Convergent Roads: Discourses of Peace and Conflict among American Indian, Euro-American and Russian Cultures

Session Submission Type: Paper Session

Abstract

This panel explores cultural and spiritual conflicts between First Nations traditional beliefs and cultures and dominant White culture as represented through US governmental policies. The panel travels time and geography presenting the Shawnee prophet Ellskwatawa at the start of the 19th century; Dakota Zitkala-Sa’s essay “Why I am a Pagan,” in early 20th century SD, the struggles of the Lakota people in SD today to revitalize their culture; and the reaction of the Lakota of Pine Ridge to Russian Pow Wows.

Sub Unit

• Peace and Conflict Communication Division

Individual Presentations

• Crafting the Prophet: Ellskwatawa, Tecumseh, and the Shawnee People - Geoffrey Klinger, DePauw University

• Zitkala-Sa’s Nonviolent Rhetoric of Native American Resistance to Cultural Violence of Religion Replacement - Ellen Gorsevski, Bowling Green State Univ

• 'I’m an Indian Inside': Russian Interpretations of American Indian Powwows in Bea Medicine’s Seeking the Spirit: Plains Indians in Russia - Charles Braithwaite, University of Nebraska, Lincoln

• Reclaiming the Red Road: Lakota Spirituality in a White World - Deborah Wooldridge, Coe College

Session Organizer

• Ellen Gorsevski, Bowling Green State Univ