09:59:00:00 – 09:59:08:02
Countdown
09:59:09:17 – 09:59:13:03
Title: LEVANDE BILDER
presents
09:59:18:06 – 09:59:22:24
Title: a film by
FOLKE JOHANSSON
ANNIKA BANFIELD
10:00:24:13 – 10:00:31:02
Screentext: “First they killed our people.
Then they stole our land.
Now they steal our faith.”
10:00:32:24 – 10:00:39:22
Title: SPIRITS FOR SALE
10:00:44:03 – 10:01:01:10
Annika Banfield:VO The interest in Native Americans is bigger than ever. Hundreds of sites offer possibilities to buy Indian spirituality. I decided to visit a sweat lodge ceremony in Denmark, to see what it was all about.
10:01:02:24 – 10:01:07:05
Screentext: Torup
Denmark
10:01:49:24 – 10:01:45:00
Mike Chirobokow: My name is Mike Chirobokow. That is my Canadian name. My Indian name is ” Nottowindowso” which is Blackfoot, and translates into "sacred warrior coming down". It was a name given to me by my elder and Sundance chief, Morris Crow, with the black foot Indians in Canada.
10:01:49:24 – 10:02:09:22
Majken Schultz: I met some people who tried the sweat lodge before, and they said it was a really personal interesting experience. Just something very special. This is my first time, I'm very curious actually, I'm very excited. I think it's gonna be tough somehow.
10:02:12:21 – 10:02:49:21
Mike Chirobokow: Everything we're doing has a purpose and a meaning. Because in the end, as we contribute our energy, our prayers, our thoughts and good intentions, it starts to create a very special atmosphere. We're working here with our grandfathers, our grandmothers, our spirit helpers. We're asking them to come to this lodge, and be part of it. To make this a really special time for each one of us. We're working with mother earth, she who gives us life. We have a spiritual relationship and need to revive that.
10:02:58:16 – 10:03:10:19
Annika Banfield VO: The visit in Denmark made me curious about Native American spirituality. But what do the Indians think about the Danish version of a sweatlodge ceremony?
10:03:12:04 – 10:03:40:10
Annika Banfield VO: Some time ago, I was given an eagle feather by a Native American visiting Sweden. I have realized that this is a very sacred object, and it should probably not be in my hands. What was I supposed to do with it? I decided to visit Andrew Thomas, a Navajo friend in New Mexico, to ask for guidance.
10:04:00:07 – 10:04:02:16
Screentext: Albuquerque
New Mexico
10:04:14:04 – 10:04:35:11
Andrew Thomas: Let's see what we've got here… Oh beautiful, look at this feather. Very, very, nice. Of course I'm from the great Navajo nation. My people used feathers in a very special way, to communicate with the upper Gods. And to give us strength, peace and harmony.
10:04:42:08 – 10:05:05:22
Andrew Thomas: /Navajo language/. It's customary to introduce yourself through our clan, which we all refer to as kinship. We call ourselves "Dinéh", which just simply means "the people of the earth".
10:05:14:12 – 10:05:27:16
Andrew Thomas: Of course, I grew up very traditionally minded, although I refuged into a big city here in Albuquerque, to find a betterment of my life. Having a job, I'm an assistant manager at the Indian Pueblo Cultural center.
10:05:40:24 – 10:06:17:19
Andrew Thomas: As native peoples, we recognized a natural order of life. The physical being, the emotional and also a mental being. But, as we refuge to cities, the major cities and towns, that reflection sort of disappears, and we sort of not acknowledge that anymore. Through means of our prayers, our songs and dances, and also our way of living. I think the complex of it, we're so diverse now, even in the city that I live in, in Albuquerque. It's so structured that we lose the connection with our spiritual mother, the earth.
10:06:21:14 – 10:06:37:20
Andrew Thomas: We have goals to be met, there's family to raise. We're just so enthralled of our 21st century, that we sort of lost touch of who we are. Of having that base knowledge again, the wisdom of who we are as native peoples, as indigenous people.
