Last Saturday we had one of our public meetings in a county park. (The county sponsors us to do educational events). We try to have a meeting once a month and we tend to have a great turn out. Its mostly families with small children. At this meeting we were putting up a teepee. Of course we explained the historical and cultural significances of the teepee. The teepee is plains Indian home. It is probably the very first mobile home. The Lakota were consider nomadic but they carried their homes with them. After we gave background information we had volunteers come up and help us raise it. Let me tell you, its hard. I'm a Lakota and traditionally it was the women's job to assemble the teepees. I am 100% sure I would not have been able to do that. It was extremely hard and this was not my first time doing it. I can't image it being over 100 degrees and having to build this thing or worse it being freezing and having to build this thing.
In the past we built a long house, which is a structure that the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) used. We've also done lectures on boarding schools and mascots, we've invited Indian dancers to perform, and done arts and crafts. We also had professors from Kean University come out and talk about American Indian Genocide. Our programs can range from very fun topics and events to very serious ones. One issue as an organization we've always faced, when educating the public, is how serious do we go? We want people to keep coming therefore we don't want things to be a complete downer. But at the same time issue of racism, wrong information given out at schools, and native identity are real issues that Indians face today. As an organization I often wonder if we are turning into commodities, something to entrain people. Are they really walking away with a new found knowledge or does this just feed into the “romanticized” image of American Indians?
Enjoy the one picture! My camera decided to die on me. =(
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