#65 - Singing, Gambling, and Social Change: A Brief Ethnography of Modern Native Gatherings - Tribal Research Specialist: The Podcast

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Shandin Pete (00:00):
Do they? Yes, were you at a salon?

Aaron Brien (00:05):
I'm in my apartment.

This is a new look.

No, what's a new angle?

That's it really looks like, Huh? That's what it
really looks like. That's anawesome chandelier. That's
awesome chandelier. Back there,

Chandy, chandelier.

Did you? Did you install that yourself?

No

easier place in Hardin, yeah. Well,

how many places do I have? I don't know. Man, your
man of mission townhouse. Thisis my high rise.

My pied a tear in harden.

I mean, we don't, we don't use the video. So the
lights are fine.

No, we use the video. Patreon. Patreon folks
get the video, yeah?

Well, yeah, we'll go turn those that

looks cool, yeah, I upload the live videos like
they're supporting us, man.

Turn that one off.
That one right here. They're

giving us a lot of supports. Like that one. I give
them some love. You know,

$25 I'm worth more than $25 you

oh no, no, but yeah, no, the lights are
fine. Don't worry about that. Aboot. Don't reboot it, getting a
smidge of a Canadian accent. Inotice I say a bit
more often, just a bit. Idon't know if that's truly a

(02:13):
Canadian nervous just just me. Idon't know,
not sure just you mightbe just me. Yeah, I like your
ceiling there that looks pretty,uh, looks like like you're in.
It looks like you're in a nailsalon.

You get your toes done, right?

You're getting your toes

done. Manny in the I decided to go to relaxation
with the relax potty tonight. Soyeah,

may as well Rob

scored too, because I was horseback yesterday. Oh
yeah, cowboy yesterday.

Yeah. Had it been a while?

Yeah. A long while, and it was rough. I'm sore. I've
been complaining about it allday. So like, when a guy gets a
cold, is that? What it is? A mancold? Oh yeah, yeah, I'm the man
flu. I'm just overdoing it, youknow? Oh yeah.

Did not nothing more manly for a man and to feel
sore. And they gotta, theygotta, you gotta brag about it.
You gotta tell everybody aboutit, you

know, after a hard day's work, and yeah, oh

man, my shoulders, my shoulders are sore, you know.
And been a whileback, it's a sore today.

Oh, it's even better when you're like, you sit
there and you just start rubbingyour neck and you're like, Oh,
you're wanting someone to go.
What's wrong? It's nothing.
Horsebacking. Horseback youknow,

or like those, uh, those guys who walk around like
their legs are always sore, youknow, usually they're from Rocky
Boy, I think,

I don't know. I think my soreness is more of a
testimony to my how out of shapeI am, more than the amount of
work. Oh, man, I'm just sogrossly out of shape. I can
relate grossly.

I can relate to that. Can relate to that. Over
the couple weekends ago, set upthe old teepee a couple times.
And, you know, set up tear downa couple times. And, yeah, I got
kind of sore. I hadn't done thatin a while, like anything, like

(04:59):
electric. Mean, like on the reswork, I've been living a city
life, and you, you know, youdon't, you don't get a chance to
do those things. So you do itgives, Uber Eats, oh yeah, Uber
Uber anything, man, Uber TP,Uber TP, set her uppers,
yeah? But, um, yeah, I'm gonnayou send me a song,

yeah, just because you're always picking songs. So
I

want to play that song because I have a
complimentary song that willchat about too. But I want you
to tell me about this.

I mean, all right, what I could tell you, what I
can with there ain't much, but,yeah,

why not? Why not secret information?
So secret you don't want tobraid your knowledge with me.

I don't we bring no knowledge today.

Okay, let me know.
Let me know, if you can Hearthis, here we Go. I'm Hey the i

(07:33):
Hey, oh, yeah, tell me aboutThis tune. Man, that's a dandy

(08:02):
one. It sounds very to me like,if I didn't, if you didn't tell
me what this song was, it soundsvery Midwest,

if you know what I mean, oh, I get what you're
saying now,

yeah, yeah. It sounds, it sounds very Midwest,
very Ponca, yeah. I was thinkingmore very,

yeah. I was

thinking more lakes, you know, oh, Ojibwe,
great I mean, the Great Lakes isquite expensive, you know, yeah.
So some of those you mentionedcould be in that area, but
that's what it reminds me of.
That sort of gives me that feel,you know, in the old birch bark,
kind of slapping some rice,slapping down the rice. No, I

(08:58):
don't know. It's kind of theregion,

slap it a rice so that's, it's a hand game song.
Just a crow hand game song,yeah? Um, I've always kind of
known a couple hand game songshere and there, but it was never
like a thing for me, yeah?
Because I think in my youngerdays when I was, like, motivated

(09:25):
to do more singing, yeah, handgame season around here was
during, like, especially the bigtournament, like the big
district tournament was during,like, the university powwows,
like the regional universitypowerhouse. So, yeah, I was
always kind of like wanting togo to that instead. But I've
always kind of liked hand gametunes. But over the last few

(09:48):
years, I've, I've participated alot more in the big crow
district 10 game tournament.
Yeah, and so. For peoplelistening, they should check it
out, like, go to YouTube andjust look up crow hand game and,
like, see it's, it's a big deal,right? Yeah, it's a big deal.
It's not like a stick gametournament in the sense, like,

(10:10):
the game is similar, yeah, butthe pageantry of it, the
presentation of it, it's waydifferent, yeah, even, even the
um, like, build up to each gameis like a thing, like, so the so
songs and singing is like acenterpiece. It's like a big

(10:31):
part of it. So, like, um, youwant to jam, right? Like, and
so, these songs, I don't know,the original hand game songs,
the ones that were given to uswith the ceremony, which later
just became a game. And then sothere's still ceremonial
elements of the of the game, butfor the most part, it's a game,