10:06:37:20 – 10:07:01:10
Andrew Thomas: We have large collection of pottery, which could be from Acoma, Pojoaque, Santo Domingo…
10:06:45:14 – 10:07:01:10
Andrew Thomas: We have to also to fight two battles, living the traditional battle, and also working with the contemporary battle. So there's lot of battles that need to be fought, and also to be won.
10:07:02:11 – 10:07:26:03
Andrew Thomas: Now I understand you want the actual significance of to give or to receive a feather. I know of a friend, in San Antonio, Texas, and he is a professor in Native American history, and his name is Al Carroll. And he'll tell you all the significant of prehistoric, historic and contemporary setting, so I'll highly recommend him.
10:07:44:12 – 10:07:49:03
Screentext: San Antonio
Texas
10:08:18:08 – 10:08:54:22
Al Carroll: I thank you for wanting to give this to me, but this is not for me. My heritage is Apache, Apaches do not use feathers the way many other tribes do, the way plains tribes, so often do. For Apaches, eagle feathers are used by medicine people, and healers, and singers at ceremonies. I am degreed and I have a doctorial training, but what I know is not nearly as much as what elders know, and what medicine people, healers and singers know. And I'm not a medicine man and I'm not a singer, I'm not someone who does ceremonies, so the feather is not meant for me, it's not proper for me to keep it.
10:09:08:19 – 10:09:42:21
Al Carroll: My name is Al Carroll, my background, my ancestry, my heritage, is Mescalero Apache. I'm also Mexican and Irish. I teach American history. San Antonio has about one million people. When I grew up, it was a very racist town to grow up in. I was getting in fights almost every week I was in school. Usually over some racist comment, over being called I'm a redskin or a red back or a prairie nigger. Or being told I look like a nigger, or some other racist remark
10:10:33:20 – 10:11:02:16
Al Carroll: So many Europeans, so many whites and so many outsiders - only know what they see in movies about us. And they have this image of us in buckskin and feathers and riding a horse. And that is just not true for most of us anymore. A big part of why I am a history teacher, a history professor, I wanted to teach people about what life is like for Native people today. The truth about Native people, Native history.
10:10:33:20 – 10:11:02:16
Al Carroll: At the time Columbus came here, in 1492, there were at least five hundred tribes, speaking at least 150 different languages, just in the US alone. At least 2 000 tribes in all of the Americas, living in any kind of environment you could imagine. From jungles to desert, to plains to the arctic. The huge variety of cultures, a huge variety of different ways of living, a huge variety of different beliefs.
10:11:08:11 – 10:11:26:10
Al Carroll: At the time Columbus came here, there were at least 120 million native people, compared to about 80 million Europeans at the same time. Living sometimes in bands of a few dozen, sometimes in villages of hundreds, or towns of thousands, sometimes in major cities of hundreds of thousands.
10:11:41:02 – 10:11:45:04
Screentext: Enchanted Rock
Texas
10:11:48:14 – 10:12:34:22
Gayle Ross: From what I've seen around this country, people don't want to listen, to what the Indian people have to say. They can't seem to wrap their minds around the fact that if there isn't a building built on a place where people walk through a door to pray. That there could be a place where, instead of us praying to God, God speaks to us. Doesn't seem to be able to sink in, they don't seem to be able to give the same respect, to the way that native people pray. And the way that native people pray, is to understand their relationship with the world around them.
10:12:46:00 – 10:13:11:13
Gayle Ross: My name is Gayle Ross, and I'm an enrolled member of the Cherokee nation. I grew up with stories, and my grandmother told us stories about Cherokee history, about our ancestors, and she told traditional Cherokee stories. From the time that I was very small, I just loved stories, and today that's how I make my living.
10:13:11:14 – 10:14:05:18
Gayle Ross: Rabbit, “jisto” means” rabbit" in Cherokee, so you're singing “jisto, jisto na ta nei “that is "Rabbit, rabbit what's that sound?". And the reason the song is "what's that sound?", is because rabbit is always talking or singing. You wanna know why? 'Cause he want's you to know that Rabbit is here. (Song). I speak in schools and libraries, and theatres and festivals. Try to point out, why native tribes are the way they are, and what tribal sovereignty, what our history, our heritage and our culture means to us, through the medium of story.
