The Ojibwe, Ojibwa, Chippewa, or Saulteaux are an Anishinaabe people in what is currently southern Canada, the northern Midwestern United States, and Northern Plains. They are Indigenous peoples of the Subarctic and Northeastern Woodlands.
A powwow is a gathering with dances held by many Native American and First Nations communities. Powwows today are an opportunity for Indigenous people to socialize, dance, sing, and honor their cultures. Powwows may be private or public, indoors or outdoors. Dancing events can be competitive with monetary prizes. Powwows vary in length from single-day to weeklong events.
Fancy dance, Pan-Indian dancing, Fancy Feather or Fancy War Dance is a style of dance some believe was originally created by members of the Ponca tribe in the 1920s and 1930s, in an attempt to preserve their culture and religion. It is loosely based on the war dance. Fancy dance was considered appropriate to be performed for visitors to reservations and at "Wild West" shows. But today, fancy dancers can be seen at many powwows across the nation and even the world.
Sandy Lake Band of Mississippi Chippewa are a historical Ojibwa tribe located in the upper Mississippi River basin, on and around Big Sandy Lake in what today is in Aitkin County, Minnesota. Though politically folded into the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, thus no longer independently federally recognized, for decades, Sandy Lake Band members have been leading efforts to restore their independent Federal recognition.
The Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, also known as the Mille Lacs Band of Chippewa Indians, is a federally recognized American Indian tribe in east-central Minnesota. The Band has 4,302 members as of 2012. Its homeland is the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation, consisting of District I, District II, District IIa, and District III.
Mississippi River Band of Chippewa Indians or simply the Mississippi Chippewa, are a historical Ojibwa Band inhabiting the headwaters of the Mississippi River and its tributaries in present-day Minnesota.
Hanging Cloud was an Ojibwe woman who was a full warrior among her people, and claimed by the Wisconsin Historical Society as the only woman to ever become one. She was the daughter of Chief Nenaa'angebi and his wife Niigi'o. Aazhawigiizhigokwe was of the Makwa-doodem, and was born and lived most of her life at Rice Lake, Wisconsin. Her community became part of the Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians after the 1854 Treaty of La Pointe.
The Midewiwin or the Grand Medicine Society is a secretive religion of some of the Indigenous peoples of the Maritimes, New England and Great Lakes regions in North America. Its practitioners are called Midew, and the practices of Midewiwin are referred to as Mide. Occasionally, male Midew are called Midewinini, which is sometimes translated into English as "medicine man".
Mille Lacs Kathio State Park, also known as Kathio Site, is a Minnesota state park on Mille Lacs Lake. The park preserves habitation sites and mound groups, believed to date between 3000 BC and 1750 AD, that document Dakota Indian culture and Ojibwe-Dakota relationships. The park contains 19 identified archaeological sites, making it one of the most significant archaeological collections in Minnesota. The earliest site dates to the Archaic period and shows evidence of copper tool manufacture. The Dakota lived in this area roughly until the 18th century, when many bands of them were moving southward into the prairies and river areas of southern Minnesota. At the same time, Ojibwe (Anishinaabe) were moving in from the east. Ojibwe oral tradition, published by William Whipple Warren, suggests that there was a battle in which they successfully took control of the area from the Lakota.
The Sandy Lake Tragedy was the culmination in 1850 of a series of events centered in Big Sandy Lake, Minnesota that resulted in the deaths of several hundred Lake Superior Chippewa. Officials of the Zachary Taylor Administration and Minnesota Territory sought to relocate several bands of the tribe to areas west of the Mississippi River. By changing the location for fall annuity payments, the officials intended the Chippewa to stay at the new site for the winter, hoping to lower their resistance to relocation. Due to delayed and inadequate payments of annuities and lack of promised supplies, about 400 Ojibwe, mostly men and 12% of the tribe, died of disease, starvation and cold. The outrage increased Ojibwe resistance to removal. The bands effectively gained widespread public support to achieve permanent reservations in their traditional territories.
The Lake Superior Chippewa are a large number of Ojibwe (Anishinaabe) bands living around Lake Superior; this territory is considered part of northern Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota in the United States. They migrated into the area by the seventeenth century, encroaching on the Eastern Dakota people who had historically occupied the area. The Ojibwe defeated the Eastern Dakota, who migrated west into the Great Plains after the final battle in 1745. While they share a common culture including the Anishinaabe language, this highly decentralized group of Ojibwe includes at least twelve independent bands in the region.
Lake Lena is an unincorporated community and Native American village in Ogema Township, Pine County, Minnesota, United States, located along the Lower Tamarack River. It currently is the administrative center for the Mille Lacs Indian Reservation, District III.
Juanita Growing Thunder Fogarty is a Native American, Assiniboine Sioux bead worker and porcupine quill worker. She creates traditional Northern Plains regalia.
Ribbon work is an appliqué technique for clothing and dance regalia among Prairie and Great Lakes indigenous peoples. Deb Haaland wore a ribbon skirt made by Agnes Woodward for her 2021 swearing in ceremony as US Interior Secretary.
The Mille Lacs Indian Museum and Trading Post is a museum dedicated to the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe's history, culture, and contemporary life. It officially opened to the public on May 18, 1996. Located in Onamia, Minnesota, United States, it is one of the 26 historical sites and museums run by the Minnesota Historical Society.
Big Indian Farms is a remote clearing in the Chequamegon Forest west of Medford, Wisconsin where as many as 130 Potawatomi and others lived from around 1896 to 1908. In this isolated spot they were able to practice and preserve their ancestors' culture better than if they had lived under the direct influence of the Bureau of Indian Affairs on a reservation.
Hole-in-the-Day (1825–1868) was a prominent chief of the Mississippi band of Ojibwe/Chippewa/Anishinaabe in Minnesota. The native pronunciation has been written with different spellings due different speakers variance in their enunciation, such as Bagone-giizhig, Bagwunagijik, Bug-o-nay-ki-shig, Pugonakeshig or Puk-O-Nay-Keshig. Hole-in-the-Day has also been called Hole-in-the-Sky. The name refers to a dream in which the guardian spirit was seen through an opening in the clouds. It also refers to the Anishinaabek name for the constellation of the same name, also known as the Pleiades.
Acosia Red Elk is a jingle dress dancer from the Umatilla people of Oregon. A descendant of Hin-mah-too-yah-lat-kekt, she did not become interested in dancing until she was 16, when she taught herself to dance from videos of other jingle dancers. Red Elk began dancing professionally in 1998 with her then-husband, Paris Leighton, visiting up to 50 pow wows a year for ten years.
The REDress Project by Jaime Black is a public art installation that was created in response to the missing and murdered Indigenous women (MMIW) epidemic in Canada and the United States. The on-going project began in 2010 and commemorates missing and murdered indigenous women from the First Nations, Inuit, Métis (FNIM), and Native American communities by hanging empty red dresses in a range of environments. The project has also inspired other artists to use red to draw attention to the issue of MMIW, and prompted the creation of Red Dress Day.
Brenda J. Child is an Ojibwe historian and author.