(10:55):
but it's created almost like itsown, generous

generic

genre in like crow music, genre, I've come to
appreciate more what was a longwinded response? Well, the
biggest thing is the way it was,the way they're made. Those
songs are made different. Theygot a different cadence to them
a different rhythm. There'slike, a different like, and
they're designed to be upbeatand to like, get people fired

(11:27):
up. Yeah. So yeah. Well,

we can throw a couple links in the show notes
for people to click on and checkit out. But I would definitely
say that it is in my experienceof watching hand game and stick
game, it is, it is unique amongthe Rocky Mountains, I would
say, on the crow res and yeah,like I, like I when you're a kid

(12:02):
growing up in Arley, Montana,you know, you can't help but not
know at least two or three real,real popular hand game songs,
because you hear them becausethey're they're playing it
during the powwow that they'replaying, they're gambling During
the powwow. And you can heareverything. Yeah, even into the

(12:23):
night, even into the night, youcan hear him going. So like
those, those core songseverybody sings You just once
you hear it, you just know it.
But that's a bit that'sdifferent than the way it's done
over your territory, yeah,because it's, it's not a joined
with the the annual celebration.

No, it's its own thing. Yeah, it's its own deal.
And it's a big deal, yeah, andit's, there's an expectation
with it, that it, it's going tobe a big deal, and that, and
there's some actual prestigeinvolved in it, meaning, like,
if you're the so there's aposition on each team called,

(13:08):
it's just called medicine man,yeah. And I guess it just
depends on what people believeand what they don't believe. But
this person is entrusted for thespiritual success of the team,
okay? And they so they pass outthe bones and the elk teeth. So
their job is, for lack of abetter term, to make medicine

(13:30):
and choose who they're going topick. Yeah, and I'm not saying
anything that shouldn't betalked about, because you can
watch them do it on YouTube, youknow. Yeah. So if you're a
champion Medicine Man, that's abig deal. That's like, major
bragging rights. And if you're achampion head guesser, so with
the crow hand game, you have toown the right to guess. You

(13:54):
can't just, you can't just say,oh, I want to guess. Let's pick
this person to guess. You haveto be given a guessing way. And
these ways mimic like animalsand different things, whatever
they're to borrow a term theirspiritual patron. So they'll
mimic the movements of that.
They're taught it right? Sothey're taught like how to

(14:17):
guess. And so when you beforeyou guess you do this, you do
this and and it all leads upeven the preparation before the
big tournament, what you'resupposed to do now, you might
have clan feeds or go on thesweat, or there's other personal
things that people have to do inpreparation, but the idea is
that that that's the ceremonial,ceremonialism involved in the

(14:40):
game. Yeah. So behind the head,behind the the guessing line are
what they'll call the frontline. Yeah, and I'm not a hand
game expert, like by any means,so you just go into what you
know, just what I know. Okay,we're not going to hold you
behind them. You. Is thesingers, the singers row. Well,

(15:01):
Joe can call it the drum line,right? And everybody hold the
hand drum and yeah. And usuallythe person who sits in the
middle of that line is the headsinger, even though it's not a
position, right? It's, it's,it's, it's, like it's a
unofficial position, and thentypically his to his left and to

(15:24):
his right are kind of like hisgo to helpers, and like people,
he's going to pass leads, theymight help pick songs and then
further down the line. So, andthat's not a hard and fast rule,
like it doesn't mean justbecause they're at the end,
they're not good singers, orjust because they're in the
middle, they're the bestsingers. Just yeah, sometimes
it's kind of like peopleadvocate for their relatives to

(15:47):
be in certain spots, and yeah,it's a big deal. And then the
wind behind them is the women.
All the women sit in a bleacher,and they're all just the same.
All the men are just the same,and so, so the way, so songs
accompany what's going on in thefront. So the game itself is

(16:09):
happening in the middle. Yeah,it's what the guessers so the
medicine, when the the medicineman is making medicine and going
to hand out those pieces, it'sour job to make good music for
him, right? Yeah, yeah. Sothey'll tap their drum, we'll

(16:31):
tap the rim of our drum. Andthis is two there's two major
reasons. One is it sounds cool,right? The other one is that,
like, we don't sit there and gowith over to every singer and
show them the song, right? Wemight show the ones next to us
and maybe down a couple, butyeah, once we start singing, we
start tapping the drum. Andthat's really just a practical

(16:54):
thing. The women can hear us,the other singers can hear us,
and then everyone can startsinging the song before we pick
the drum beat up. You know,

when people give people a chance to catch on,
yeah,

the song, yeah. In in, in theory, you would have
practiced together as much ofthe singers as you can get
together, yeah, you would havepracticed songs some, some
district teams are a littlebetter at doing that than
others. And hm, it's although,we're told it's like, not,

(17:28):
there's no structure to it.
They're very much is. They'relike, Oh, it's just a game. Join
in. I would say it's not just agame. Just join in. I feel like
you don't want to throw someoneinto it that doesn't know what
they're doing or is easilyintimidated, because it is
intimidating. It's anintimidating thing. And if you
were just take someone whodoesn't have any for one,

(17:49):
appreciation for competition,yeah, and and the other no
knowledge of like,ceremonialism, yeah. And then
all so has, they don't havepageantry unders. How to
Understand pageantry, yeah?
Because it's kind of in yourface, man, like, yeah, it's

(18:10):
pretty intense. Like, it's a bigdeal. So you can almost, I feel
like you could actually scarepeople off if, oh yeah, rush
them into something like that,you know. So, yeah, so, lot of
Crow people start their kidsyoung playing hand game and
until they grow up in it. Youknow, me, I didn't grow up in,
you know. I never really evencared to play hand game until I

(18:31):
was much older. Yeah, and, andthen, really, that was just a
way to just sing more, you know,yeah, it's like to sing. So we
just sing more, yeah, yeah.
Well,

there's definitely two crowds. You know, when it
comes to that, it seems like,like there's the, I mean, I
guess with with all of it, youknow, there's it, well, I guess
it's not impossible, but it'shard to stretch yourself across
and dedicate to a lot ofdifferent things. I don't know
if that's 100%

true, but like, I mean, there's some truth to
that. Yeah, yeah,

yeah. If you took like, at least like, with the
contemporary powwow scene, it'shard to be to maintain, I guess,
being a dancer and also stickgame or a hand gamer. It's
almost, it's impossible,especially the way it's
structured here in sort of theRocky Mountains. Besides Crow,

(19:29):
you know, because they happen atthe same time, you just can't,
yeah, do it, yeah, yeah. It'sreal hard.