10:14:11:13 – 10:14:35:09
Gayle Ross: All of these things, the language, the culture, the stories, the music, the dance… They play an integral part in our survival as Indian people. So when they are under assault, our survival is under assault.
10:14:42:02 – 10:14:59:04
Mike Chirobokow: We call upon you, fire spirit, to burn bright. To light the wood, to heat the grandfather rocks, and to help us with our prayers and our intentions. We give thanks to you.
10:15:00:24 – 10:15:46:04
Gayle Ross: The entire arena of cultural exploitation is deeply disturbing to native people across this country. People who set themselves up to teach or perform ceremony, is probably the one that strikes deepest into the hearts of Indian people, because our ceremonies are what enable us to survive. So when those are taken, and manipulated and misused, it is taking something very, very important to us and degrading it. It hurts.
10:15:48:15 – 10:16:01:22
Mike Chirobokow: The most important is to smudge your tools when you are working with them.
Smudging tools?
Smudge yourself…
And work in the right spirit…
10:16:02:03 – 10:16:45:17
Al Carroll: It is very interesting to see this group of Danish people, trying to imitate what they think people are doing with a sweat lodge ceremony. And they're giving a perfect, almost textbook example, of almost everything wrong you could possibly do. The first mistake is, a true ceremony is not something you should film. All the great majority of native ceremonies, especially sun dances, especially vision quest, especially sweat lodges, they should not be recorded, they should not be photographed, especially not flash photography. It's disruptive, it changes the nature of the ceremony, and it turns it into something for display, instead of something for the people involved in the ceremony. The spot is supposed to be quiet and calm, they brought in chainsaws.
10:16:47:22 – 10:16:58:20
Majken Schultz: I think it's five hundred kronors for a weekend, per person. But I think that's pretty cheap for a big experience.
10:16:58:22 – 10:17:24:10
Mike Chirobokow: In the old way, what happened was, the people would respect the person who did the ceremony so they would bring gifts. They would bring whatever that elder needed, whether it was food, blankets or whatever. That was the currency of exchange. But you can't put tobacco into a gas tank, or you can't pay your electrical bill with tobacco. So today there is some exchange of money.
10:17:24:11 – 10:17:44:10
Al Carroll: The fact that this man is charging, is terrible. People are supposed to give from the heart, you are not supposed to have a set fee. People are supposed to contribute their time and their labor and materials they have to contribute. But to give money is crass. This is simply a "pay-to-pray" ceremony. Very disrespectful.
10:17:46:01 – 10:18:05:20
Mike Chirobokow: There are some young people who I think have a lot of resentment, a lot of hurt because of old history, because of how the Europeans came in and took away a lot of things and in some ways they see this as taking away their ceremonies. But one of the things the old people taught us it was where did the ceremonies come from in the first place? They came from God.
10:18:06:17 – 10:18:53:08
Al Carroll: The fact is that just about any Indian would object to this, because they are doing it so poorly. The elders are the ones leading the protest.
10:18:16:00 – 10:18:53:08
Al Carroll: When you talk about what makes an American Indian, you're talking about both a cultural thing, a social thing and a legal thing. And the legal definition in the US, of an Indian, is someone who is enrolled in an American Indian tribe or has at least one fourth, American Indian ancestry. I'm sorry to tell this to any new age-people or to any people who think they'd wanna become an Indian: You have to have Indian blood in you to be an Indian. You cannot simply declare yourself one, or become one, or anything like that. Anymore than you can become black, or become African, or become Asian or become Middle Eastern. It is simply something you are born with.
10:18:58:14 – 10:19:22:13
Al Carroll: My advice to you, for this eagle feather is to take it, to someone who knows the significance and the proper use of it. Such as the Lakota people, over in South Dakota, more than a thousand miles away from where Apache people mostly are. Eagle feathers are used much more widely, they are also given to warriors, they are also part of the regalia, traditionally, and they are used at Pow-Wows and in dances.
