Native Americans from all different Canadian and American tribes gathered to celebrate the beginning of Native American Heritage Month.
The Office of the Vice President for Diversity, Equity, and Multicultural Affairs and the First Nations Educational and Cultural Center sponsored the event along with the Native American Graduate Student Association and the American Indian Center of Indiana.
The Traditional Powwow began with a grand entrance of dancers on both Saturday and Sunday.
Crowds from the Bloomington community sat alongside Alumni Hall to watch the intertribal and exhibition dancing in the center circle.
Vendors selling traditional Native American clothing and art also accompanied the powwows. This is where self-proclaimed “powwow addict” Morning Lark Baskett sets up shop.
Baskett dedicates her entire winter to creating finger weaves, ribbon shirts and other traditional clothing and crafts to be sold at powwows.
Preserving Native American tradition and art is a driving force for most of ?Baskett’s art.
After elderly shawl makers in the Indiana area died, Baskett took it upon herself to continue the practice and to bring them to the powwow community.
“You share your culture,” she said. “Some people learn, some people teach. Even people who are teaching learn from others and people, who are learning, teach ?others.”
Recently, she picked up finger weaving to revitalize the dying Native American art. Fingerweaving is a traditional Native American practice used to create belts, sashes, straps and other materials by using scraps from other fabric.
“We’re the original recyclers,” Baskett said. “Respect is important to our people and to just throw something away instead of reusing it is not respectful.”
Powwows are a venue for the Native American community to celebrate traditions through dancing, art and storytelling so they don’t fade away through generations.
“It’s strengthening our community ties and keeping our culture alive,” she said.
Baskett describes powwows as a reunion. Native Americans often caravan and camp together to create a sense of community at ?powwows.
Baskett and her dog Petunia travel to powwows all throughout the year and see both familiar and forgotten faces. Just this year Baskett has attended eight or nine powwows. In one instance, she went seven weekends in a row.
Last month, Baskett won first place for her rendition of an Abenaki story of a raccoon and an Alaskan story about why the leaves fall off the trees in the winter.
“With our traditional stories, they have a teaching in them,” she said. “Sometimes they can be serious and make you cry. Sometimes they can make you laugh hysterically, but they always have a ?teaching in them.”
Baskett’s passion for powwows also extends to her ?passion for protests.
She once canoed in the Detroit River to protest when Jay Treaty rights were being revoked at the border crossing between Michigan and Canada.
The Jay Treaty allows citizens carded as Native Americans to travel and trade freely between Canada and the United States.
“We have to keep our culture alive and our pride,” she said. “That is primary. Protect our traditions and keep our culture alive.”
As a child, Baskett was not allowed to show off her ?heritage. Her mother’s family was racist toward Native Americans and would not allow her to keep any trinkets she received from relatives on the reservations.
Now, Baskett has been celebrating her culture at powwows for roughly 25 years. Baskett is Cherokee, Tuscarora and Shawnee. She honors and represents all three tribes when she dances by wearing traditional ?clothing from each.
“It was always alive in me but I didn’t say anything,” she said. “Then, finally, when I got out on my own, I started doing what I wanted. It snowballed into ‘I am a powwow addict.’”