It would be like being a rodeo guy and an Indian
Relay guy. It was likeimpossible to do both. I'm sure
there's people that can do both,but because they run
simultaneously, yeah, and thenpreparation for them is, is, is,
there's so much to it, it wouldbe, it would be hard, you know,
yeah, so yeah. And, and, becauseof my experience in the

(19:58):
northwest, I know that, like.
All summer long. It's oppositehere, where there's very little
hand game played in the summers.
In fact, when I was young, itwas kind of like taboo to play
hand game in the summer, hm, andwhere that's becoming less and
less. So it was like a winterthing. So all winter districts

(20:20):
on the reservation would hosthand game, like, single Games
Invitational. So like, yeah, onedistrict would invite another
district, and they would comeover and they would play a game,
maybe two, if that one game wentfast, just simply an
invitational, right? Yeah, um,it seems like there's more and

(20:40):
more, like weekend hand gametournaments here. Oh, where that
didn't seem and I could bewrong, but that didn't seem to
be such a big thing when I wasyounger. But in the last 1520
years, it seems like it'sbecoming a lot, a lot bigger,
especially in the last 15 years.
Oh yeah, and I, there was neverMemorial hand game tournaments.

(21:02):
And then now there's more.
There's like, Memorial things.
You know, crows were kind ofagainst memorials. Oh, that
seems to be a more common thing.
So hand game is is becomingpopularized, because now the
northern Cheyennes play the crowhand game, yeah. And in fact,

(21:25):
they're good at it like, yeah.
They've, they've won ourdistrict tournament a couple of
times, both in the juniors andthe seniors. Seniors is 30 years
old and above and juniors is 30years old and below, yeah. And
then, then there's, there's ateam every year that comes up
from Oklahoma. It's just kind ofa, I don't think it's all Kaya

(21:46):
was or, yeah, I think it's agroup of Cheyenne or apples,
Kiowas, Comanches, like, mainly,seems like around the Anadarko
and Apache, lot, kind of area,yeah, like they come up and
they, they participate in thehand game tournament, and then
on the on the reservation,there's all the districts plus

(22:07):
two extra teams. Were basicallywhen districts split into two
teams. So, oh, get too large orsomething, yeah, too large, um,
fighting each other, kind of,maybe, maybe in the past, but,
you know, because they've beengoing so long now, like it's
just kind of their own thing.

(22:28):
So, yeah, yeah. So, well,

that's really been that sort of follows suit with
what, at least my observationhere in the Northwest is, you
know, and I was a kid there was,there was a, probably the
occasional tournament. Andagain, I don't, I don't, I never
played a whole lot, very little,but just from observation. But
now, you know, you have theseWell, generally, as they, they

(22:54):
occurred along with the with thecelebrations, the powers, you
know, and they'd have atournament, maybe, or just open
games. But now, man, they'restandalone. Their stick games
are standalone tournaments.
Yeah, lot of money. 50,000whatever. 120,000 I don't know
you win, win a boat. I don'tknow,

100 teams in it, yeah, they're all going on.
Like, there's 40 games happeningat one time. Like it's a big
deal. Yeah, it is. It seems likeit became really big. And I
could be wrong, but it seemedlike the stick game thing blew
up with the casinos. Oh, yeah.
Like hosting, like hosting bigstick game tournament. I believe
that outside of Arley, Iremember, like in the past,

(23:40):
Arley always had a big stickgame venue, and then whopping
it. And then outside of that, itwas kind of like hit or miss,
like when you where you weregoing to get big stick games.
Browning seemed to have kind ofthat, yeah, and, and it's known
as flathead style, becausethere's different styles of
playing game, right? And themost popular, I think, by far

(24:03):
right, is flathead style. Theycall it flathead

style. I would guess. I'm not.

They would even say, they even say, we're going,
we're playing flat head rules.
So the way you're guessing, theway everything is happening is
like, is, is,

yeah, with the two, with the two, the two bones
and 12 sticks.

12 sticks, kick stick, yeah, the way your your
hand motions, and everything.

And, yeah, no, thumbs, no,

yeah. It gets that's, that's, that seems to be
the most popular that I've seen.
Yeah. I know down there, like inNevada, they kind of have their
own thing. I think they call itbone game. I don't know anything
about it, though. Yeah. I meaneither. And then, of course,
there's the crow hand game. Andthen I believe there's, like,
another kind of form of it, likein the the the Midwest. But I

(24:54):
could be wrong. Then. Second tothe crows in terms of, like, how
big a tournament means to itspeople are a game. It's probably
those the in the NorthwestTerritories, those the name
people that their end game is abig deal for

them. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Far I didn't, I wouldn't sayit's very like, far different,
but the singing is waydifferent.

The Singing is very different, way different in
terms of, like, the crowds theygenerate generate huge like, the
energy that it produces is, likea big deal. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Agreed.

Agreed. Now, if we're talking like insides of a
tournament, I don't think anyonebeats like that flathead style,
like, it's big, you know, it's abig deal. But I, if I had to
rank them in terms of, like,that energy level that's
produced, yeah, it's probablylike crow hand game that didn't,
people and probably, like,flathead, yeah,

well, the I know the difference. The main
difference is that there's thisone main game, right?