10:19:44:16 – 10:19:48:14
Screentext: South Dakota
10:19:52:01 – 10:20:13:21
Al Carroll: Among the Lakota, probably the best known, the most widely respected is Arvol Looking Horse. The 19th generation keeper of their sacred pipe. Looking horse has also been doing some very good work for a long time, fighting for the protection of ceremonies against abuse, against fraud and exploitation by outsiders, by charlatans and by people who take advantage of those who don't know any better.
10:20:34:10 – 10:20:52:21
Arvol Looking Horse: We live in poverty like you said and there's no way that our people should be paying a medicine man. It's not right. We're gonna try our best to stop everybody.
10:20:52:13 – 10:21:07:05
Cora Birdhat: The joke around here is that medicine men all wear diamond rings, and they're driving Cadillacs. And then when he gets up to pray, everyone thinks "Oh god…"
10:21:07:06 – 10:21:16:22
Clinton Birdhat: The pope said: “Take your Tipi down, and get the hell out of here!”
10:21:29:13 – 10:21:57:17
Magdalena Short Bear: A long time ago, when I was a young kid, we had chiefs. And Arvol to me, is my chief. I have a high, high, respect for him. He's our leader. He's the leader of our people. He takes care of that Chanupa, he knows the language, he knows all those ceremonies. And I know that he works for the Creator. To me it's like talking to the Pope. That's what I feel like in my heart.
10:21:59:14 – 10:22:23:17
Lucy Little: Arvol is the keeper of the pipe. That's the original pipe that came to us, and it came down generations. I went up there one time, they brought out the pipe, and they put it on the ground. So people could come and pray. That was the only time I went to the sweat lodge, to cleanse myself, so I could go pray at that pipe. I knelt down, put my head to it, and I prayed.
10:22:25:18 – 10:22:44:04
David Little: It's such an immense responsibility to keep a gift of the pipe. It's a gift from the Great Spirit. It would be like watching over the Ark of the Covenant. That's how much responsibility he has.
10:22:59:04 – 10:23:38:18
Arvol Looking Horse: I'm chief Arvol Looking Horse, and I'm the 19th generation keeper of sacred Chanupa, the sacred pipe, for Lakota, Dakota and Nakota, Sioux nation. We are a nation that still have our traditions fully intact. From the eagle feathers to our buffalo ceremonies.
10:23:45:11 – 10:24:07:07
Arvol Looking Horse: We believe in vision and dream. Even when a child is born, we look for signs. And when the baby is born, we do a ceremony. When you're going to ceremony, you know, watch your mind. You come there with good heart and a good mind.
10:24:08:15 – 10:24:25:02
Arvol Looking Horse: If we just do ceremonies without doing it properly, the spirit won't come in.
10:24:27: - 10:24:36:15
Arvol Looking Horse: The ceremonies are very sacred to our people. Every part of our ceremony relates to a well being here on earth.
10:24:44:16 – 10:25:12:10
Arvol Looking Horse: You can't carry any pain or any anger. Because if you try to do ceremonies when there are some problems, you're gonna hurt another person. That's why I try my best to walk the spiritual path, and be humble and respectful.
10:25:22:09 – 10:26:30:19
Gayle Ross: Engage in Native community as you are invited in. It's like a Pow-Wow. Pow-Wows are intertribal events, they are social gatherings, they are not ceremony. They are a place where non-Indian people are welcome to come, and experience what people are comfortable in sharing of their culture. They are one of the most beautiful things you could ever see, the drums are pounding, the singers, the regalia, the sounds of the jingles and the deer tow rattles. It just all blends together in the most incredible music. The MC is calling the different dance styles and he is talking about the beautiful Indian women and the strong Indian men and right down to the most beautiful children on the face of the earth, our little tiny tot dancers. You can't help to be overwhelmed and moved. It's one of the genuine expressions of our shared common grounds as Indian people.
