The Power of Kiowa Song

by Lassiter, Luke E.

• ISBN13: 9780816518357
• ISBN10: 0816518351
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1998-10-01
• Publisher: Univ of Arizona Pr

Summary

Many Kiowas believethat song is a gift from God. Its power, argues Luke E. Lassiter, rests in the many ways that community members hear, understand, and feel it: "Song has power. As I begin to understand what this means for my mentors, I am just beginning to understand what this means in my life. They are not just singers. They are vehicles for something greater than all of us. Indeed, I now understand that I am not just a singer. But . . . I will sing until I die." As a boy, Lassiter had an early fascination with pow wows. This interest eventually went from a hobby to a passion. As Lassiter made Kiowa friends who taught him to sing and traveled the pow wow circuit, serving many times as a head singer, he began to investigate and write about the pow wow as an experiential encounter with song. The Power of Kiowa Songshows how song is interpreted, created, and used by individuals, how it is negotiated through the context of an event, and how it emerges as a powerfully unique and specific public expression. The Power of Kiowa Songpresents a collaborative, community-wide dialogue about the experience of song. Using conversations with Kiowa friends as a frame, Lassiter seeks to describe the entire experience of song rather than to analyze it solely from a distance. Lassiter's Kiowa consultants were extremely active in the writing of the book, re-explaining concepts that seemed difficult to grasp and discussing the organization and content of the work. In a text that is engaging and easily read, Lassiter has combined experiential narrative with ethnological theory to create a new form of collaborative ethnography that makes anthropology accessible to everyone. This book is designed for anyone interested in Native American studies or anthropology, and it also serves as a resource written by and for the Kiowa themselves. Hear the Power of Kiowa Song

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations and Tables
Acknowledgments
Introduction	p. 3
Experience, Dialogue, and Ethnography
Oklahoma	p. 17
Boy Scouts, Hobbyists, and Indians	p. 22
Bound for "Indian Country"	p. 30
Anthropology	p. 44
On Ethnography	p. 57
Powwows, the Gourd Dance, and Kiowa Song
Indian Worlds	p. 69
On Powwow People	p. 80
Gourd Dancing	p. 99
The Kiowa Rattle Dance Revived	p. 116
On the Songs	p. 129
Sound and Knowledge	p. 139
Red Wolf, Satethieday, and Charlie Brown: On Some of the Kiowa Knowledge Surrounding Three Gourd Dance Songs	p. 153
Fun, Feeling Song, and Spirit	p. 187
"Dear Lord, We Come to You in Prayer, Tonight Again"	p. 217
Epilogue	p. 221
Notes on Style	p. 231
Song References	p. 233
Notes	p. 235
References	p. 251
Index	p. 259
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