Native American Heritage Celebration In Motion

The Native American Heritage Celebration started at CSU on Nov. 5, the first of many events inside the programs to be displayed at the university. The event began at Cleveland state seven years ago, and has been held annually since. It is a wonderfully cultural experience in which people of all nationalities are invited to learn a little about this country's native peoples and their traditions and lives. Two events passed so far for this year's celebration, Dreaming Our Future Generations and The Exiles. Dreaming Our Future focused on the diverse and scattered Native American tribes and traditions. The event drew over 100 students, staff, faculty and community members who came to hear Cook-Lynn's lecture and experience Native American drumming, dancing and singing. Elizabeth Cook-Lynn, a member of the Crow Creek Sioux tribe and the author of Anti-Indianism in Modern America: A Voice from Tatekeya's Earth and New Indians, Old Wars hosted the event. She is the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writers' Circle of the Americas. It was wonderful to see her at this event as she introduced and welcomed the performers and speakers, "Welcome to the 7th annual Native American Heritage Celebration," she smiled and went on to say that this was something they did every year and planned to keep doing, "I can't wait until I'm welcoming you all to our 20th celebration!" She then introduced Chris Megny of the Crooked River Dance Crew. "A lot of our culture is tied to dance," Megny said, and explained that he and his dance crew were going to be performing a Grass Dance for the audience accompanied by a group of drummers. "The connection between the drummers and the dancers is very important, we dance for them and they play for us," Megny said. He also explained the garb they wore for the dance to some extent, "The tall fringes on our head dresses represent the tall grasses on the planes." After he had finished speaking he took the floor, "The dance we are about to do is one usually performed before a powwow." And then the musicians began to play and right away you could feel the drums in your chest like cannons going off. It was intense. The singing was soulful and well syncopated to the steady rhythm of the drums.

Also, there were tacos served on Navajo fried bread, the taste was incomparable. But, it was sort of like a Chalupa from Taco Bell, only a million times better. If you missed Dreaming our Future, or if you missed The Exiles on Thursday at 6:00 p.m. (which was the showing of an extremely eye-opening film about the lives of Native Americans living in the Bunker Hill district of Los Angeles), fret not. There will be Native American Heritage Celebration events going on all through the month. Head over to the library and pick up a flyer if you're interested in dates and listings, or just look for it on the CSU website.