Pan-Indianism in Native American Music and Dance

Abstract

In my 1955 paper on the subject (Howard 1955) I defined PanIndianism as the process by which certain American groups are losing their tribal distinctiveness and in its place are developing a generalized, nontribal Indian culture. Some of the elements in this culture are modifications of old tribal customs, others are reworkings of elements from the major White culture, while a third group of elements are innovations peculiar to Pan-Indianism itself. The content of that part of Pan-Indianism which is Indian-derived stems largely from the PrairiePlains culture area, though there are minor elements from the Northeast (certain costume items), the Southeast (the Leading or Stomp dance) and the Southwest (the Pueblo-style Eagle dance). Since 1955 Pan-Indianism has proceeded apace in its diffusion. The principal manifestations of Pan-Indianism that involve music and dance are the intertribal pow-wow in the secular sphere and peyotism in the religious sphere. In the pow-wow the principal dance forms are a modified version of the Hethushka or War dance (also known as Omaha dance, Grass dance, Hot dance and Wolf dance in various tribal settings), which has been stripped of most of its warrior society and religious features and has been opened to participation by both sexes; the Round dance; and, since 1970, the Gourd dance. It may be followed, depending upon the locale, by the Leading or Stomp dance, the Forty-nine dance, or the Owl dance as an after-pow-wow feature. All of these dance forms have an accompanying repertoire of music as does the Peyote religion. Before I discuss the spread of these forms in their Pan-Indian setting I would like to anticipate a criticism often leveled at the concept of PanIndianism, a criticism based upon a misunderstanding of the concept. This is that Pan-Indianism is nothing more than intertribal diffusion, and that Native Americans have always enjoyed giving and receiving new religious cults, dances, and musical forms and that many ceremonies such as the Sun dance, Midewiwin, and Drum religion, which enjoy a wide areal distribution, are hence Pan-Indian. I am quite aware of this sort of diffusion but I do not regard it as Pan-Indianism. In the days when cultures were more or less intact, the borrowing of a new warrior society