Background on the Sioux Indian Culture

The three online movies I chose to learn more about the culture in which I chose to write about and depict the life and culture of the Sioux Indian, (both past and present) are all from YouTube, and are as follows: *500 Tribes, *Meet the Sioux Indians, Plains Indian Tribe, 1949, and *The Great Sioux Nation. The films portrayed the Sioux in an almost identical manor, and although each of the films ran from twenty-five minutes long, to an hour and a half, they covered the same amount of ground and produced the same information. The realization that the culture and beliefs of the Sioux has basically remained unchanged over the past few hundred years seems a bit staggering to me, however, it does show that although the Sioux have evolved with the changes of the world, they have been true to the beliefs of their people. The Sioux have had their struggles, and eventually gave up the rights to the lands they loved so much to the US Federal Government. However, the one thing that the Sioux were not ready to give up was their sovereignty. They did not want to answer to the white man, nor live by their laws, and still, to this day, the American Indian lives by their own laws and elects their own government. The following information will address who they were, what they were about, and how they lived.

The Sioux actually originated from the Great Plains of the United States, and were known by the names of Dakota and Lakota. The word Sioux means “little snakes”, and after learning what I have learned about this culture, it seems to be the perfect nickname. However, in most history books we only just start learning about the Sioux after their migration west. These Native Americans were nomadic and occupied territory in Minnesota, Wiscons...

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...d vulnerable. Eventually this practice and belief that cost Chief Sitting Bull and his sons their lives. A new generation of Lakota from Standing Rock Reservation is ensuring that the great chief’s ideals live on by naming a college after him that will highlight the long lengthy fight to become sovereign, and of those who fought that good fight; Chief Sitting Bull and the whole of the great Sioux Nation. (Green, Rayna 1999)

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References.

Kehoe, A. B. (2011). Culture and customs of the sioux indians. Choice, 49(3), 578-579. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/904139035?accountid=34899

Marks, Paula. In a Barren Land. New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1998

The Encyclopaedia of the First Peoples of North America. Ed. Rayna Green. Toronto: Groundwood Books Douglas & McIntyre, 1999.