10:26:48:06 – 10:27:34:12
Brenda Lofton: My name is Brenda Lofton, I was born and raised in Martin, South Dakota. I'm registered with the Oglala Sioux in Pine Ridge, South Dakota. I have ten children, five boys and five girls. My oldest daughter passed away in January, so I'm left with four daughters and five sons. I moved to Albuquerque, I left the reservation when I was 18 years old. I was married once but, I was like…too much domestic violence… So I got away from that with my children and we moved to Albuquerque.
10:27:38:24 – 10:27:51:10
Brenda Lofton: We have been here for two years, and it's hard because we run into, we bump into each other. No privacy whatever. Trying to get low-income housing. We can't even have that, because it's all the waiting list, waiting list.
10:27:52:12 – 10:28:49:03
Ella DeSersa -Lutz: My name is Ella Lutz, my maiden name was DeSersa. I have three children. I wasn't born on the reservation, but I go back and visit every now and then. It's hard to be Native American; actually it's hard for me because I'm both Native American and African American. You live day to day, worrying about next weeks meal sometimes it's tomorrows meal. I'm homeless, so it's like: Am I going to be able to stay at the shelter, how long am I gonna be able to be in that shelter, or if my time is up. I'm constantly asking those... Worrying about the next couple of days… I we're gonna be there, or if there is another shelter I could go to. Being homeless and going from shelter to shelter, it's hard to hold a regular, steady job.
10:28:50:15 – 10:29:15:06
Brenda Lofton: I have an 18-year old son that needs to get back in school; I'm trying to work on that. Because I talk to them a lot about how hard it is, living, especially being Indian. It's hard because we're forgotten, that's how I really feel about it. United States, you know, as far as being American, we're the original, Native Americans, but to me, no matter what, we're the forgotten people.
10:30:00:22 – 10:30:46:22
Theresa Little Bear: Like right now, I'm living without an income. I've been living out here for three years without an income. I make star quilts, crochet things and butcher things, whatever, just to pay my bills. Right now I'm sitting without lights. There's a lack of jobs, housing, there's no other way for some people to get out. They drink, they drug. There's a lot of child abuse. A lot of our children are in homes, because of the alcohol and drugs. I don't like it. I pray daily for all of them.
10:30:58:20 – 10:31:17:11
Al Carroll: A lot of the problems that are now affecting the native people in the big cities, also affect the native people on the reservations. In the past twenty years you've seen an explosion of gangs on the reservations, you've seen an explosion of drug use, an explosion of violence, an explosion of domestic violence especially.
10:31:21:19 – 10:31:55:23
Andrew Thomas: The way society is… It's very complex, there's not enough jobs to go around. There's not enough college funding to give our youth. They have loads of times on their hand.
And we start to wander, our minds starts to wander. No spirituality behind us, no structure behind us, no support behind us, and we start to do things that we'd never thought to do. It's to grab hold of that bottle, that's the pain reliever.
10:31:56:22 – 10:32:30:13
Magdalena Short Bear: I've seen alcohol come in to our reservation, and that turned the minds of our people. I've seen that happen, it even happened to me, I became an alcoholic. Because of the abuse, the psychological damage that was put on me. All the abuse that I was put through… The hitting, all that bad stuff. I ran from my reservation, and I stayed gone until I was 38 years old. Then I came home. And it's still going on at my home.
10:32:32:20 – 10:34:04:24
Ella Desersa-Lutz: I worry a lot about where I'm gonna live…sorry…but it's hard to get help, it's hard to get work. Sometimes, by being a Native American, they think that you're just an alcoholic or drug addict. Most of that is following you and it hurts a lot. Not all Native Americans are like that. So it's hard to get a good rep, and get a good job. You have to go in with a lot of degrees, lots of certificates. And it's hard to get that when you can't even get the grants to go to college. To go to school… I'm glad we didn't have to experience being taken away from my mom when we were little. Because that was what my mom experienced. Being taken away. At a certain age they were taken away to boarding schools. That's an other reason why I know my mom feels a little… like she cheated us out of our language. I wish I would have known it so I could teach it to my children. They made it like it was dirty, a dirty language. And that was her language, her culture. They made it like it was something evil or something bad. So that's all we know now, is English. Sorry…
10:34:22:15 – 10:35:08:23
Aron Widow: Ever since the beginning of time, there was the drum. We use the drum to encourage people out of, it could be depression, it could be posttraumatic stress, it could be illness. We don't fear evil, that's the reason why we come together. The people, be strong, and stay within the hoop. Keep the hoop mended. So this alcoholism or drugs or whatever, meth or marijuana, won't interfere with our younger generations that are coming.
