|
|
|
August 15, 1999
A celebration of culturesBy GUY PRIEL Journal Staff Writer MORTON -- Dozens of residents from throughout the area gathered at the Lower Sioux Agency on Saturday in celebration of the fourth annual Dakota Culture day. The day was organized by members of the Lower Sioux Agency in conjunction with the Minnesota Historical Society as a way to make residents aware of the rich history of the Dakota tribe, organizers said. "This is our second year to visit during Culture Days," Jacob Schmitz of Eagle Lake said. "It is a great event and the organizers should be commended for their efforts." Schmitz and his wife Shelly were touring the site with their three children, Amanda, age 5, Joseph, age 3 and Jeremiah, age 1. "We hear a lot about the Dakota Indians and the battles, but we seldom hear both sides," he said. "By visiting here during an event like this we are able to get the other side and realize how great a tragedy it was." Throughout the day, visitors were treated to a presentation of hide tanning; heard a Native American perspective on traditional uses for plants; heard Daniel Necklace playing the sounds of nature on his Native American flute; heard a presentation on contemporary Dakota life; heard a presentation on Dakota world view; learned about a woman's role in traditional and contemporary Dakota society; and were treated to a performance by the Cansayapi Oyate Dance Troupe and a special performance of hoop dancing with Samuel and Martina Necklace. "Events like this are great for us, because it allows people to see what we do in our traditional dances," Mike Lucio said. Known by his Dakota name of Cansayapi Oyate, he is the father of four children who performed a variety of native dances, resplendent in a variety of feathers and bells. "During the 1960s and 1970s we lived under a period of suppression and we were not allowed to perform publicly, speak our language, or even talk about our traditions," he said. "We were considered a threat, Now we are able to express who we are." His family was on the verge of losing touch with their customs and their roots, until they relocated from South Dakota and rejoined their relatives, he said. "Their grandfather and uncles have been a big help in getting them interested in dancing again," he said. "My son is just a regular boy until he gets into costume, then he becomes a different person. he is very serious about what he does." His daughters are recognized royalty, being named Junior Miss Lower Sioux for 1999 and Junior Miss Running Bear for 1999. "Sioux and Indian are not part of our language," Ed Hdi Nazin, professor of American Indian and Dakota Studies at Southwest State University in Marshall said. Better known by his Dakota name, Chris Mato Numpa, he states that his people are Dakota and he is proud to be an American, a Dakota and a Minnesotan, a name which came from the original Dakota language. "I believe you should call people by their names," he said. "People wonder whether to call us Sioux or Indians or Native Americans, why not call us people? Is it unreasonable to ask that we be called people?" The Dakota figure prominently in the history of Minnesota, with many towns deriving their names from various descriptive words in the Dakota language, but their side is rarely heard in school, he said. "Why not teach children in schools in Dakota?" He said. "That was the first language of Minnesota. Both sides of the story need to be heard. Not just the story of the winners, but of the oppressed." When the Constitution was written, the phrase "All men are created equal," did not apply to minorities, especially not to Indians, who were slaughtered and forced off their lands, he said. A new trail through the site greeted first-time visitors, with gravel paths and better interpretive markers that explain the location of buildings and roads and the lives of the people who once lived and worked here in an extensive complex that spread for more than a mile along the river. The story of the Lower Sioux Agency is the story of early settlement in the Minnesota River Valley and human impact on the environment. The Agency was established by the federal government in 1853 to serve as a center for government efforts to remove the Dakota nation to its reservation lands and to transform the tribes into self-sufficient farmers. The reservation was just 4 percent of the land previously inhabited by the Dakota. A crop failure a few years later left families starving and in need of late annuity payments, which the government owed the Dakota. After an agent refused to make partial payments, the Agency became the site of the first battle of the U.S.-Dakota conflict of 1862.
|