Beyond the Classroom--Music of Indigenous Americans

 In class, I was really intrigued by the Blessingway Ceremony and after that, I became curious of other kinds of ceremonies in the Navajo tribe. I started by searching "Navajo ceremonies" on Google. I found that the Blessingway and Enemyway are both prominent ceremonies for the Navajo tribe. What they both have in common is restore balance. For the Enemyway ceremony, the focus is on returning men from combat, those who were captured, or wounded. 



While we watched videos of Pow Wows in class, Jingle Dress dance was mentioned, but we didn't talk much about it. I became interested and I found more about it. The Jingle Dress Dance is performed most commonly in Pow Wow dance competitions. It started in the early 1900s in the Ojibwe Tribe in Canada. Its popularity began to spread around the Great Lakes and eventually the rest of the United States. The dresses would originally have 365 visible jingles that would be made out of rolled up snuff can lids. Now, they're usually machine made. The dance itself requires the women to be light on their feet and to keep their feet close to the ground. 

I wanted to learn more about the types of drums and I came across the double sided hoop drum. When I saw a picture of it I realized that I had seen it many times before, but I never knew the name of it or that it is used for Native American drumming. This drum is small enough that it can be held in your hand. Since it's smaller, it's usually used to accompany larger drums (like the powwow drum) in social gatherings and ceremonies. The drum can be struck with the players hand or with a drum beater. The hand drum in this video is only one sided, but I couldn't resist attaching it because as the video says, this kid is rocking the hand drum.




Comments

  1. JillianJanuary 10, 2022 at 9:44 PM

    I loved reading what you wrote about the Jingle dress. The video segment we watched was so wholesome, and it's nice to know more about it. It's interesting how it spread from one tribe to others, and that it prevails today. And that kid was so into his performance! That was really nice to watch.

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