Dancing and drumming at Vancouver powwow one part of keeping Indigenous culture alive in the Northwest

Civil rights, political upheaval and the uncertain future are on the minds of Indigenous citizens as they prepare for the annual traditional powwow set for Saturday at Clark College.

Hundreds of participants from all over the Pacific Northwest are expected to attend, including as many as 20 local young people who have been practicing their dance steps and fashioning their colorful regalia during gatherings of the Native American Rising Generations Foundation.

“They are a bunch of hard workers,” said Robert Barnes, chairman of the Rising Generations Foundation.

The Clark County nonprofit agency that helps pass Indigenous culture from elders to youth sponsors the annual powwow every spring. Rising Generations used to be a school-based group called the Native American Parent Association of Southwest Washington. A few years ago, leaders decided the organization would be freer to serve its whole community if it spun off as a nonprofit independent of the school system, Barnes said.

“We are keeping our culture alive and passing it down to the next generation,” Barnes said.

That’s the whole point of a powwow, a tradition that originates on the Great Plains circa 1900, when white America was on the march and Native Americans were seeking solidarity in retreat. Then, powwows were exercises in cultural survival. Some argue that the same mission continues today.

“We are very concerned we stand a chance of losing our citizenship,” Barnes said.

News and word-of-mouth reports of immigration enforcement agents detaining or harassing Native people living in urban centers close to the southern border, like Phoenix, Ariz., have made Natives all over the U.S. — including here in the Pacific Northwest — anxious and angry, he said.

“We weren’t considered citizens in our own land until 1924,” said Barnes, who traces his heritage to the Crow Creek Sioux tribe of South Dakota. “We got our citizenship through an act of Congress, and I guess they could decide we’re not citizens again.”

The Chinook Indian Nation, based in Pacific County on the Washington Coast, last week released a statement describing its disappointment with U.S. Rep. Maria Gluesenkamp Perez, D-Skamania, for weakening proposed legislation aimed at restoring the tribe’s official federal recognition, which was briefly granted in 2001 but abruptly rescinded again in 2002. Without federal recognition, the tribe can’t access resources like public health and housing programs that sister tribes enjoy.

“All of our lands, villages, sacred sites, fishing and burial grounds were taken away from us by the United States,” Chinook tribal Chairman Tony Johnson said. “The Chinook Indian Nation cannot be asked to give up even more.”

Role models

What exactly is a powwow? Today’s powwows are noisy, friendly, intertribal gatherings focused on dancing and drumming, with plenty of room around the edges for mingling, browsing craft booths and sampling goodies like fry bread. Saturday’s loose schedule includes dance sessions for participants of different genders, ages and skill levels — including a few open to anybody and everybody, including non-Indigenous visitors bold enough to come down off the bleachers and get a taste of the action.

If your eyes and ears have never been filled up with colorful regalia and the pounding rhythms of Native drums, you may find it’s a rewarding cultural experience that has you coming back every year.

The event is free, and visitors are welcome to come and go as they please. Although there’s a markedly informal, easygoing vibe to most powwow proceedings, it’s always a good idea to show respect before taking photos of individual dancers by asking for permission — which they’re usually happy to give.

Amid all that informality, don’t miss one of two formal, flag-bearing Grand Entry parades, scheduled for 1 p.m. and 6 p.m. (after a dinner break at 5 p.m.) led by elders and military veterans, who always occupy positions of honor and respect in Native culture.

But the event’s designated lead dancers are always young people. (This year’s lead dancers, Qalch’ema Friedlander and Cil Xu Sasquet Friedlander Jr., are from Oregon, not Clark County.)

“You want someone who can dance 10 to 12 hours in the day,” Barnes said. “They are responsible for being role models for Native American kids, and non-Native kids who show up too.”