"For my kids to actually be around buffalo and see them in real life, in their natural habitat, and have a better connection and understanding of who they are is very powerful," Turning Heart says. She never saw a bison in person until she reached adulthood and visited her husband's Lakota reservation in South Dakota. Turning Heart says the animal was an abstract concept for her as a child - she only knew it from pictures. The dance evokes "how buffalo sound when they're running, shaking the ground" through stomping, she says. Halay Turning Heart is a project administrator for the Yuchi Language Project and a lifelong participant in the Green Corn Ceremony, including the buffalo dance. For generations, it was passed on by people who had never seen one in person. In a major Yuchi celebration called the Green Corn Ceremony, there is a dance to honor the relationship between people and the bison. It means "We, the Yuchi People, are still here." They, like the bison, survived colonial efforts to wipe them out, but were physically separated after being forced from their homelands in what is now the southeastern United States. "yUdjEhanAnô sô KAnAnô," Grounds remembers saying to the bison when he came face to face with them in Denver. The importance, and long absence, of bison in Yuchi culture Since 2018, the city has donated 85 surplus bison - which many, including Indigenous people, commonly call buffalo - to Native American tribes instead of selling them at auction, reflecting a broader effort to return stewardship to Native Americans. The Yuchi Tribe was one of several to receive bison from the city of Denver, which maintains two conservation herds that are descended from the last wild bison in North America. "We have an opportunity to connect with them in direct ways and help them on their journey," says Richard Grounds, the executive director of the Yuchi Language Project, which works to create new Yuchi speakers by having fluent elders work with children. The Yuchi Tribe of Oklahoma received five bison from Denver earlier this month, marking the first time in nearly two centuries that Yuchi people will once again interact with the animal. Five of the bison went to the Yuchi Tribe of Oklahoma. One of the 35 Denver Mountain Park bison stands in a corral as it waits to be transferred to representatives of four Native American tribes and one memorial council so they can reintroduce the animals to tribal lands March 15, 2023, near Golden, Colo.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |