MLC hosts Dakota symposium Saturday

Former NU mayor among speakers

By FRITZ BUSCH

Journal Staff Writer

NEW ULM -- Martin Luther College will host a symposium on Dakota culture, spirituality and conflict, 1-5 p.m. Saturday in the Wittenberg Collegiate Center Auditorium.

Speakers include former MLC Professor of religion and history Arn Koelpin; MLC Professor of Spanish, religion and minority cultures Mark Goeglein; Dakota speaker, consultant, tour guide and historian John LaBatte; and Dr. Elton Lawrence, who served at Wahpeton Community College in Sisseton, S.D., among other places.

Nine of LaBatte's ancestors were involved in the Dakota Conflict of 1862. Three were Dakota, five were part Dakota, Irish, and French and one was Irish. At least six of them were Christians or became Christians.

Lawrence served at the Tiospa Zina Tribal School, Agency Village, S.D., Tekakwitha Children's Home in Sisseton and was tribal executive for the Sisseton-Wahpeton Sioux Tribe.

Koelpin served as New Ulm mayor from 2000 to 2003. In June of 2001, he issued a Joint Declaration of Friendship between the City of New Ulm and the Dakota with Dakota leader Clifford Canku at MLC's Summer Institute, "Reconciliation -- A Bridge to Diabetes and Language/Culture Education."

The institute was a unique combination of workshops on Dakota language, culture, history, and on diabetes, a disease that affects all Americans, but strikes Native Americans particularly hard.

New Ulm native Paul Wessel helped organize the institute.

LaBatte will speak from 1 p.m. to 2:25 p.m. on traditional Dakota culture and spirituality. He will provide a brief history of tribal structure, early migration, contact with white settlers and the Dakota Conflict of 1862.

At 2:25 p.m., LaBatte will talk about early missionaries, why they came, their instructions and difficulties they faced. He will explain the clash of cultures and religions, focusing on fur traders, treaties and white settlers as well as the differences between Christians and traditional Indians.

Lawrence will talk about the Dakota conflicts of 1862, its causes, results, and involvement with Christians.

Beginning at 3:40 p.m., LaBatte will speak about Dakota Christians after the war, how the church survived, the work of Dakota ministers and missionaries, and second-generation white missionaries.

Koelpin will talk about modern missions issues followed by a solution discussion by Goeglein.