Lakota Woman

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Lakota Woman

Mary was born 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 Sacred Campfires, the seven tribes of the Western Sioux known collectively as the Lakota. The Brule rode horses and were great warriors. Between 1870 and 1880 all Sioux were driven into reservations, fenced in and forced to give up everything. Her family settled in on the reservation in a small place called He-Dog. Her grandpa was a He-Dog and told about the Wounded Knee massacre. Almost three hundred Sioux men, women, and children were killed by white 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 summer because she would tan and make her look more Indian. She had a husband from the Crow 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 have many traditions which keep the intermediate 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 refused 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 mostly white. He left almost immediately after Mary was born becaus...

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...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 longer 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 Sun Dance for four years straight. She started to dance by making flesh 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 experienced a great rush of happiness."

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