Yeah, there's very now, sometimes on these weekend
tournaments, they'll have like,two games happening at one time.
Oh, but never more than that,maybe three but, but that's
recent that, and I feel likethat's kind of influence from
just people traveling and going,Yeah, I believe it, yeah, but,

(26:33):
um, like, if my district was tohost a game that We would invite
it. We would invite anotherdistrict over, and we usually
feed them. That's like a part ofit. You invite the district, and
then you feed them and and thenyou play hand game. You know,
it's usually late. It startslate at night. I mean, nothing

(26:54):
before nine o'clock, you know,like, like it's you're going to
play into the night full andmore hours, huh? And you might
play. You might play one or twogames and then and see in the
old days, my grandma used to saythat they would stay because
traveling was not as easy. Solike when the arrow Creek

(27:15):
district, the prior district,would come to crow and play,
they would stay. So they wouldstay two or three days at a
time. So you would play two orthree nights in a row. Oh, and
because we're neighbors with theBlack Lodge district, they might
play us for two nights, and thenBlack Lodge would invite them
over, and they would play them.
So like prior, because it's anhour drive, but, but back then

(27:38):
it was such a big deal oftravel. So they would, yeah,
they would kind of do a tour andhit the coaster districts there,
you know, yeah, yeah, play handgame all, all weekend, but yeah,
and I don't know all the historyof hand game, because it was
never my deal, but yeah, I dolike the singing and and in that

(27:58):
particular recording we werepracticing, but we're, it's not
even a we're not singing,singing indie singer would know
that, that we're just going overa song, yeah, going over the
song, yeah. In that recording,which, me personally, are the
recordings I like to hear. Ilike to hear the songs, yeah, so

(28:18):
you can hear the song. I So, ifI had to drive around and listen
to music, if I could have allrecordings of that kind of
stuff, I would,

yeah,

yeah, yeah. I like, anyway, I didn't mean to talk so
much.

You did.
No, it's cool, man, um, youknow, gambling is, gambling is a
weird thing. It's and goes backinto the beginning of time, you
know? But I think everybodyrecognizes the dangers of it can

(28:57):
consume you,

yeah? And I think that's the beauty of, like,
stick game and hand game, isthat, because it's kind of, it's
relatively seasonal, yeah, it'ssomewhat keeps that part of it
in check and so. But I mean,betting on, like the kick stick,
or like a game, and, yeah, it'spretty it really is pretty

(29:21):
casual. And, I mean, you gottabe really in the stick game to
gamble, that much, you know. Andif it's not progressive, so it's
not like online, it's not likesomething you can like, call
into. You gotta be there. So yougotta be willing to travel, to
go to these places and bet sothat it really limits the crowd

(29:42):
on and, yeah, and just likepower Indian rodeo or anything,
you go to enough of them andit's the same people, right?

Yeah,

circle of people.
So yeah, like in hand game, youcan bet on the first two points,
or you bet on the game, orwhatever. You know,

yeah. Yeah,

first two points would be equivalent to the kick
stick.

Right? Yeah, right, right,
yeah. Man, I didn't. I was nevera big gambler myself in that
kind of way either. Yeah? Imean, I never did it. I I'd give
my one of my uncles five bucksor so see if he could double it
for me. And I like to sit downand sing every now and then,

(30:28):
every now and then, not,probably once a decade, maybe
once a decade,

yeah. But it's, I mean, yeah, like, if it wasn't
for the style of Crow, hand gamesongs, I probably wouldn't sing
them. I like the style. They'reThey're fun sing but, but now

people bet though too, right? You just said that,
people, I had a question, butfinish your thought first,
that's done that was it was wasthat? Was that? Was it, was
drums always used, or was theresomething else prior?

I mean, if there was, I don't know, don't know, I
know you guys, there was, itwas, yeah, like a pole or
something, yeah,

the the pole, yeah, pole and a stick at it.
Drums are fairly new,apparently, apparently,

yeah, as far as I know crows, I mean, crows have
always had hand drums, at leastfor a while, so

since the reservation period, I would
imagine maybe longer. I don't

know, maybe longer.
I mean, I mean, because they'repart of our tobacco ceremonies
and so, yeah, I think the way wemake them now is pretty
contemporary, but I mean,probably some form of them are
right. If I've never heardanyone ever talk about when hand
drums, hand drums areintroduced. I definitely know

(32:00):
hand drums existed before thedrum at least, yeah,

yeah, yeah. Same, same, yeah. So what? So, when
the So, where did this? Wheredid the hand game come from

then? Well, there's two stories. So there is an old
man, Coyote story, yeah, aboutthe hand game that being given
to the crows. The other story isthat it was kind of shared with
us by the grove on and then somepeople say the Assiniboine, but
I think it's that Fort Belknaparea for sure, you know. But and

(32:38):
that it's a kind of a descendantor an amalgamation of the
feather game. Oh, yeah, whichthey call the feather game,
which, yeah. And as far Johntalked, John stiff arm on the
podcast talked about the feathergame. I remember that kind of
informal version of the feathergame is the hand game, so, but I

(33:02):
think you would really have toknow what you're looking at to
see those, the detailedcommonalities of them. And I've
talked, I've talked to some ofthem, grove on guys about hand
gaming, and I have a personalworking theory on like, what I
think it is, or or where it camefrom and how it changed, but

(33:23):
it's not at a place where I Ieven tell too many people,
because it's not, I don't knowif it's true. You know what I
mean? And it's just kind of athought, like it's kind of, this
is what I think happened. No,yeah. So,

yeah,

yeah. So is this what you want to talk

about? I thought that you wanted to talk about,
no, I just

like the song and songs
you play out then songs thatwe've never talked about our
dance. Oh no, yeah, I'll playsomething.

Well, listen to this song and then tell me if it
sounds, if it has a similarsound.

I mean, we've been talking a long time too, so this
can be the podcast,

yeah. This can be Yeah. I mean, I think we're deep
in

Yeah, all right. I

want, and I'm curious, without knowing
anything about it, what kind ofsong or anything. Want to get
your take on this.

Okay, are you ready? Yeah,

I'm born ready.
Super ready. I'm

actually not ready.
I.

Yeah, yeah, um, let's

hear it. I'm pretty sure I've heard that before,
really,

yeah, tell me.
Tell me what you tell me. Tellme what you think.

