Great Plains Ghost Dance

Great Plains Ghost Dance
Name	Great Plains Ghost Dance
Type	Indigenous religious movement
Region	Great Plains
Time period	1880s
Participants	Lakota Sioux, Arapaho, Cheyenne, Crow, Pawnee, Mandan, Hidatsa, Arikara, Omaha, Ponca, Kiowa, Comanche, Chemehuevi
Founder	Wovoka (Jack Wilson)
Related	Ghost Dance movement, Wounded Knee Massacre

Great Plains Ghost Dance The Great Plains Ghost Dance was a late 19th‑century Indigenous spiritual movement influential among the Lakota, Arapaho, Cheyenne, Crow, Pawnee, Kiowa, Comanche, Ponca, Omaha, Mandan, Hidatsa, Arikara, and other Plains peoples. Emerging from prophetic teachings by Wovoka (Jack Wilson) during the Paiute revitalization, the movement intersected with encounters involving United States Indian Agents, U.S. Army, settlers, missionaries, and traders across reservations and agency posts such as Standing Rock Agency and Pine Ridge Reservation. The dance combined ritual practice, millenarian expectation, and sociopolitical response to displacement after treaties like the Treaty of Fort Laramie (1868).

Origins and Beliefs

Wovoka, a Paiute prophet from Nevada, articulated a vision during the 1880s that promised renewal, return of the dead, and the disappearance of settlers; his message spread through messengers and converts to the Plains, reaching leaders associated with the Lakota Sioux and bands affected by the Sioux Wars, including veterans of skirmishes near sites such as Little Bighorn. The doctrine drew on preceding movements including the Ghost Dance movement antecedents among the Shoshone and revitalization patterns similar to those in the Prophet Movement sparked by Tenskwatawa centuries earlier. Followers interpreted Wovoka’s prophecies alongside oral histories tied to the Fort Laramie Treaty era, the aftermath of the Sand Creek Massacre, and the consequences of policies implemented under the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

Spread and Variations Across Tribes

Messengers and interpreters carried Wovoka’s teachings to disparate communities: Lakota leaders such as members of the Oglala Sioux and Brulé Sioux encountered the doctrine at agencies like Spotted Tail Agency and Cheyenne River Reservation, while Northern Plains groups including the Assiniboine and Aaniiih (Gros Ventre) adapted elements to local cosmologies. Variants emerged among Cheyenne and Arapaho bands in the Sand Creek region, and among Kiowa and Comanche in the Southern Plains where contact zones included forts like Fort Sill. Regional syncretism involved interactions with Christian missionaries from denominations including Methodist Church, Roman Catholic Church, and Presbyterian Church (USA), and with itinerant traders tied to companies such as the American Fur Company legacy.

Practice and Ritual Elements

Ritual expression centered on communal dancing, singing, and the wearing of special shirts or regalia reputed to offer spiritual protection; artisans from the Black Hills and trading posts at Fort Benton supplied beads and materials. Ceremonies took place in camp circles near tracks of the Bozeman Trail and at agency gathering grounds, often led by ceremonialists informed by elders of the Sioux and Cheyenne medicine societies. Songs and drums linked to the ghost rites included melodic phrases traced to traditions preserved by the Omaha and Ponca, while fasting, vision quests, and sweat lodges associated with the Lakota and Crow complemented the dance. Interpretations of supernatural protection intersected with stories of resistance tied to leaders like Sitting Bull and warriors who had faced Red Cloud’s campaigns.

Interaction with U.S. Government and Settlers

Colonializing pressures—manifest in military deployments from posts such as Fort Laramie (Wyoming), Fort Keogh, and Fort Abraham Lincoln—and federal agents at the Bureau of Indian Affairs offices responded to the spread with alarm. Territorial officials, including territorial governors and Indian agents, reported gatherings to the U.S. Army and to politicians in Washington, D.C.; tension escalated amid anxieties following incidents like the Bozeman Trail conflicts. Missionaries and local newspapers in towns such as Deadwood and Rapid City often portrayed the movement as a threat, prompting increased patrols by units associated with commanders who served in prior campaigns like those around Fort McPherson and Fort Benton. Negotiations and directives from authorities connected to policies under officials linked to the Indian Appropriations Act era influenced responses at reservations.

Role in the Ghost Dance Movement and Wounded Knee

The Plains variant played a central role in events leading to the massacre at Wounded Knee Creek on the Pine Ridge Reservation in 1890, where interactions among followers, elements of the 7th Cavalry Regiment, and leaders such as Sitting Bull became focal points. Arrests and confrontations involving figures from the Oglala Sioux and Hunkpapa Sioux precipitated violence that culminated in deaths and federal inquiries, intersecting with legal and military histories connected to courts-martial and Congressional scrutiny in Washington, D.C.. The suppression of the dance at sites across the Plains followed military and civil injunctions that referenced precedents of previous campaigns including those connected to the Indian Wars.

Cultural Impact and Legacy

The Great Plains Ghost Dance influenced subsequent Indigenous political movements and cultural revitalization efforts among tribes such as the Lakota, Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Pawnee, and shaped portrayals in ethnographic studies by researchers affiliated with institutions like the Smithsonian Institution and the Bureau of American Ethnology. Artistic revivals in regalia, beadwork, and song repertories drew on documented dance forms preserved by communities and by collectors associated with museums in Chicago, Philadelphia, and Washington, D.C.. Commemorations at memorials for those killed at Wounded Knee and cultural programs on reservations including Standing Rock have sustained dialogues involving tribal councils, cultural preservationists, legal advocates who engage with statutes such as the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, and educators at tribal colleges like Sinte Gleska University and Little Big Horn College. The movement’s legacy continues to inform scholarship, activism, and artistic expression across Plains nations and institutions including the National Museum of the American Indian.

Category:Religious movements Category:Native American history Category:Great Plains