10:35:19:09 – 10:35:42:16
Aron Widow: Once we start beating the drums and start singing, it brings out the positive. It almost takes the weaknesses out of the human being. We're pleading with God to bless this feather, to bless this drum, to bless the singers and the people. So we all be well, keep our good health.
10:36:14:04 – 10:36:57:13
Vic Camp: Today, we have a camp called "Defend Bear Butte", we're actually having a gathering of nations bringing people together to educate them about the desecration that is going on in South Dakota. /Lakota language/ I'd like to say that my name is Vic Camp, that was the name that was given to me by my mother when I was born, the white name that I can use. My Lakota name is Tatanka Skamwani, which means "White Buffalo Walking".
10:37:02:03 – 10:37:25:13
Vic Camp: We're here today because of a bar that is being put up just north of here. We have a man who is building the world's largest biker bar. They didn't think about any other human beings, they didn't think about, especially the Native American's church that you see behind me here.
10:37:26:00 – 10:37:31:00
Screentext Bear Butte
South Dakota
10:37:28:07 – 10:37:33:07
Vic Camp: It's a church and it's a school, and it's a hospital.
10:37:35:09 – 10:37:55:03
Arvol Looking Horse: The Black Hills is the heart of mother earth. We are the keepers of this heart. “Wutchimaka”, Grandmother earth. Bear Butte is one of the seven sacred sights, so that's where the people go to Vision Quest.
10:37:55:11 – 10:38:08:04
Vic Camp: It's a place where we come to gather medicines; it's a place where we come to teach our children about spirituality. It's a place where we come to make sure that we don't lose our identity as Lakota people.
10:38:18:08 – 10:38:50:15
Vic Camp: There's people who are on the “Homblecha”, that means Vision Quest, but while they are up there praying, just south of us, there is drag racing going on. They bring these cars in here with these huge engines that make a lot of noise, the tires squeal and they let smoke go into the air from the rubber, which is pollution. Now all the while my people are praying and trying to be in peace and quiet and listen to the birds and the sky and the wind. At the same time they have to listen to these cars down here.
10:38:54:07 – 10:39:18:02
Vic Camp: If you went on top of this hill, you could hear the noise from miles, and miles around. It's kind of like an am phi theatre; you could hear everything that is there. Now, if they did this in the dead of winter, had their gathering then, maybe we wouldn't make such a fuss, but to Lakota people there's certain ceremonies when the light is coming back, that can only be made during that time.
10:39:21:12 – 10:40:00:16
Vic Camp: The reason we're starting today, on the 4th of July, is that this is the day that the white man declared independence on Indian land. So we figured that on this day, maybe we could start to re-educate the people of America. And re-educate our own people on who they are. We're not Americans. We live in America, but we are the first nation here. The protectors of this land. So we're gonna be here on July 4th, to celebrate our independence in America - as Lakota and as the indigenous people of this earth.
10:40:10:03 – 10:40:38:13
Vic Camp: Now this flag that's up, is just a warrior flag, and it represents warrior societies. And it's a flag to let other warrior societies know, that it is OK to come here to protect the people. And throughout the next days, we will have other flags going up. We have the Oglala flag, we're gonna have the Cheyenne River, the Rosebud Sioux-tribe, the Cheyenne's, the Rapaho's, Ponca's, the American flag will probably be up there also.
