Lakota Sioux Dance Theatre

Transcription

1 TEACHER S GUIDE Class Acts season sponsored by Lakota Sioux Dance Theatre Friday, October 9, :00 AM

2 Dear Educator, Welcome to Class Acts at Sangamon Auditorium, UIS! We hope this guide will help you expand on concepts from this particular performance and incorporate them into your classroom teaching, both before and after the performance. We want students to think of the arts as an integral part of their lives, not just a one-time isolated event. Before arriving at the Auditorium, you can prepare your students by helping them understand the story or by sharing basic information about the performing art form they are going to see. We also ask you to review the theater etiquette information with your students (found on pages 2-3 of this guide) to help prepare them for attending a live performance. After the performance you can talk to your students about their experience. Did they enjoy the performance? What did they learn? How was the performance different than what they expected? We hope the information and activity ideas included in this guide will help your students gain a deeper understanding of the performance they see. We look forward to seeing you! If you have any questions about these materials, please feel free to contact me at or azepp2@uis.edu. Amy Zepp Audience Development Coordinator Youth programming in the Class Acts series and in conjunction with other Sangamon Auditorium events is supported in part by the Helen Hamilton Performing Arts Endowment for Youth Fund, gifts from Elizabeth and Robert Staley, and a grant from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency. 1

3 Theater Etiquette Going to a live theatrical performance is different than watching a movie or TV show the members of the audience are very important, and the way they behave will affect the performance. Therefore, theaters have their own special rules about behavior. Ask the ushers if you need help with anything The people who wear red coats are volunteer ushers, and they want to make sure everyone is able to enjoy the performance. They will guide you to your seat, and they can help you find a restroom. In any emergency situation, the ushers will help guide your class to safety. There may be as many as 1700 people coming to see the performance. Please follow the instructions of the ushers at all times. Turn off and put away cell phones, beeping watches, or anything else that can light up or make noise These can be very distracting to the performers and your fellow audience members. Do not eat, drink, or chew gum in the auditorium Even the quietest chewers and slurpers make a great deal of noise in the auditorium! The noise is very distracting to the performers and to the other people around you. Also, even if you are very careful, food and drinks can sometimes make a mess in the auditorium. We try to keep the auditorium as clean as possible so that it will be just as nice for the next audience. Never throw anything in the auditorium This is distracting and dangerous for the performers and people in the audience. Do not put your feet on the back of the seat in front of you Please do not wear a hat inside the auditorium It is difficult for the people behind you to see the stage if you re wearing a hat. Use the restroom before the performance begins As soon as your class arrives and is seated in the auditorium, the teacher can arrange visits to the restroom before the performance begins. The ushers will help you find the closest restroom. Of course, if you must use the restroom during the performance, please be as quiet as possible about leaving your seat. Once you get to the aisle, an usher will help you find the way. When the lights begin to dim, the performance is beginning This tells the audience to stop conversations, get settled in their seats, and focus their attention on the stage. A person will come out and make an announcement before the performance begins. Pay close attention to the announcement because it might include special instructions that you will need to remember. 2

4 Remember that the overture is part of the performance If the performance has music in it, there might be an opening piece of music called an overture before any actors appear on stage. Give this piece of music the same respect you give the performers by being quiet and attentive while the overture is played. Do not take pictures or recordings during the performance The flashes can be distracting to performers, and it is against the law to take pictures or recordings of many performances. Refrain from talking, whispering, and making noise during the performance Remember that live performers can see and hear you from the stage. It is very distracting to the performers and the other audience members if you talk during the performance. After all, the audience came to hear the professionals perform! It s ok to react to the performance Spontaneous laughter, applause, and gasps of surprise are welcome as part of the special connection between the performers and the audience during a live show. However, shouts, loud comments, and other inappropriate noises are rude and distracting to the actors and your fellow audience members. Clap at the appropriate times If you are enjoying the performance, you can let the performers know by clapping for them. During a play or musical, you can clap between scenes (during a blackout) or after songs. During a music concert or dance performance you can clap after each piece is performed. In a jazz music concert it is ok to clap in the middle of a song when a musician has finished a solo. If a music ensemble plays a piece with several sections, called movements, the audience will usually only clap at the very end of all the movements. The performers will bow when the performance ends This is called a curtain call. You should applaud to thank the performers for their hard work, but you should not begin to leave the auditorium until the curtain call is over and the lights become brighter. If you really enjoyed the performance, you are welcome to give a standing ovation while you applaud. This is reserved for performances you feel are truly outstanding! Respect the hard work of the performers You may not enjoy every performance you see, but I hope you will recognize that each performance requires a tremendous amount of dedication on the part of the performers and those who work backstage. It is polite to keep any negative comments to yourself until you have left the building. 3