I can't even like, almost sing it, yeah,

it's familiar, right?
That's a stick game song, yeah,from where, always thinking his
brain's burning, brain'ssmoking.

(35:52):
It, it, you can't fit it into,you can't fit it into a beat
that

it's Nez Pierce.
You think it's Nez Perce? It'smy guess.

I mean, the beat right, the beat is not, doesn't
feel like like a stick gamesong, right? At least flat, the
Flathead style or the Salishstyle.

Is it not a straight beat?

Oh, well. I mean, let's, let's do it again. And I
would say no,

if it's a double Beat, I'm gonna steal that song,
kind of pretty, man,

it is a good one.
Let me go back. Let's do itagain. Man. It's a nice song in
that then I'll tell you. I'lltell you about it, but I'm
trying to get you to feel thebeat, though. Feel the beat
because you know thetraditional, do you know the
traditional sort of flat headstyle? You know it's real? Yeah.

(37:00):
Yeah. Okay, so this one,not quite the same.

Hard to

fit it into that real faster you

a, it almost sounds like like an out and speed,

almost, ain't it?
Almost? Well, that is indeed astick game song.

I'm going to out dance me. I'm going to the out
dance me.

This here is that was Paul Finley recorded in like
1950 stick game song that heborrowed from the crease five to
10 years prior. Five to 10 yearsprior? Creed, yeah, my

failure. I

failed you. Well, no, that's a dozen. No, that's a
tough one. Man, that that's areal tough one. It'd be hard to
pick that out, but that's, Ithought it was a pretty unique
stick game song in the genre ofthe Flathead style of stick
gaming. Because the beat is notit's not,

to me, I would, I bet it's a double beat. I bet
it's a double beat.

Might be in it. It might be, can you hear Yeah, I
can hear that, yeah,

yeah, yeah, I'm going with double beat. Then it

might be, it might be hurting all our ears. Man,
what a leader. No, yeah, I justthought that when you when I
heard that song that you sentme, and when you showed that to
me the first time, that's thesong, I thought about, oh, it's
kind of sounds like in the styleof this other song that I know,

(39:43):
not saying

that's a similar, like, traditional kind of
quarter Lane weapon. It usflathead kind of Yeah, regional
sound, you know, it's Yeah,yeah. Well, you know, it's
pretty though. I heard

somebody singing around dance song at the end
games a couple weekends ago.
Well, I mean, who says youcan't?

Yeah, I guess you're right, and in that
setting, it's just accompanyingsomething that really there's
you can play stick game without

singers, yeah, oh, yeah. It's kind of weird, but
yeah. I

mean, it's weird, but it's, it's not a necessity,
right? It doesn't stop the gamefrom happening, right? Yeah,
yeah,

most of those songs are, they're, they're
meant to carry, like the thingyou said, like the medicine, the
power of the gambling, or orwhatever, at least that's from
my knowledge around here.

Yeah, I remember visiting with a few people
there, and this was years ago,before I even had a I mean, I
was just, it was just random.
And there was a similar talk.
There was similar talk likethat. Like people had special
abilities that were like, Yeah,came from certain things and
animals and paints and thingslike that, so yeah. So maybe at

(41:09):
one time it maybe the game was alot more formalized at one time,
or, yeah, had more of aceremonial element. But anytime
there's competition, there'sgoing to be some of that. People
think it's not a thing, but itis. I mean, it's competition,
yeah, and if, especially if,there's like bragging rights and

(41:29):
like status and

yeah, yeah, agree.
I agree.

Talk Like, like, it wasn't like that, but it
definitely

is, yeah,

instead, now it's like Indian basketball. It's
like bragging rights. There's nomoney. Really, no one's going to
make a living off of Indianbasketball. But there's like,
prestige and, yeah, winningcertain tournaments. And even
people who aren't basketballplayers, like, no, like, you
hear about like, teams that aregood and, yeah, which
tournaments are kind of like abig deal to win. And, yeah,

agreed

so there had to be something, tournament ball
before Ford Hall, six foot andunder, you know what? I

mean, some of the entry fee, yeah, there was some,
yeah, before I was going on,yeah, something else going on.
Yeah, there's a lot of storiesabout, about the hand game, and
where this, where the songs comefrom, and all that, all centered
around, you know, getting a goodluck or being a good guesser,

(42:39):
all that business kind of whatyou talked about, you know,
yeah, yeah. It, it reminds me ofthe the humanity of, well, you
know, just, you know, humans arefaced with all kinds of human
challenges. You know, we're not,we're not immune to, any sort of

(43:03):
vice that's out there, contraryto the romantic beliefs put
forward by both indigenous andnon Indigenous people, that
we're these, these people whoare not don't have a don't have
issue with with, you know, thethings that are happening in the

(43:26):
world today. It reminds me oflike, like, if given an
opportunity, you I'm sure thatthere's some, some Indian person
who would gladly take the reinsof one of the oil executives
chair and just go for it andmake make themselves a fortune.

(43:49):
You know, ain't nothing stoppingthem. Yeah, ain't nothing
stopping them. Yeah. The thingthat don't have

you heard about this? Yeah, what have you heard
about this controversy with thatrapper or singer or whatever?
His name's Russ,

that's like, real fresh. That's real fresh. Yeah,
that's like yesterday. Isit? What about it?