10:40:40:23 – 10:40:49:19
Vic Camp: All people, we’re asking you, all campers, start making your way this way. We’re getting ready to get started now.
10:40:50:18 – 10:40:55:11
Vic Camp: We have the grand entry and the staff carriers are gonna come in.
10:40:55:11 – 10:41:02:02
Vic Camp: So again we're calling all the tribal leadership to come, and get ready. We're gonna have the grand entry now.
10:41:26:10 – 10:41:38:22
Vic Camp: We're here to show the people that we still have treaty rights, to learn about our treaties, to understand our treaties. So we have a lot of learning to do together as a people, as nations.
10:41:48:07 – 10:42:08:22
Red Cloud: Today, we're here. We are Lakota. Back in the days our grandpa's and our grandma's. Our relatives come here and pray for Lakota people. It's our turn, to be here now.
10:42:14:19 – 10:42:32:09
Marie Randal: I'm glad that that you're all here, because it's very important for your younger generation to know who they are. We'll never change from the color we carry, and so we should never be ashamed of the skin color you carry as Lakota.
10:42:33:14 – 10:43:38:13
Alex White Plume: I wanna talk about why we're here today. We're here for many reasons. Well I wanna just kind of go back and explain the little history of how the 7th cavalry came from California, and they were trying to apologize for what they did to our relatives at Wounded Knee. Well, it seemed like a good idea: "We want to apologize for the massacre of your people at "Wounded Knee". But you know, that wasn't just a massacre. They killed our relatives! It's not that simple. We escorted these guys of the reservation. They asked, "Why won't you accept our apology?" I said, "You know, The Lakota have been here for millions of years, we have many ceremonies, but we have never had a ceremony to accept an apology." I'm sick and tired of living in these two worlds, and I just want to live in my world. We have to all pull together, so we can have one way again.
10:43:41:02 – 10:43:49:14
Vic Camp: The statement that we're making is that this is our land, still. It's gonna continue to be our land until our people are totally gone.
10:44:49:13 – 10:45:11:15
Arvol Looking Horse: We pray to the west for the “Cho go koniaké”, the horse nation. Since then we've been known for raising horses, we're "Horse people." We honor the horses, we use them in ceremonies, and we also ride them, up to this day.
10:45:31:15 – 10:46:24:16
Arvol Looking Horse: We are the watchers. We see everything that goes on here. And we see what is going on across the ocean. Where a lot of money has been exchanged in ceremonies. Now we live in a time, we would say individualism. It's all about money. It's all about how much money you can get out of another person. You can't have any other thoughts in your mind except healing. If you have money on your mind, you're doing more damage than good.
10:46:31:14 – 10:47:14:19
Vic Camp: Who is gonna exploit us? Who is gonna exploit our people, and make money of our ceremonies? And who is going to do these ceremonies in a good way, so that the people could prosper, and be healthy? Now that is a big issue, and I cannot speak for any other man. I can only speak for myself, and I believe that our ceremonies were here for our people. Our ceremonies are here for us. And that's the way we need to keep them, we need to keep them, and use them for our people. And also to pray for all the human beings of the world, and like I said, there are certain times, when we invite friends to come to the ceremonies, and there are certain times when we have to respectfully ask them to stay out.
10:47:22:09 – 10:47:53:05
Al Carroll: When you have imposters, frauds and charlatans, exploiters replacing native voices, it justifies what we have to call genocide. When you justify the racist images that are out there of native people, you justify religious bigotry against the native religion. You justify all the discrimination and prejudices that happen to native people. A lot of these imposters and their followers disrupt native communities all the time. Their voices become the only voices we know. The biggest problem for Native people today is invisibility.
10:47:58:18 – 10:48:26:09
Vic Camp: American people forgot about the natives. They made treaties with us, with our ancestors, with our grandfathers, and yet they failed to uphold their part of the treaty. They took the land because there was gold that was here. So they took the land, and they stole it from us. In the supreme court of 1980, they said this was the ripest, rankest case of theft in American history. What they did to my people.
