ustitlvdatsi:

tlichoonlinestore:

Porcupine Quill “Tail” Earrings made by Creations for Continuity on the Tlicho Online Store.

Natural and dyed turquoise Porcupine Quills, Delica beads and Surgical Steel Hooks. $130

these are too good

littlelionheartedavatar:

*snorts*

(Source: maryslovechild)

adailyriot:

hopefloatson:

In the 19th Century, about 50 million bison were killed by the settlers either for their meat or fur, or as a sport. Sometimes, the settlers even wiped out thousands of herds so as to deprive the Native Americans of their meat and fur, or indirectly their livelihood. Due to this, the once enormous population of the bison reduced to a mere few hundred. The government and people of North America stepped forward to save the beast from becoming extinct. 

Today, there are about 200,000 bison in North America living in sanctuaries, preserves, and ranches.

How about that for a comeback.

The government sponsored people going out and killing the bison. This was directly related to cutting off Native Americans’ access to the bison. For many tribes, particularly the plains tribes, the bison were everything to them. As Francis Rains put it, the bison were like the people’s Walmart. They were a main source of their food, clothing, shelter, tools, utensils, etc. They also played a large part in many tribes’ spiritual practices.  To kill the bison would be devastating for tribes.

During Civil War a general went through towns and villages burning the crops and cutting people off from their food sources. For him, this was a successful tactic which lead him to victory (regardless of it being an utterly horrific tactic). Given the tactic’s success, the government put it to use in the “Indian Wars.” They knew that if they killed off the bison, they would be able to kill off Native Americans, move the remaining off their land, put them onto reservations, and open land up for settlers to claim land and settle it.

With the railroads now crossing the plains, railroad companies advertised being able to ride the trains and shoot the bison as they pass. This became a popular “sport” for people. Many people also began trying to gain notoriety by killing as many buffalo as possible. Buffalo Bill himself had gained his name by the tremendous amount of bison he had killed.  While it’s true that sometimes when bison were killed, they were killed for their hides/fur and tongue (which had become a delicacy) over all, when bison were killed, their whole bodies were left to rot in the fields where they were shot. It was said that the stench of rotting bison could be smelled from miles and miles away. 

People also began making an industry out of selling bison skulls.

Above is a photo of one of the many large mounds of bison skulls. To give you an idea of how large the mounds were, at the bottom of the photo stands a man with his foot on one of the bison skulls. They were HUGE.

Within two years, two years, the number of bison in North America were hunted down to 12 bison. This last herd of 12 bison were moved into the Yellowstone National Park where they would be protected.

As the OP said, the number of bison now in North America has grown quiet a bit. Tribal Nations have played a roll in both protecting the bison, as well as working to create new herds and spaces for them to grow and roam. Bison as also been taken up as a live stock animal in many places around the United States (and are sometimes sadly made to breed with cows… so now there is a cattle/bison mixture idk… that’s a whole other topic though). They are also present in other sanctuaries and preserves. 

However, the bison are not yet in the clear. Today there is a large herd of bison in Yellowstone National Park. Although they are protected within the boundaries of the park, they are not once they cross out of Yellowstone. Bison are free roaming migratory animals and have historically migrated north and south feeding on the grasses of the plains region. In the past decade farmers/ranchers around the area of Yellowstone accuse the Bison of carrying diseases & spreading them. In reality, no such diseases have been found among the bison yet. However, ranchers/farmers have been waiting until the bison cross the boundary line of the park and have been shooting/killing the bison. This has been devastating to the Yellowstone bison population and organizations have been formed to try to protect the bison, however, more efforts could be made.

fun fact:

When Bison, unlike cows, feed off the grass, they eat just the tops of it, leaving the roots intact. This allows for the grasses to come back a new. Cows, however, eat both the tops of the grass and the roots when they eat it, destroying the grass.

Throwing down another fact: Because of the near extinction of American Bison, we will never, EVER, be able to get back the same prairie that existed pre-contact, because several species of plant have gone extinct because their germination cycle required the seeds to pass through a bison’s digestive system.

The more you know and are bitter about.

lastrealindians:

Sioux Tribes Purchase Pe’Sla!

