Native American Commentators

Any assessment of the rhetoric of the Oglala Sioux must include the sociology of Oglala experience, particularly in the last part of the 19th century, which witnessed the decisive diminution of meaningful political power of Native Americans and the consolidation of Anglo-European American hegemony in North America. Of particular note in the background of Oglala history are the events at Wounded Knee, South Dakota, in 1890. That event was the last "battle" of any moment between whites and Indians. Essentially it appears to have been a preemptive strike by the US Army, which was responding to the growth of what was called the Ghost Dance, a mystical, pietistic religious movement that had gained currency among various Native American peoples in the 1880s. Specifically, a Nevada Paiute called Wovoka preached a gospel of abstemiousness, distance from

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difficult lives that the Plains tribes were forced to lead at the behest of the US government and suggests the attraction that the Messiah Movement must have held for them. The wish for the white man to disappear, however unrealistic, seems to have had a reality that was difficult to overstate. Indeed, Black Elk's visionary language must also be set beside the more or less straight reportage of the details of white takeover of Native American lands and internal colonization of the people who had to relinquish them. In addition to the strong presence of the US military was the fact that (for example) whites, or Wasichus, were looking for "the yellow metal" in the Black Hills. For that and other reasons, the Lakota Sioux adopted a long-term strategy of ongoing warfare, not only with the Wasichus but also with the Indian people who were willing to sell their lands: "Then my father told me we were going back to Crazy Horse and that we were going to have to fight from then on, because there was no other way to keep our country." Black Elk was a warrior, and he was part of the war party at the Little Bighorn in 1876, where Long Hair, as Custer was called, was "rubbed out," for the rather simple reason that "the soldiers came thereto
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Some common words found in the essay are:
Black Elk, Native American, Black Elk's, Ghost Dance, Klamaths West, Rushmore Indians, Elk's Catholicism, Messiah Movement, Russell Means, Means AIM, black elk, native american, black elk's, wounded knee, ghost dance, russell means, native americans, messiah movement, 19th century, experience black elk, black hills, black elk speaks, peoples ghost dance, black elk's account, american indian movement,
Approximate Word count = 2245
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page)

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