It's like the exam.
It's like when you said, just asecond ago, you were talking
about, there's always going tobe somebody that steps in there.
And it reminded me of, of ofthis situation, because I don't
understand the need, why we asIndian people, feel like it's

(44:43):
our need to include people,yeah, in in the things we do
that aren't even of ourcommunities, or even like they
say, they're not even advocatesfor what we do. Meanwhile. Like,
there's people who, like, liveon the streets and, and, oh,
yeah, our own people that dothis. So in this instance with

(45:05):
Russ, there was some tribalperson that was trying to give
him a medallion, yeah, and hedidn't see them. So then they
faked an emergency during hisconcert, yeah, and then he
denied the medallion orsomething, yeah. And then now
everybody's like, on him thathe's, yeah, you don't like

(45:27):
Indian

people. It's Indians, yeah,

it's like, who even cares? Man? Why were you trying
to give him a medallion in thefirst place? I'm sure you got
nieces and nephews that need

one moccasins.
Man, yeah,

I don't see, I don't see the need to get
acceptance or, like, some sortof like, and I don't even know
how I got here, but there's thisthing, this weird starvation we
have for it, you know, yeah,this has to do with hang game or
anything. I'm actually trying toreplay back how I got to this

(46:09):
point, and I can't You saidsomething that triggered it,
like,

yeah, it triggered you, vices, the the vice human,
vices,

yeah. And then you started saying,

Oh, shoot.
Oh, I said. I said, yeah, there,there's a, there's Indian person
out there who would gladly takethe seed of the oil executive
and do the exact same thingthey're doing,
in a way, maybe, but I don't.
Then you, then you, then youstarted talking

about that. I have no idea what I'm talking about,
but it's, it is a pet peeve ofmine that we feel the need as
Indian people to like, to findacceptance by by celebrities, by
politicians, by Yeah, theBritish Crown are like whatever,

(47:01):
like, we're constantly givingwar bonds to somebody, adopting
somebody, and like, crows getteased for this. But in all
honesty, man, there's a lot ofpeople doing it, you know, and
it's like, yeah, we're givingIndian names up. Meanwhile, our
own people are, like, culturallystarving, and we ain't doing a
damn thing for them. Yeah, thosesame people who are doing their

(47:25):
best to like, give Obama Indiannames and Prince Charles and
like Kyrie Irving, but Iactually think he's part, he's
literally part Indian orsomething. I don't know. I have
no idea, but, yeah, there's aweird. There's a weird, like,
fascination, yeah, with withthat, but we don't do that for

(47:46):
our own. Um, so bringing it backto hand game, one thing I
appreciate about crow hand game,and really, you can say this for
even, like, stick games thatI've witnessed, yeah, they seem
to be so insular that it's notcatering to non Indian people at
all. Like, when you go to a handgame, it's, that's not their

(48:08):
audience, yeah, yeah. It's, it'snot in even crow hand games.
It's like, it's just a it's justits own thing. Yeah, and even I
like Paulo, but Paulo, in itsnature, is like for a show. You
know?

Yeah, I was just thinking about that the other
day because I went to thislittle pow here in in the city,
and I could hear the somebodyNon, non native folks in the
back saying, Oh, I can't waittill these guys perform. Can't
wait till the performancestarts. And I thought, well, I
know. I mean, not really. I meanat one time it was right, it was

(48:48):
the show.
What its

own thing now, yeah, from its own deal. Like,
yeah, it's, it's, it's asubculture of native culture.
Now pause its own thing.

Yeah. So I was telling my kids, I said, Look at
all these people. They thinkwe're putting on a show for
them. You know, even when we'regetting dressed, they're like,
really watching us, you know,taking pictures. And we're there
to, you know, to enjoy ourselvesand not to put on a show. And
then everybody claps when thesong's over, you it's like, oh,
God,

I have a controversial thought though
about pow wow? Yeah. So we'vekind of been getting Miranda and
I, we kind of been getting intothis, like, powwow vlogs.

Oh, okay, like, just watching them. Okay.
Coolest

thing for people who like to go to powers, you
never have to leave your house.
You could just watch thesepeople travel. Oh, yeah, there's
a guy who's a fancy dancer,right? Yeah. And me, personally,
I maybe I never gave fancydance. It's appreciation

or but it seems like an evangelist hater.

Well, no, but I just never, that's at the last
it used to be at the end,remember? And it was Oh yeah,
always oh my

god, I'm over without chicken dance. At the
end, yeah,

if you're sitting at the day like, you're like,
Come on, man, like, I want to gohome anyway. But so, because
he's a fancy dancer, his vlog islike, fancy dance based, right?
Yeah, so watching, like, fancydancers and like, and I, we even
had Walt on the podcast. Hetalked a lot about fence events,
but watching it, yeah, like,what, sitting there and actually

(50:26):
paying attention to it like Inever did before. Yeah, what?
Like, where did it even comefrom? It almost doesn't look
native to me, like us, likeNorth America, like, like
Indian, it doesn't it's like,yeah, I don't know. It's like,
yeah, Inca or something, like,you watching them, and you're

(50:53):
like, What are they doing?
They're like, doing cartwheels,and they're like, doing the
splits, and they got two bustleson. And they're kind of creepy
looking actually, when you like,watch, it's like, I'm probably
gonna piss somebody off. But I'mjust saying it because you look
at chicken dance, you look atcrow style, you look at Northern
traditional, oh, jive. They kindof make sense. You're like, Oh,

(51:16):
I get that,

right. It emulates an older style.

And you can kind of almost see, yeah, okay, the
northern bustle, clearly is,like, from this, and then you
got round bustle, and then yougot all this stuff, and you can
kind of see where it's going,yeah, and then, boom, fancy
dancing. You're like, what,like, where's this? It is
insane, dude, yeah, it seems sohard,

yeah, yeah.

So you, you were probably from, like, your pow
wowing age, when you were young,fancy dance was a big deal for
me. It was my I remember my age,it was like, grass dancing.
Everybody wanted to be a grassdancer. It was like, Cool. It
was almost, kind of like it wasalmost kind of had a little bit
of hip hop and, yeah, oh yeah,yeah, you know what I mean,
like, it was, like, it, it justwas different. And, like, Yeah,

(52:10):
whatever, you know. But so maybeI'm just biased and kind of a
weirdo. But when you sit downand you really watch all the
categories of native dances atpowwows. Fancy Dance does seem,
and I hope I'm not offendinganyone to be like the most far
out,

yeah, well, it's probably the newest, I would
say,

in a way, yeah, I think it. I mean, I think it is,

yeah, as far as the the step in, in the in the
attire, very contemporary, yeah.
And I'm not talking like 2000scontemporary. I'm talking like,
what did it start? I can'tremember what Walt was telling
us about his

70s, 60s,

60s. Yeah, 60s. I remember.

