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]] Noted in historical accounts as the Ghost Dance of 1890, the Ghost Dance was a religious movement incorporated into numerous Native American belief systems. The traditional ritual used in the Ghost Dance, the Circle Dance , has been used by many Native Americans since pre-historic times, but was first performed in accordance with Jack Wilson's teachings among the Nevada Paiute in 1889. The practice swept throughout much of the American West, quickly reaching areas of California and Oklahoma . As the Ghost Dance spread from its original source, Native American tribes synthesized selective aspects of the ritual with their own beliefs, often creating change in both the Society that integrated it and the ritual itself.
HISTORICAL FOUNDATIONS Paiute background The through this locally plentiful food source for a portion of the year, also augmenting their diets with fish, Pine Nuts , and the occasional clubbing of wild game.
Prior to . Many families were prevented from continuing their Nomadic lifestyle, following pine nut harvests and wild game herds. Left with few options, many families ended up in Virginia City seeking wage work. Round dance precursors The physical form of the ritual associated with the Ghost Dance religion did not originate with Jack Wilson, nor did it die with him. Referred to as the "round dance," this ritual form characteristically includes a circular community dance held around an individual who leads the ceremony. Often accompanying the ritual are intermissions of Trance , exhortations and Prophesying . The term “ Prophet Dances ” was applied during an investigation of Native American rituals carried out by Anthropologist Leslie Spier, a student of Franz Boas . He noted that versions of the round dance were present throughout much of the Pacific Northwest including the Columbia Plateau (a region including Washington , Oregon , Idaho , and parts of western Montana ). However, Spier’s study was conducted at a time when most of these rituals had already incorporated Christian elements, which further complicated the investigation of the round dance’s origin. European impact on native populations (often prior to actual physical exploration of the more remote regions of the continent) has made it difficult to acquire "pristine" data on North American societies during their "pre-historic" or "proto-historic" eras. Changes in Native American societies before physical contact with Europeans can be attributed to severe disease epidemics, an increased frequency and volume in trade caused by the introduction of European goods, from Europeans purchasing local resources and the introduction of the horse (which revolutionized the foraging lifestyle for some Aboriginal societies). Enculturation and Diffusion are not the only explanations for the common circle dance rituals. Anthropologist James Mooney was one of the first to study the circle dance. He observed striking similarities in many Native American rituals. However, he also claimed that “a hope and longing common to all humanity, manifests through behavior rooted in human physiology and common experience”; therefore, alluding to either the notion of universal imprints on the human mind, or to ubiquitous behaviors drawn from universal life courses that led to the ritual form. JACK WILSON'S VISION spiritual leader and creator of the Ghost Dance]] Jack Wilson, the prophet formerly known as Wovoka until his adoption of an Anglo name, was believed to have experienced a Vision during a Solar Eclipse on January 1 , 1889 . It was reportedly not his first time experiencing a vision directly from God; but as a young adult, he claimed that he was then better equipped, spiritually, to handle this message. Jack had received training from an experienced Shaman under his parents' guidance after they realized that he was having difficulty interpreting his previous visions. Jack was also training to be a "weather doctor", following in his father’s footsteps, and was known throughout Mason Valley as a gifted and blessed young leader. He often presided over circle dances, which symbolizes the sun’s heavenly path across the sky, while preaching a message of universal love.
In God's presence, Jack proclaimed, there would be no sickness, disease, or old age. According to Jack, he was then given the Ghost Dance and commanded to take it back to his people. Jack preached that if this five-day dance was performed in the proper intervals, the performers would secure their happiness and hasten the reunion of the living and deceased. God purportedly gave Jack powers over weather and told him that he would be the deputy in charge of affairs in the Western United States, leaving current President Harrison as God’s deputy in the East. Jack claims that he was then told to return home and preach God’s message. Jack Wilson claimed to have left the presence of God convinced that if every Indian in the West danced the new dance to “hasten the event,” all evil in the world would be swept away leaving a renewed Earth filled with food, love, and faith. Quickly accepted by his Paiute brethren, the new religion was termed “Dance In A Circle." Because the first Anglo contact with the practice came by way of the Sioux, their expression "Spirit Dance" was adopted as a descriptive title for all such practices. This was subsequently translated as "Ghost Dance". ROLE IN WOUNDED KNEE MASSACRE See Also: Wounded Knee Massacre
Chief Big Foot lies dead in the snow. 1891]] While most followers of the Ghost Dance understood Wovoka's role as being that of a teacher of pacifism and peace, others did not.