By: Chase Iron Eyes

The unthinkable has happened! The world has shown its support and the Oceti Sakowin (Great Sioux Nation) has provided a powerful new narrative for Indigenous people. Indigenous is not a human construct as is “race.” Indigenous is a respect relationship between families, nations and life’s creatures, land, sacred sites, water, with each other, and with the holy powers of the Universe. Indigenous is not anthropocentric, but biocentric. Mitakuye Oyasin -We Are All Related. Even western science has reached this conclusion, finally. Pe’Sla is secured. Our ancestors are watching us, expecting us to fulfill our roles and reach our potential.

The Pe’Sla effort was driven and shared by many throughout the world, including Dr. Sara Jumping Eagle, Dana Lone Hill, Ruth Hopkins and all who donated time, energy, money and artwork for perks in the first campaign. There are simply too many people in too many capacities to thank. What a whirlwind when we activate. LRI wants to extend its gratitude to the bands of the Oceti Sakowin (Great Sioux Nation) who stepped up to make this happen along with the Indian Land Tenure Foundation. We owe a special shout out to DJ Two Bears, Sol Guy, Ezra Miller, Anneliese Vandenberg, and Piet Suess who helped spring the movement back into consciousness with the second campaign. Additionally, thanks to celebrities P. Diddy, Bette Midler, Lou Diamond Phillips, Rosanne Barr, Whoopi Goldberg, Ashley Judd, and Susan Sarandon who retweeted to raise awareness to help save Pe’Sla. Most thankfully, we send a voice to our spiritual leaders who answer the call to travel to our sacred sites to perform obligations on our behalf.

From the bottom of my heart and spirit I know the world is a better place because of the Pe’Sla campaign. Lastrealindians, Inc. has contributed over $900,000 toward the total purchase price of $9 Million. All the day-to-day hustle to meet our basic needs in the artificial, destructive corporate economy fades away when we are engaged in prayer. Our spirits are lifted. I know that when considerable numbers of people around the globe are all thinking and praying about Pe’Sla, our collective human consciousness ascends in a prayer bringing us all to the center. This is a story that transcends race, space and linear time. Ceremonies have been conducted at Pe’Sla for untold millennia. Indeed, the ceremonies carried out at Pe’Sla are for the survival of humanity and the renewal of life’s gifts.

These are times of prophecy. White buffalo calves are being born, earthquakes and tsunamis abound, droughts ravage our lands, we as humans have lost our way; but there is still hope. We want hope and our spirits require more than what money, oil, and pop “culture” can offer us. As Arvol Looking Horse, 19^th Generation Keeper of the Sacred White Buffalo Calf Pipe Bundle, says, “We humans send sacred energy, we have power, but we don’t use it and we need to in these times; our prophecies tell us to return to the Black Hills.” It is time we come together as one. When we are at our center we are one with the Universe. There is nothing more powerful than dedicated humans strong in their love for Creator. Indeed, this is the only thing that will save us. I believe this is a sign that humans are returning to their center as Crazy Horse said they would…READ THE REST HERE:  http://www.lastrealindians.com/axCommentDetails.php?postId=2138

queennubian:

alostbird:

Pow Wow Roger Williams Park, Providence, RI :: 1

OMG THE CUTE!!!!!

sikssaapo-p:

drfurball:

Seemed appropriate.

Oh Warpath

sipala:

Pat Pruitt (Laguna Pueblo/Laguna Pueblo)

Eternity, 316 Stainless Steel, Industrial Diamonds

moderndayndnprincess:

And my all time fav Sho Sho Esquiro dress (so far)

Inspired by a Kaska Dene Legend “The Girl who Lived with the Salmon”

Salmon Skin with Glass Cut Beads, Sequins and over 1000 hand sewn Rooster Feathers

SALMON SKIN.. Girl is cray talented to be working with Salmon skin…

carrymetoo:

The theme was Pin-up/Rockabilly. I chose to rebel. What’s more rebellious than rebelling against the rebel?

In your sartorial statement against departure from 50’s classic (the Buddy Holly look) into Rockabilly/Pinup and by association other anti-establishment fashion movements, you’ve displayed antidisestablishmentarianism.

It’s not often one has a valid reason to use that word, and I commend you for giving me this opportunity.

Also you look awesome.

starchildnirvana:

Me.

“Indian Costumes” are HURTFUL.

