Black Elk's Religion: The Sun Dance and Lakota CatholicismIn this religious history of the spiritual life of the great Lakota leader Black Elk, Clyde Holler reconstructs the development of the Lakota Sun Dance—the central religious ritual of the Lakota tradition, which is essential to understanding Black Elk's thought. This comprehensive study of the dance, which was banned by the U.S. government in 1883, shows how Black Elk adapted the dance to the conditions and circumstances of reservation life and reinterpreted it in terms commensurate with Christianity. A creative thinker, rather than a passive informant on his people's past, Black Elk was both a sincere traditionalist and a sincere Christian, seeing the two religious traditions as expressions of the sacred. Through a firsthand account of the dance associated with Frank Fools Crow at Three Mile Camp, near Kyle, South Dakota, the author demonstrates how the contemporary Sun Dance reflects Black Elk's vision. Holler's book is a penetrating model of philosophical engagement with native North American religion that is carried out in close dialogue with anthropology. Readers who were captivated by John G. Neihardt's gripping portrait of Black Elk in Black Elk Speaks may be surprised to learn that he was a vital and creative leader until his death in 1950, and not the broken, despairing old man made famous by Neihardt. As the greatest native American religious thinker of North America, much has been written about Black Elk, his life and influence; but of those works, Roller's is likely to stand out as the most capacious in breadth and analysis. |
Contents
The Search for the Historical Black Elk | 1 |
The Classic Sun Dance Observed 18661882 | 39 |
The Classic Sun Dance Remembered 18871911 | 75 |
The Sun Dance Under Ban 188319341952 | 110 |
Black Elk and the Revival of the Sun Dance | 139 |
Bibliography | 231 |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
According agents anthropologists apparently believe Black Elk Speaks Bourke Brulé buffalo skulls Bushotter camp catechist Catholic Catholicism ceremonies characterizes Christianity classic dance contemporary dance context Curtis dancers DeMallie DeMallie's Densmore described Eagle Feather Ecumenist Elk's essential flesh offerings Fools Crow Ghost Dance gion holy horse Indian indicates intercessor interpretation interviews Kablaya Lakota culture Lakota Sun Dance literature Looks Twice Lynd Mails McGillycuddy medicine medicine men mention missionary mystery circle native American Neihardt observed Oglala painted participation piercing Pine Ridge Pine Ridge Reservation pledgers pole present religious reports reservation revival Rice Riggs ritual Rosebud Sacred Pipe sacrifice Santee Schwatka seems shade shaman Short Bull simply sincerity Sioux social spectators Steinmetz Steltenkamp Sun Dance sunwise sweat lodge symbolic Teton tion tipi traditional Lakota religion traditional religion traditionalist tree tribal council Univ vision Wakan Tanka Walker warrior wicasa wakan Wounded Knee yuwipi