5 Class Acts and Common Core Attendance at any Class Acts event can help teachers meet Common Core Standards. The clearest example can be found in the Standard for Speaking and Listening, #2: Integrate and evaluate information presented in diverse media and formats, including visually, quantitatively, and orally. The experience of attending a live performance is a unique format that can greatly enhance a student s understanding of an important topic or theme. Additionally, in the Common Core Standards for Reading, the definition of the word text can be expanded to include non-printed works such as dance, music, theater, and visual arts. This makes the arts an important part of all standards in the Reading category, at every grade level. Write to Us! We would love to hear from you and your students! If your students write about the performance they saw or create artwork related to it, you are welcome to send it to us via to azepp2@uis.edu or through the mail to Class Acts Sangamon Auditorium, UIS One University Plaza, MS PAC 397 Springfield, IL We love sharing student work with our Class Acts sponsors, so they can see the impact of their donations. 4

6 LAKOTA SIOUX DANCE THEATRE

7 About Lakota Sioux Dance Theatre Lakota Sioux Indian Dance Theatre has educated, entertained and enlightened audiences all over the world for more than three decades. The company communicates the powerful messages and resonance of Dance and Song in Plains Indian Society at the center of a living history and oral tradition in American Indian society. Under the directory of noted choreographer Henry Smith, the company includes some of the most highly acclaimed Championship performers of the Sioux Nation. Founded in 1978 on the Rosebud Reservation, South Dakota, Solaris/Lakota Sioux Dance Theatre began with the support of traditional Lakota Indian educators, healers, community leaders, championship powwow dancers, singers and storytellers; and its signature work allows the opportunity for people of all ages to experience the holistic worldview of the Lakota Sioux through performance, educational outreach, and original broadcast television programs. The company has appeared often at the Kennedy Center, and was featured in the opening festivities for the National Museum of the American Indian, The Millennium Celebration Times Square 2000, at Universities, Cultural Centers and in reservation and casino settings throughout the United States; toured West Africa under auspices of the State Department in the 1980s; and performs regularly in New York City. Lakota Sioux Dance Theatre toured Greece as part of the Cultural Olympiad, performing at the Kalamata Dance Festival and at the Hellenic Festival, which took place at the Herodion Theatre in the Acropolis; and has completed extensive cultural exchange tours to Alaska and Hawaii the past two seasons. 2

8 About Lakota Sioux Dance Dance is a central part of the life of the Lakota Sioux people. They dance to express their belief in spirits, natures, and the relationship of all things to one another. They dance to share traditions. They dance to honor people. They dance in pow-wows to celebrate their culture. And they dance to enjoy themselves. Native American dancers dance in honor of Wakan Tanka, the Great Spirit. When they dance to express their beliefs, to share traditions, or to honor people, all the members of the tribe are part of the dance. Even the people standing around the circle in which the dances are performing are part of it. Mothers may hold babies, people may chat and gossip, but everyone helps the dancers by praying and shouting approval and applauding. In that way, all the members of the tribe participate in the dance. When the dancers perform in front of audiences in theaters, things are different. The dancers are sharing their traditions with and telling about their history to nontribal audiences. Since they perform on a stage rather than in the sacred circle on their reservations, a narrator explains the dances so that the audience will understand them. When dances are performed for other Lakota Sioux, everyone understands their meaning because they have grown up participating in them. At the performance of the Lakota Sioux Indian Dance Theatre, the narrator will explain the meaning of each dance. He will also discuss important ideas about the history and beliefs of the Lakota Sioux. The dancers will sometimes sing while they dance. Some members will play the flute and drum. There are many kinds of dances performed by the Lakota Sioux Dance Theatre. A few of them are described on these pages. The Hoop Dance celebrates the way of life of all Native Americans. One legend says that the hoop dance is about the sacred circle of life. When a person does the hoop dance he is acknowledging the sacred circle and all the things that are connected within in. The Women s Shawl Dance requires dancers to improvise movement to unusually fast drum beats. Important in the dance are the women s fringed shawls and beaded leggings and moccasins. The women move their arms to imitate eagles wings. The Women s Shawl Dance is not a traditional dance. It was invented in the 1940s and 50s. 3

