A (somewhat virtual) trip on the pow wow trail

Apparently the DVD that I'd been relying on to introduce you to pow wows and pow wow dancing is fried. So we're going to skin the cat another way. (Sorry about that, Kitty.) We're going put together a pow wow on YouTube. But first, let's pause for this message. It's the Smithsonian Institution's promotional video for the 2007 National Powwow at the Verizon Center in Washington, D.C. It'll give a taste of what a pow wow looks like on professional quality video.

One of the best places to start, though, is Wikipedia. Its page on pow wows explains how they're organized and what to look for. What to listen for, too, since the drum and the master of ceremonies ("emcee") are so important. Another basic website, and a very good one, is Powwow Power ... especially its page on Powwow Etiquette. We'll visit it briefly.

But we'll spend most of the class Friday watching videos collected by YouTube subscriber Ahwahneechee, who describes himself as "a Paiute person whose ancestors came from several bands of Paiutes through out California and Nevada" and who has a fascinating set of videos on pow wow dancing and Native American history. There's other stuff on the net that's more technically proficient, like the Smithsonian promo shots above, but these clips were obviously put together by someone who knows and loves the art form.

We'll watch snippets of:

• the 1995 Grand Entry of Schmitz Pow Wow, from the 1997 Reno Nevada TV program Native Voices. It is the first of 11 clips. The pow wow was huge, and the grand entry lasted 45 minutes.
  
  
• Two clips of teen male Northern Traditional style dancing at the 2005 Numaga Pow Wow in Nevada.
  
  
• Men's Fancy Native American Dancing at the Numaga Pow Wow in 2005. See why they call it "fancy" dancing?
  
  
• Elders' dance at Numaga in 2005. Notice the difference in the pace as the elders join the circle.
  
  
• Combined footage of a men's grass dance and a women's Jingle dance at a pow wow in Yakima, Wash. Here's another clip of a jingle dance ... old footage from an unidentified pow wow.
  
  
• southern cloth dance for women. At a big indoor pow wow in Oklahoma. Notice how different the tempo and movements are from the jingle dance.
  
  
• Old footage of a Rabbit Dance a purely social dance for couples. This was taken at the Fallon (Nev.) Indian Rodeo days around 1996.
  

Bonus! A potato dance at the Welcome Back Pow Wow in 2005 at Southern Oregon University. What's a potato dance? Is it traditional? I doubt it, although one of the YouTube posters who commented on this video mentioned seeing the same dance done with oranges at another pow wow. But it looks like fun.