Did he mention a guy named Gus McDonald and a guy
named Gus McDonald? I can'tremember, but I know that that's
like a name, yeah, like theponkas and Anadarko and, like,

Yeah, let's revisit that

to know. I mean, that's not what I even wanted to
talk about. I guess I just westarted going into the show
thing. So, oh yeah, it was just,just because we were watching
these vlogs, and I'm like, holysmokes. Like, Fancy Dance seems
so like, foreign almost to me.
Yeah,

yeah, it's definitely something else. But
yeah, the whole powwow scene.
Now, you know, I think it's, um,unless you're like people,
outside of it is verymisunderstood. You know, people
still think it's a show put onfor people. But, man, it's, it's
its own it's its own thing now.
I mean, it has been for formany, many decades. I think

(53:58):
since

we're finishing the podcast with the power thing.
When did the whole, like,northern traditional things
start of, like, tell your story,and then, like, when all the
northern dancers, like, go tothe middle of the arena, and
then they're like, like, whendid that start? Because I know
for a fact there's going to bepeople that, oh, yeah, oh, we've

(54:20):
always done this, but

no, no, no, that's no, no, no, that, I mean,
that's, that's pretty new. Ithas been the last 510, years or
so. I remember the first time Iseen it. I can't remember where
I was at but yeah, it was, itwas a bit odd to me. And I
don't, I don't when I'm dancing,I don't do it. I'm because I

(54:43):
don't know what's going on. Whatdo we do your story? I don't, I
don't tell you that's not partof my story. I don't, I don't do
that. My story is different. I'moff on the side getting the work
done.

Yeah, I know. I just kind of like, know.
Percent. I'm not even a powwowexpert. Yeah, I don't consider
myself a powwow guy. I think Ijust had a short run, yeah, just
so maybe I'm wrong, but the

crowd loves it, though, man. Though they do
though, man, they love it. Oh,yeah. Look at all these guys
attacking the middle, yeah, andthey'll raise their stick and
then go the opposite way.

You put your you put your acoustic in, you

put your dance stick
in. All about, yeah, I mean,maybe, maybe it was a, like a
traditional somewhere, and itjust caught on. You know, I was
just talking to my daughter andher boyfriend, and I said, you
remember the the itty bittybustle people used to put on the
back of their roach? It was likea fad for like, a second,

oh, like on the bottom part, like, yeah, like,

one person did it.
Next thing, you know, everybodywas doing it. And then, like, in
a few years, it justdisappeared. What did they do
with that?

Like, flicker feathers?

No, it's like, it was like a, like, a little, like
a little mini round, oh, Iremember

that. Do you remember, like, the flicker,
like, flicker feathers becamelike a big deal, and then
everybody had them, like, on theside of their head. Oh, yeah,

yeah, Indians. And then they were
ancient, then they're gone,

history, then they're gone. Yeah, you don't
see them. I don't

know, man, you,

you're probably old enough now to where you're
getting to that point wherethere's people that are claiming
that always, we've always donethis, and you're like, what?

Oh yeah, yeah, oh yeah. I heard Yeah.
I heard it all, yeah. I thinkone guy was claiming that the
grand entry was first started inthe 1970 1970 or something. I
was like, what I mean? Yeah, no,I'm Everybody's got their own

(57:06):
experience, so I'm not gonna, Iain't gonna, fact check, nobody,
but fads, fads are fads. That's,I think that's unique, though,
and I think it's needed. And Idon't, I don't, I used to kind
of scoff at it a bit, but Ithink it kind of unifies people
in a way

it does, and it makes it their thing. They're
like time stamps. They're liketimestamps. It's like my era
was, especially in the roundedand singing world, was big river
Cree, man. And there's nodenying that I'm time stamped.
Yeah, to Big River Cree, youknow, yeah, I really want to be
in the little island Cree era,but I'm not really. I mean, I

(57:46):
like getting force yourself, butI'm definitely from the lard
Thomas era

of, yeah. So, yeah,
yeah. I think that that, thefact that we can see fads like
that kind of, yeah, blow

through witness Chicken Dance blow up, oh yeah,
yeah, like in front of my eyes,yeah,

oh yeah. And, and even, even the style of dancing
has changed since it's blown up,yeah, the style of chicken
dancing has changed. Oh yeah,yeah, I don't

know, man, so, but wait real quick. Besides Nikki
Bell, we met Nikki at theUniversity of Indiana. He was
like the first nations whatever,yeah. Besides his dissertation,
our masters, do you have, you'veever heard of anyone studying
that have ever written on power,like, not in the sense, like,

(58:46):
all the history of power, butlike, like, almost like, an
anthropological works on, like,power as a subculture of native
people. That would be kind ofinteresting, if it's like, like,
look like, legit,

yeah, I don't know for sure. You know, I'm not 100%
sure. I don't know. I haven'tcome across much, but I haven't
looked mucheither. Yeah, for that, I'm
gonna

it just made me think of it. I've never even
once thought about it, but telljust now

I've come across some kind of corny ones that,
you know they talk about powwowsand drug addiction. No, that's
not corny. I mean, you know,

I witnessed you cancel yourself.

I mean, you know, where you where a person tries
to fit the real academic thinginto something that it isn't,
you know, like the power methodof healing, or the power method,
oh

yeah, oh boy, yeah,

method of, of to.
To alleviate, you know, dyslexiaor so,

Aaron Brien (01:00:07):
powwow to combat

Shandin Pete (01:00:08):
diabetes was a Yeah, yeah. I know you can
google good on YouTube rightnow, and you can find a powwow
workout video sponsored bydiabetes association.

You should, you should post a power workout, no,
and tell your story. Oh no,practice.

Oh no, that's not going to happen.