9 The Women s Traditional Dance honors women, who represent Mother Earth. In Lakota Sioux tradition, women are admired as the bringers of peace and harmony. The Grass Dance is also called the Grass Flattening Dance. The dancers flatten a grassy area where a special event takes place. In the past, those who performed the dance were admired because when they danced they cleansed and purified the circle in which they danced. The movement, in combination with the sweetgrass on the dancers leggings, are an offering to the Earth Mother and to the Great Spirit. Today, dancers wear yarn on their leggings instead of sweetgrass. The Buffalo Dance honors the animal that gave the Lakota Sioux food, shelter, and other means of survival. This dance was originally performed by members of the Buffalo Society, all of whom had dreamed of the buffalo in their vision quests. The Sneak Up Dance reenacts a battle. The dancers depict warriors stalking their enemies. The Eagle Dance is a prayer to the Great Spirit. The dancer asks for a blessing on the people as he imitates the soaring of the eagle, a symbol of the Great Spirit. The whistle imitates the eagle s cry. The Round Dance is one of the most significant dances in which men and women dance together. It is related to the hoop of the nation and the sacred circle. The Round Dance is a friendship dance for all people to join in to complete the sacred circle of life and to help keep all things on earth in balance. 4

10 History of The Lakota People The Lakota were originally referred to as the Dakota when they lived by the Great Lakes. Encroaching European-American settlement led them to migrate west from the Great Lakes region. They later called themselves the Lakota and were also called Sioux. They were introduced to horse culture by the Cheyenne about After their adoption of the horse, šúŋkawakȟáŋ ('dog [of] power/mystery/ wonder'), their society centered on the buffalo hunt with the horse. There were estimated to be 20,000 Lakota in the mid- 18th century. The number has now increased to about 70,000, of whom about 20,500 speak the Lakota language. After 1720, the Lakota branch of the Seven Council Fires split into two major sects, the Saône who moved to the Lake Traverse area on the South Dakota-North Dakota-Minnesota border, and the Oglala- Sicangu who occupied the James River valley. By about 1750, however, the Saône had moved to the east bank of the Missouri River, followed 10 years later by the Oglala and Brulé (Sicangu). The large and powerful Arikara, Mandan, and Hidatsa villages had prevented the Lakota from crossing the Missouri for an extended period. After smallpox and other infectious diseases nearly destroyed these tribes, the way was open for the first Lakota to cross the Missouri into the drier, short-grass prairies of the High Plains. These Saône, well-mounted and increasingly confident, spread out quickly. In 1765, a Saône exploring and raiding party led by Chief Standing Bear discovered the Black Hills (which they call the Paha Sapa), first the territory of the Cheyenne. Just a decade later, in 1775, the Oglala and Brulé also crossed the river. The great smallpox epidemic of destroyed three-quarters of the American Indian populations in the Missouri Valley. In 1776, the Lakota defeated the Cheyenne, as the Cheyenne had earlier defeated the Kiowa. The Cheyenne moved west into the Powder River Country, and the Lakota gained control of the land which became the center of the Lakota universe. Initial contacts between the Lakota and the United States, during the Lewis and Clark Expedition of , were marked by a standoff. When Lakota bands refused to allow the explorers to continue upstream, the Expedition prepared to do battle. More than half a century later, after U.S. forces built Fort Laramie on Lakota land, officials negotiated the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851 with the Lakota and other numerous Plains tribes to protect emigrant travelers on the Oregon Trail, which crossed their territory. The Cheyenne and Lakota had raided emigrant parties in part due to competition for resources, and because of settler encroachment on their lands. Formally, the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1851 acknowledged native sovereignty over the Great Plains in exchange for free passage along the Oregon Trail, for "as long as the river flows and the eagle flies". 5