10:48:29:21 – 10:48:53:18
Brenda Lofton: I don't get my help from my reservation. They don't help me, they don't send me nothing like, some of these other tribes, they get that “per capita” money, from the government stuff. I think some different tribes get it like two or three times a year. The Lakota Sioux, we don't get that. We don't get nothing like that. They claim they get theirs from their casinos. We've got our casinos, we don't get nothing.
10:49:12:06 – 10:49:14:24
Screen text Sandia Casino
Albuquerque
10:49:12:07 – 10:49:29:19
Al Carroll: Many tribes have casinos, that is something that probably many people in Europe don't realize, is that one out of four tribes in the US have casinos. They are using the money from the casinos to fund education, to fund health care, to fund housing. To have control over their own finances and resources.
10:49:41:07 – 10:50:01:10
Al Carroll: The problem with that is that at the same time you have a lot of backlash against native people for newfound wealth. So ironically, in the U.S. you're seeing the stereotype of Indians as being greedy, or materialistic, or out to control everything. Stereotypes, which are very much, like the stereotypes that used to be applied to Jewish people.
10:50:26:21 – 10:51:11:09
Vic Camp: Who are we? Are we Lakota? Are we indigenous people, or are we just existing as Americans? I live over here and speak my language to my family, do my ceremonies. Then I got to come back over here and try to educate the white people and speak their language, get inside their mind and let them inside my mind. Then I go home and back over here to my world, and my people. We're living in two worlds and living in one world is hard enough. So when you are Lakota, and you live in two worlds, it's twice as hard. We got to find a balance, right in-between, and make sure we don't forget this side - but make sure we can live over here and survive in today's world.
10:51:14:00 – 10:51:36:11
Vic Camp: It's only been four or five generations since the white man came here. That's not very far, so in my mind, if we went from there to here in five generations, why can't we go from here to back there in five more? Why can't we return to having all of us speaking our language? Why can't we return to having a total sovereign nation?
10:51:47:16 – 10:52:22:22
Vic Camp: I must have the freedom to pray; I must have the freedom to do my ceremonies in peace and in quiet. Otherwise, I will start losing my identity, and instead of going back to here, I'm gonna keep leaning over here. Keep leaning, and then eventually, instead of over here in the Indian world, the Indian way of thinking, I'm over here in the capitalism, white way of thinking. Eventually I'll leave this identity, so who am I? I'm just another human that don't have a culture, don't have a language.
10:52:35:05 – 10:52:45:12
Annika Banfield: Mr Looking Horse, I've been given this eagle feather, and it's not appropriate for me to have it. It belongs to your people. Will you please accept this gift for me?
10:52:46:03 – 10:53:30:14
Arvol Looking Horse: I'd be honored. /Lakota language/ Today it's a good honor to accept this eagle feather. It's the highest honor among our people. I really respect that, from the bottom of my heart, I really respect that. This feather is in every part of our ceremony, it represents the sacred knowledge. From this day forward, things will be good.
10:53:56:22 – 10:54:19:04
Arvol Looking Horse: My hope is that we would live in good health. Fresh water, sweet water and green grass and trees. That beautiful environment. We don't own the land, the land owns us, we have to respect that.
10:54:19:15 – 10:55:02:16
Vic Camp: My hopes and dreams for native people in America, is that one day we are recognized as truly being sovereign. My hopes and dreams are that one day every Lakota child speaks his language. My hopes and dreams are every day, the Lakota people could get up and say "I'm Lakota". To say, "This is my land", and to be truly a sovereign nation. To not have another government look over us, watch over us like we can’t take care of ourselves. So my hopes and dreams are that one day, the Lakota people will be free again. Free to be who we are, and to reclaim our identity.
10:55:13:16 – 10:55:33:05
Annika Banfield: The journey has come to an end. I've learned a lot about the Native Americans' struggle for justice, and their attempts to protect their sacred ceremonies and places. The feather has finally returned home, to the native people that share a dream that what belongs to them, will one day be returned.
10:56:21:08 – 10:57:13:19
CREDITS