Dressing up in redface is hurtful. Wearing ‘war paint’ is hurtful. Dressing up as another race by wearing terribly stereotypical caricatures of what you think that race looks like is not appropriate. When you dress up like this and take photos like this it adds one more images to the ponderous pile of this shit that creates the pervasive cultural notion that this is what people should think of when they hear ‘Native American’ , and IT HURTS REAL NATIVE AMERICAN PEOPLE. It creates, in the minds of the people that see you dressed like that, a stereotype - a caricature of what Native people do/should look like that erases us in reality and removes us from their perception of the modern world. It turns ‘Native American’ into someone wearing beads and headbands and feathers and face paint. It turns an ethnic, racial identity into a costume.

It is racism.

When you only speak about Native American people in the past tense, in certain contexts. When you only mention us as pertains to White history. When you depict us in stereotypical ways. That is how racist thought is cemented in your mind and the minds of others.

I am tired of cultural appropriation.

I am tired of having to constantly be an educator of people who largely don’t want to be educated who get self-righteously angry (And refuse to learn. And continue to be angry) when they’re confronted. I am tired of being -hurt- by racism. I am tired of people who claim that they love and admire ‘Native American Culture’ but in fact know fuck all about Pan-Indian culture or the fact that ‘Native American’ is a blanket term for hundreds of hugely disparate indigenous nations across two continents and that we do NOT have just one culture.

And before you argue that folks who dress this way don’t MEAN to be racist or that they’re just having fun, before your many white allies rally around to tell me how wrong I am and what a good person you are and how you are not a racist…know this:

Racism is not in your intent.

Your intent is immaterial in how racist your actions are.

This isn’t about you BEING a racist. It’s about you DOING A THING that is racist.

Your intent doesn’t change it. Your ignorance of its meaning doesn’t change it. It’s got nothing to do with you as a person and everything to do with the meaning of your action in the context of sociocultural history.

If you think that dressing up as a stereotype is somehow ‘celebrating’ anyone’s culture, that speaks to some really problematic shit in how you’ve been educated, what you’ve been exposed to, what you think you know about what Native Americans are and what we look like. And while it’s not your fault that the culture of your upbringing has handed you that shit on a silver platter and said ‘eat it’, and not your fault that you did eat it without knowing better, it’s still bullshit and it’s still hurtful. You have the Internet at your disposal. You can become educated as to what Native Americans really are like and what we really are about and why not only is that outfit that you put on not remotely like anything legitimately Native American - but that you CAN’T make a costume that’s legitimately Native American. Because we don’t all look alike. Because we’re people.

Let’s go back in time. Let’s go back to my kindergarten class where kids are doing that stupid hand-over-mouth ‘woo woo’ war cry shit at me. Let’s go back to elementary school, watching Peter Pan at the end of the year and getting reprimanded when I walk out of the room to sit in the hall during the ‘What makes the red man red’ song because I can’t fucking explain to the teacher why it makes me want to cry. Let’s go back to my girlscout troop, where one of the leaders is quoting that movie and saying ‘SQUAW GETTUM FIREWOOD!’ and getting huffy and offended when called out on it by my mother. Let’s go back to my middle school chorus that’s singing Colors of the Wind and listen to all the resultant comments from my classmates AND TEACHERS. Let’s go back to when I was fourteen years old and a car full of college-aged white guys drove by shouting ‘FUCK YEAH, POCAHOTNESS’ and making sexual gestures at me. Let’s go back to last year, when a coworker asked me why I was asking for a personal day and checked ‘Religious Observance’ when she knows I’m not a Christian- I told her it was for a powwow, and she wanted to come. I told her it wasn’t open to the public and she said ‘Then why even have one.’

Then why even have one?

THEN WHY EVEN HAVE ONE?

Let’s talk about the fact that NDN women are 3.5 times more likely to be raped. And that we are raped by a non-Native man in 86% of cases. 70% of the time, our rapist is white.

When people dress like this, they perpetuate stereotypes about native people, AND THEY UPHOLD AND COSIGN ALL THAT SHIT.

nd-ndn:

Sandra Yellowhorn (Cree) in costume for DANCING EARTH- ‘Walking at the Edge of Water’. Sandra is from the Bigstone Cree Nation in Northern Alberta, Canada. She has fifteen years experience in ten international styles of dance.

nd-ndn:

Nimkii Osawamick (Ojibwe) in costume for DANCING EARTH- ‘Walking at the Edge of Water.’