11 The government did not enforce the treaty against European-American encroachment. When the Lakota and other bands attacked settlers and emigrant trains, there was public pressure for the U.S. Army to punish the tribes. In Nebraska on September 3, 1855, 700 soldiers under American General William S. Harney avenged the Grattan Massacre by attacking a Lakota village, killing 100 men, women, and children. Other wars followed; and in , refugees from the "Dakota War of 1862" in Minnesota fled west to their allies in Montana and Dakota Territory. With increasing settler expansion, war found the tribes again. Because the Black Hills are sacred to the Lakota, they objected to mining in the area, which had been attempted since the early years of the 19th century. In 1868, the U.S. government signed the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868, exempting the Black Hills from all white settlement forever. 'Forever' lasted only four years; when gold was publicly discovered there, an influx of prospectors descended upon the area. Again, the U.S. reacted to attacks on settlers and miners with military force, abetted by army commanders such as Lt. Colonel George Armstrong Custer. The latter tried to administer a lesson of noninterference with white policies, resulting in the Great Sioux War of General Philip Sheridan encouraged troops to hunt and kill buffalo as a means of "destroying the Indians' commissary." The unified Northern Cheyenne led much of the warfare after 1860 on the Plains, along with allied Lakota and Arapaho bands, which operated independently. They defeated General George Crook's army at the Battle of the Rosebud, and a week later defeated the U.S. 7th Cavalry in 1876 at the Battle of the Little Bighorn. Lakota call it the Grease Grass battle. Custer attacked a camp of several tribes, much larger than he realized. Their combined forces killed 258 soldiers, wiping out the entire Custer battalion and inflicting more than 50% casualties on the regiment. Their victory over the U.S. Army would not last, however. The U.S. Congress authorized funds to expand the army by 2500 men. The reinforced U.S. Army defeated the Lakota bands in a series of battles, finally ending the Great Sioux War in The Lakota were eventually confined onto reservations, prevented from hunting buffalo and forced to accept government food distribution. In 1877 some of the Lakota bands signed a treaty ceding the Black Hills to the United States. Lowintensity conflicts continued. Fourteen years later, Sitting Bull was killed at Standing Rock reservation on December 15, The U.S. Army attacked Spotted Elk (aka Bigfoot), Mnicoujou band of Lakota at the Wounded Knee Massacre on December 29, 1890, at Pine Ridge. Today, the Lakota are found mostly in the five reservations of western South Dakota: Rosebud Indian Reservation (home of the Upper Sicangu or Brulé), Pine Ridge Indian Reservation (home of the Oglala), Lower Brule Indian Reservation (home of the Lower Sicangu), Cheyenne River Indian Reservation (home of several other of the seven Lakota bands, including the Mnicoujou, Itazipco, Sihasapa and Oohenumpa), and Standing Rock Indian Reservation (home of the Hunkpapa and also home to people from many bands). Lakota also live on the Fort Peck Indian Reservation in northeastern Montana, the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation of northwestern North Dakota, and several small reserves in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. Their ancestors fled to "Grandmother's [i.e. Queen Victoria's] Land" (Canada) during the Minnesota or Black Hills War. 6

12 Large numbers of Lakota live in Rapid City and other towns in the Black Hills, and in metro Denver. Lakota elders joined the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO) to seek protection and recognition for their cultural and land rights. The names of many places in the United States have American Indian names. Some of them are: Potomac (River), Manhattan, Chicago, Appalachia, and Mississippi. Identify places in the city or state where you live that have Indian names. Find out what the names mean. Make a small dictionary of these words. The word Sangamon, as in Sangamon Auditorium, comes from the name of the local Sangamon River. The origin of the name of the river is unknown; among several explanations is the theory that it comes from the Pottawatomie word Sain-guee-mon (pronounced sang gä mun ) meaning where there is plenty to eat. Some famous Lakota Sioux leaders were Sitting Bull, Chief Red Cloud, Chief Black Elk, Chief Crazy Horse, and Chief Spotted Tail. Find out why they are remembered. Alone or with others, make a booklet in which you include their biographies and pictures. 7

13 Looking and Listening Remember Watch Listen The dances allow us to experience something about the Lakota Sioux way of life The dances are about such things as the sacred hoop, the buffalo, and the eagle The Lakota Sioux believe that dance is an important part of the sacred circle of life Dance must be watched closely in order to see the patterns of movement How the dancers use the space of the stage: one place or many; close together or far away How the dancers movements are usually close to the ground How the dancers start and stop exactly on the beat How the dancers show energy: fast, close; calm, exciting For objects such as eagle feather fans and horse dance sticks How the drum beats fit the dances For the one special time in each dance when four beats are sounded loudly and the dancers turn four times (The four beats represent the four directions of the compass, which are part of the sacred circle of life.) For rhythms For singing 8