It's not going to happen. No, it will

never happen.
Ever. Yeah,yeah, pretty crazy. Well, how
long

did we talk? Um, I

don't know you tell me, but I don't see it no
more. We've been talking awhile, right? We've been at it
for about an hour. I think,yeah, that's enough.

That's plenty, man.
And then sometimes our podcastis too long.

Yeah, they get talking too much. We're talking
too much. We need to talk thatmuch. Yeah, we're boring.

We I mean, we are

boring as hell.
Who wants to listen to us droneon about hand game

power? Do you not consider yourself boring? No,
I'm

a boring person. I can tell because when I try to
talk to people, they just theyice me.

I'm a boring guy.
I'm a boring guy. I mean, myidea of fun is like watching
power vlogs. Yeah, it's, thereyou go. It's literally watching
someone else have fun.

Yeah? Yeah, you're cut. You turn into a homebody. I
see you got the lazy boy out.
And

then what's happening, yeah, is I've learned
to nap. I've never napped. I wasnever a Napper. So now Miranda
has introduced me to the powerof the nap. Oh, man, I fought it
for so long.

So you got slippers?

Do I got slippers?

Yeah. What kind are they? I want to see them.
Are they leather? Are theyleathery? Oh, no. They got like,
fur on the inside of them.

Yeah, of course, yeah, insulated. What are they
made of? I mean, I don't knowleather Blender.

I want to see a slipper, man. I want to see this
slipper.

Where? Where's the sign?
Man, you know what I do too,when we get home, like, I
literally walk in the door and Ijust put pajamas on right away.
It's like sweat. It's like astraight like it used to be
where I kept my jeans on. I'mlike, you never know. I might

(01:03:01):
have to go outside. Companymight come over. I walk right
in. Boom, change, like Superman,man,

you went from 30 to 60 in like a year.
Oh yeah, dude,

I'm Uncle Rico to the max. I'm, this is what I
think I'm Uncle Rico, witheverything, with Pow Wow,
singing, with round dancing withwhen I did jujitsu, when I did
MMA, yeah, even like horses andstuff, yeah, just uncle Rico,
everything is used to, be usedto, I used to. I used to

(01:03:40):
everything's used to, even, likeacademic stuff. It's used to
back when I did that, back whenI that's all I am, and back when
i i Should that should be whatmy I should just be. I should be
my motto when I did that, youknow, like,

I done all that, but I don't do it now.

Yeah, it's like, shut up, Aaron, you should just
do something new, you know,like, just go do something

else. It's like, wow, back on.

Put the jeans back on, and get out there and change
the world, you know,

enroll in a dojo.

Be the change here.
See

that slipper?
Let's see that slipper. I knowit's leather.

Well, it's got a real soul, just in case you
gotta haul the trash Bozemanlike Target slippers. What do
they say? Oh, man, deer foams,D, E, A, R, deer foams. Deer

(01:04:55):
foams.

Do? Oh, man, you're done.

You're done. This is how lazy I am. Even my
slippers are like, slip ons. Ican't even I just, they just
slip on they don't go over myankle. They're just like, oh,
even my slippers are going,Dude, you're done. I'm done for

it. Yeah, you need to find a you need to find a
coffee shop or a cafe you can goto and sit there and tell your
has been stories now.

Oh, you reach that, man, you reach that. I've earned
it. Man, you've

earned it. Earned

it, yeah, but yesterday, I am, I helped move
some cows. Oh, yeah. And so Igot a new story, you know, so
that, I mean, that's, that's anexample of me putting the Oh,
dude, I hit a cow. We hit a cow.
Like driving, driving home lastnight. Boom, hard, fast, yeah,
oh yeah. Ruin it. Ruin somethingright on the road, right on the

(01:06:05):
middle of the road. Boom, yeah.
Ruin your

ruin your video, ruin your rig. Or what?

No, you know, what's crazy is I got that big
grill guard on the front of mypickup. When it smashed the
grill guard, it pushed it in soit broke my um headlights. But
had it not been for that grillguard, I bet, I bet, I would
have destroyed my front end.
Man, oh yeah, I'd have destroyedit, that

thing, 1000 pounds.

Think, um, Jesus, Herbert Christ,

Abraham, get me the

Bible. Say Jesus, Angel Christ. I think his middle
name is Herbert

hair Berry, I've been

trying to make that joke work for years. It ain't
happening. It ain't no,

you lost me. Yeah.

You know how they say Jesus aged Christ?

Oh, yeah. Oh,

what's the age?
Herbert,

you gone. You're gone, man, I don't know you
anymore. I don't know you.

Who is this person?
I don't know you. Mr. Trying toeat sushi on the side of the
upscale cafe. You act like youain't from a gravel road, and I
don't know what this is like,what this you've changed. You're
a changed. Man.

Yeah? I asked the other day. I said, Oh yeah, see
that, that vegan sushirestaurant over there, it's
pretty good.

Yeah, you're done.
Yeah, you're done. You're done,dude,

oh man, yeah, I'm done. I've had it. Yeah, I'm
done,

yeah. Game

Over, game over,

game over. Shall we order in whatever man,

yes, you know me,

yeah, got it used to be, used to be so different.
You're a man of the people. Whatdo the people want?

People want nothing from me now you're like,

Lacroix,

yeah, bubbly, get me a La Croix. Abraham,
yeah. Get me a Lacroix.

You better, like, get in a fight or something and
get some street cred backer.

Oh goodness, man, I don't want to do that. I've
been trying to fight some ofthese people up here, but
nobody's no no takers,

no taker. Too polite, too polite.

No, I haven't been Let's wrap it up. Man, alright,
we're getting crazy. Yeah,alright, alright, ma'am. Good
one. Talk

to you later. You

you.

All Episodes

#65 - Singing, Gambling, and Social Change: A Brief Ethnography of Modern Native Gatherings

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

On Purpose with Jay Shetty

Crime Junkie

Cardiac Cowboys

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}#65 - Singing, Gambling, and Social Change: A Brief Ethnography of Modern Native Gatherings