her to get me something I could point at it but I could not look her in the eye or I could not speak to her and I've been trying ever since I first heard that to get it back into place today but it won't work it won't go for it we're trying have you ever missed a day when you are on sweat lodge oh yes I sure did I got food a
5:03 couple of times um did you uh in the tipis you know in the summertime some of we don't live in tipis right now I'll tell you this like my wife and I own a bed and breakfast we have eight eight bedrooms six bathrooms and three living rooms so but in the summertime we uh we actually some of the families do live in
5:27 some of the lodges in the summertime just to get out of the house or just to go camping eh something like that we do living upstair um even though you know how you say all this stuff in our minds about the you you you hold not really it's because they didn't know long ago a lot of the movies were
5:50 made without ever asking a Native American without ever asking an Indian the way I kind of relate that to is nowadays there's a lot of question about the mascots for instance the Indians name the Braves the warrior the tomahawk chop most of the people I can guarantee you that are
6:13 opposed that do not like that idea are people who have not lived their Indian way who are not in tune with their native culture their native history to me I think it's a honor to use those you know maybe the way some of them are done like for instance tomahawk
6:37 chop I mean that really doesn't bother me you know it doesn't I'm sure it doesn't bother a lot of people maybe some of the sayings they got goes with it like wa hey oh hey you know that might offend some people the thing I would have to say about having a a Native American mascot a name is maybe consult the local tribe or draw them you know like the Cleveland
7:01 Indians that guy looks like a space character or something why not draw him like a real Indian he probably wouldn't offend so many people but yeah that's a very good question no I do not hold any drudges against Hollywood or the people who making a pictures simply because they didn't know there's a picture out today called the Dances with Wolves and
7:23 that picture that movie is so close to being real as far as their language their dress and a lot of things the way they live their lives they had consulted a lot of Native Americans about that good question thank you at the beginning what was that oh sage we call it a sage that's a good question we've burn like we believe
7:47 we're we're keepers of Mother Earth so we use her her children her animals her grasses her medicines but we burned it we light it on fire and it smolders You' seen that smolder and that smell come out of it we believe it's a way to purify ourselves we would be kind of like holy water in a Catholic Church when you dip your fingers in the holy
8:12 water make the sign of the cross this is kind of like our way of purification we'll take that smoke put it on our body on our minds and we also do that to our Eagle feathers cuz we believe each one of these eagle feathers they have a spirit as well they have a a purpose a meaning so that's just a way for us to cleanse ourselves purify ourselves so that maybe we could give
8:37 the right material to you guys and we never pray for ourselves I always pray for knowledge and wisdom so that I could teach you guys more about us and it's it's a way of life every day we don't just practice our religion on Sundays we live it every day of our [Music] life pain the paint the paint you can
9:01 make yellow paint out of a mustard seed you take that Mustard Seed and you put it with coal or me Ash from the wood stove or the campfire and you mix it with water and you put it inside of an animal stomach the lining was like waterproof You' leave it in there maybe a day or so and kind of let it it makes a paste or an oil to get red we use wed red clay at home as a clay like the dirt
9:25 we'll mix that with that Ash put some water in there put it in the stomach line the cool one that I like to make is there's a root back home it's called a bitter root and it's got a purple stem right as it comes out of the ground it's just bright purple you take that purple you cut off maybe two in of that and you take that and grind it up
9:49 and you mix it with that Ash again it's ash from a campfire and you put it in that stomach line and it turns a color of blue probably this this guy's jacket right here Bright Beautiful Blue but that's how we got our paints was from different different things from the are you nervous when we uh dance excuse me are you nervous when you
10:12 dance are we nervous when we dance no it's a it's it's fun it's it's a celebration of our life are are you uh nervous when you go to class to sit and learn that's exactly what we're up here we're learning as we do everything this young man over here is about ready to have a heart attack I think holding his man for 20 [Music] minutes how long um how long does it
10:35 take to make your assist how long did it take to make this takes quite a while because you have to earn everything it doesn't just they just don't give it to you like the the eagle clly I earned because I did something uh for a family uh like Clint said it takes a long time to earn these feathers because you have to earn them over a period of time all my bead work I did like this staff here that take a not
10:59 took a long time CU that's one beat at a time literally one beat at a time put that on it and I did that all myself what is the talent the the talent that's honor the eagle that we believe if we carry the Eagle's like uh the claw we carry the Eagle's power or the wisdom of the eagle like it
11:23 you like if you had a Mas up like the Denver Broncos like clip said earlier you have the power of that Bronco right that and that's the same thing with us if we carry the eagle feather or the the eagle claw or even the eagle head that means that we have the power and the knowledge of that [Music]
11:45 eagle oh yeah there's there's a lot of people maybe not so much Native people but there's a lot of people to use the colors but in Indian Country we all basically got our base colors like the Lakota Nakota Dakota people they're all Siouan speaking people they all basically have the same language they're different tribes but their
12:10 colors are red yellow and blue they may add other colors to it like Daryl he add yellow to our red white and black but the base colors are there in almost each and every dance outfit I can go to a PO out anywhere in the United States basically tell which area the United States comes
12:34 from ever I cut off never I hope it never did get cut off actually I uh when I was a little boy I had I grew up on a ranch my dad owned a bunch of cattle and horses and stuff and uh an Indian Country the eldest the first born goes to the grandparents it's still that way today
