STATE COLLEGE, Pa. (WJAC) — Penn State University sponsored a traditional Native American powwow Saturday and Sunday. People from a number of tribes and nations gathered at a State College middle school to celebrate Native American culture and spirituality.
It's an old tradition, but for many people in State College, this was their first experience with a powwow.
"It is many things at once," Victoria Sanchez, the powwow's associate coordinator, told 6 News on Sunday. "It is a celebration. It is almost like a family reunion where people come together and enjoy each other's company."
This was the 16th annual Penn State Powwow.
"Our people don't believe that blood makes you family," Patrick Littlewolf Brooks told us. "Blood makes you related, but it doesn't make you family."
"And we believe if we make you family, then we will always protect each other."
The powwow was intertribal, with people from many North American tribes and nations here this year.
"I've been dancing since I was able to walk," Littlewolf explained. "Dancing is a part of indigenous culture. It's bred into you from the day that you're born. You're born around that drum, that drum's your whole life because the meaning behind that drum — that power, the circle of life behind that drum — gets indoctrinated into your system. So, dancing is second nature. It's almost like breathing."
"Today," said Sanchez, "especially in a place like central Pennsylvania, where there aren't a lot of native people, where there aren't a lot of opportunities to get to know native people... How are people supposed to know who we are and what our traditions are, or even that we're still here today?"
Much of that involves combatting Native American stereotypes in popular culture.
Littlewolf, who's affiliated with the Tuscarora tribe of the Iroquois, told us one of those is Hollywood depicting that sacred drumbeat as "menacing."
"But our drumbeat represents our true heartbeat," he said. "You know, it races, it slows down. So, everything [revolves] around that heartbeat."
"We call the drum 'the heartbeat of the nation,'" he added. "As long as the drum can play, our people continue to walk strong."
Littlewolf emphasized that they wanted the powwow to also shine a light on issues, mentioning the epidemic of missing indigenous women and the mass graves of children at former U.S. and Canadian residential schools.
"These things need to be talked about," he said. "And people think native people are looking for an apology. We're not looking for an apology. We're looking for recognition. We need people to know we are still here. We have our own voices and we're not all the same tribe."
This powwow provided not only an experience, but a chance to get educated.
Takara Hansell — a member of the Native American Women Warriors, a group of female veterans and soldiers who've been part of two presidential inauguration parades — told 6 News "The best way is by learning, is by experiencing it, hearing the music, hearing the teachings, seeing what's happening all around you and being able to try the food, getting out there to...go out to dance."
"'Cause of when they say it's intertribal, that means everybody's welcome," the U.S. Air Force veteran continued. "It's not just all natives, it's everybody."
Just like the drums, the powwow tradition keeps marching on, to its own beat.
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