Lakota Woman Essay -- American History Native Americans Essays

Lakota Womanbloody shame was natural with the name Mary Brave Bird. She was a Sioux from the Rosebud Reservation in South Dakota. She belonged to the Burned Thigh, the Brule Tribe, the Sicangu. The Brules are part of the seven-spot Sacred Campfires, the seven phratrys of the Western Sioux k at one sequencen collectively as the Lakota. The Brule rode horses and were wide warriors. Between 1870 and 1880 all Sioux were driven into reservations, fenced in and forced to give up e very(prenominal)thing. Her family settled in on the reservation in a mild place called He-Dog. Her grandpa was a He-Dog and told about the Wounded Knee massacre. roughly three hundred Sioux men, women, and children were killed by clear soldiers. Mary was called a iyeska, a breed which the white kids called her. She had white peoples blood in her. Her face was very Indian, but her skin was light. She hated being white and loved the pass because she would tan and make her look more Indian. She had a husban d from the gas Dogs which were full-bloods. They were the Sioux of the Sioux. Her people had very strong family ties and everyone cared for everyone. Still even though the white man has ruined their close family ties they ease up many traditions which keep the modal(a) family closely tied together. The whites however completely destroyed the tiyospaye, which is the extended family like the grandparents, uncles and aunts, in-laws and cousins. The government tore the tiyospaye apart and forced the Sioux into the kind of relationship now called the nuclear family. Those who refuse to be ruined by the government were pushed back in the country and into isolation and starvation. Her father, Bill Moore, was only part Indian and loosely white. He left almost immediately after Mary was born becaus... ...eonard returned home the entire town came to welcome him. When Leonard returned home the entire tribe came to welcome him. They had a big feast and Mary too was honored. Mary got a new name, Ohitika Win, Brave Woman. She was very honored and proud to have a True Indian name. Both Leonard and Mary had to get used to the changes they both endured over the time Leonard was in jail. Mary was no all-night a shy Sioux woman walking with downcast eyes in the footsteps of some man. Mary and her sister were apart for a long time and grew far apart. They no longer viewed things as they used to. Mary Promised herself that she would insolate Dance for four years straight. She started to dance by making form offerings for those brothers and sisters who had died. It was at that moment that I, a white-educated half blood, became wholly Indian. I undergo a great rush of happiness.