Another Lakota interpretation of Jack’s religion is drawn from the idea of a "renewed Earth" in which "all evil is washed away". This Lakota interpretation included the removal of all Anglo Americans from their lands, unlike Jack's version of the Ghost Dance which encouraged harmonious co-existence with Anglos. In February 1890, the United States government broke a Lakota treaty by adjusting the that forbade any inclusion of Native American traditional culture and language. To help support the Sioux during the period of transition, the Bureau Of Indian Affairs (BIA), was delegated the responsibility of supplementing the Sioux with food and hiring white farmers as teachers for the people. The farming plan failed to take into account the difficulty Sioux farmers would have in trying to cultivate crops in the semi-arid region of South Dakota. By the end of the 1890 growing season, a time of intense heat and low rainfall, it was clear that the land was unable to produce substantial agricultural yields. Unfortunately, this was also the time when the government’s patience with supporting the so-called "lazy Indians" ran out, resulting in rations to the Sioux being cut in half. With the Bison virtually eradicated from the plains a few years earlier, the Sioux had no options available to escape starvation. Increased performances of the Ghost Dance ritual ensued, frightening the supervising agents of the BIA. Kicking Bear was forced to leave Standing Rock, but when the dances continued unabated, Agent McLaughlin asked for more troops, claiming that prepare the ascension robes for the Second Coming of the Savior, the United States Army is not put in motion to prevent them. Why should not the Indians have the same privilege? If the troops remain, trouble is sure to come."[http://www.hanksville.org/daniel/lakota/Ghost_Dance.html Ghost Dance].
Following the massacre, chief Kicking Bear officially surrendered his weapon to General Nelson A. Miles . Outrage in the Eastern United States emerged as the general population learned about the events that had transpired. The U.S. government had insisted on numerous occasions that the Native American had already been successfully pacified, and many Americans felt the U.S. Army actions were harsh; some related the massacre at Wounded Knee Creek to the "ungentlemanly act of kicking a man when he is already down." Public uproar played a role in the reinstatement of the previous treaty’s terms including full rations and more monetary compensation for lands taken away. RELEVANT ANTHROPOLOGICAL THEORY Religious revitalization model Anthropologist Anthony F. C. Wallace’s model (1956) describes the process of a Revitalization Movement . It is derived from studies of another Native American religious movement, The Code of Handsome Lake , which may have led to the formation of the Longhouse Religion . I. ''Period of generally satisfactory adaptation'' to a group’s social and natural environment. II. ''Period of increased individual stress''. While the group as a whole is able to survive through its accustomed cultural behavior, however changes in the social or natural environment frustrate efforts of many people to obtain normal satisfactions of their needs. III. ''Period of cultural distortion''. Changes in the group’s social or natural environment drastically reduce the capacity of accustomed cultural behavior to satisfy most persons’ physical and emotional needs. IV. ''Period of revitalization'': (1) reformulation of the cultural pattern; (2) its communication; (3) organization of a reformulated cultural pattern; (4) adaptation of the reformulated pattern to better meet the needs and preferences of the group; (5) cultural transformation; (6) routinization-the adapted reformulated cultural pattern becomes the standard cultural behavior for the group. V. ''New period of generally satisfactory adaptation'' to the group's changed social and/or natural environment. Ghost Dance within revitalization model In Alice Beck Kehoe’s Ethnohistory of the Ghost Dance, she presents the movement within the framework of Wallace’s model of religious revitalization. The Tövusi-dökadö’s age of traditional Subsistence patterns constitutes a period of generally satisfactory cultural adaptation to their Environment which lasted until around 1860. Corresponding with an influx of white settlers begins the second phase of Wallace’s model, hallmarked by increased individual stress placed on some members of the community. Almost the entire 1880s are placed into the model’s third period, that of cultural distortion, due to the increased presence of white Agribusiness and the United States’ government. With the introduction of Jack Wilson’s Ghost Dance, the fourth period of revitalization is ushered which characteristically occurs after sufficient changes accrue to significantly warp the society’s cultural pattern. Following the revitalization is yet another period of satisfactory adaptation which is dated to about 1900. By this time almost all sources of traditional food were eradicated from the Tövusi-dökadö’s long-established homeland, leading to the adoption of white American subsistence methods while still maintaining a Paiute culture. Reason for rejection “Worthless words” was the description given to the Ghost Dance in 1890 by Navajo leaders. Three years later James Mooney arrived at the Navajo reservation in northern Arizona during his study of the Ghost Dance movement, only to discover that the ritual was never incorporated into Navajo society even during the brief period of its widespread acceptance in western portions of the United States . According to Kehoe, the movement did not gain fervor there in 1890 due to higher levels of social and economic satisfaction at that time. Another factor at play was the fear of ghosts and spirits among the Navajo, based in their own particular religious beliefs. Kehoe continues to elaborate on the circumstances of the Navajo’s later acceptance of the Peyote Religion during more desperate times MOVEMENTS WITH SIMILARITIES
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