12:58 the first born will go and stay with the grandparents now it kind of works both ways the oldest kid the oldest child of a family will then learn a lot of the ways that the old people have at the same time that oldest kid gets a chance to help them grandparents maybe there's a lot of tasks that they couldn't do in their everyday life but I grew up I had short hair I was basically a cowboy all
13:22 my life I mean I team roped and I rode bear backs and I did all of that cowboy stuff up up until I started I moved in with my grandmother and I learned a lot of our ways and at that point after I finally convinced my dad to let my hair grow I really about 5 years ago I cut it off because I lost a loved one I cut my hair off in the back but today it's it's
13:47 fairly long um what's sick this stick right here holds on my my hat so to speak this is what I call a roach like I said I'll grade a braid right out of the top of my head
14:10 run it through a hole in this roach then I'll poke this stick through that braid this stick actually goes right through my hair braid my braid and it holds my rope between my head and that stick so this stick is actually there if I ever see this stick coming out of my hair or I feel it coming out then I know that my roach is going to fall off so
14:32 it's a way to help keep it tied on have you ever been war I've been War the only war that I've ever been in is the war in the halls of Washington DC that's where I spend most of my time in the politics where do you get all the materials for your like clothing and Stu
14:56 we do a lot of trading like this is all elk that I have it's all elk um even if I wanted some feathers that Clint had I would trade something to him like maybe my my tobacco uh my pouch my tobacco my purse I trade this to him for a couple of his feathers or something we don't ever buy like our eagle feathers and a lot of the stuff you see that I have on I've traded for we never did
15:21 hardly buy it and we basically make our whole dance outfit everything that I'm wearing from head to toe between my wife and I we've made we never had to buy anything we have traded for different materials like in this bustle right here the bottom feathers are probably a couple hundred years old they belong to my family the rest of the feathers I traded
15:45 while I traded off two of my Colts two earing Phillies and a couple of hunting rifles so I mean that that's figure them Colts are 1,500 a piece in a m rifle they don't give for Less 5 there's a lot of money involved in but we usually trade the way I feel better about I gave that man and horses and
16:09 that that uh rifle for these feathers I feel better about that than if I have gave him $2,000 do people animals they're ermine they're her and hermine are a are a smart little animal they're little weasels is what
16:33 they are little white weasels in the snow and uh we believe that the ermine's A very wise creature and we believe if we wear them the men that wear them they possess that power as well they pass on the wiseness to you that's why we wear them we believe that carries on the mows how you have claw actually I have eagle claws he has claws
16:59 my bear claws represent my my C boy name cuz I'm two tribes I'm grot and a c boy the C boy name is standing bear that's claws my bear claws represent my my Crow boy name is is little Shield that's what this little shield in the chest is that's what represents my name Clint has on eagle claws on his
17:23 my Daryl out actually this feature right here is beadwork beadwork it took my wife almost 2 years to make this and she did it in evenings and weekends when she get off work and stuff but in every square inch there's about 350 to 400 beads so I'm not sure how many square in
17:46 are in here but there was a lot of beads that went into this just this all when someone dies what kind of that's a really good question we as Native American people as Leaders some of our spiritual leaders we believe that they shouldn't be involed that they should go back into the Mother Earth into the ground the way
18:11 we came we as Indian people like grow up people are one of our creation stories is that we are created from the dust so as a spiritual leader somebody would be kind of like an Indian doctor or somebody who knows our our our culture as a spirit CH a leader we believe that person should go back into the ground create dust to hold up us as we
18:35 walk but the rest of us we're buried in caskets and we're in balm just like everybody else but we have a ceremony and our ceremony is a morning ceremony the females will come to the site and they'll cut pieces of their hair they'll put that hair in with that body like I said 4 years ago 5 years ago
18:58 now lost a relative a real close relative I cut my whole Graves off everything I pulled my hair back into a ponytail and cut it and laid it in there with that man we believe that these people are going to come back and help us that's why I say I never pray for myself I may pray for wisdom and knowledge so that I could give you guys
19:22 all of the right information or I may pray for my grandmother who is sick in hopes in return that when I'm sick or I need help there be somebody out there praying for me so that's kind of one of our ceremonies about death is that we believe that those people will be there for us so we always we put a lot of things with the B when they go
19:46 also when my father died he died 4 years ago from cancer and I took care of him the whole time and the whole time that he was alive he gave me things or my brothers or my family stuff that he wanted us to have and when before he died he told me he says you make sure you lay all my stuff out lay all my stuff out for everybody to come and and T with so when he died the next day
20:11 after his funeral we laid all his stuff outside our house on tables I'm talking guns TVs uh VCRs you name it everything he had even his clothes we put it out there and the community came and they picked up everything they wanted anything they wanted and if they gave it back to us it was h ours but if if they didn't it was never ours cuz he already gave us what he wanted us to have so
20:35 there was no fighting no bickering amongst the family who got what or anything they the community got everything besides behind that first on the way to the cemetery have you ever seen a U-Haul tied behind it trying to take everybody's stuff with them but come into this world with nothing that we as Native America believe nothing we put a lot of things and give everything away
21:00 okay I think we might be running out of time here so I want to thank you guys very much for listening to us and listening to our story

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Traditional regalia, ceremonies, and Native American cultural practices

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