"Mitakuye Oyasin" (Lakota: We are all related)
A movement to revitalize the culture of the Lakota has begun the process of healing.
The Lakota language is a core part of this. There are unique concepts in the language that can’t be directly translated into English, such as concepts of belonging and tribal relationships. Forcing children to attend boarding schools away from their families and forbidding the use of their language was an effective way to destroy those concepts and above all their culture.
But schools have again started teaching their language. In fact, one of the main Catholic schools in the region now hires Lakota language and culture teachers, and learning Lakota is core curriculum. Quite a positive change!
Food can be another core part of culture. There is a movement to bring back buffalo, and revive traditional foods that grow naturally in the region, like chokecherry, currant and buffalo berry. Traditional medicine is also being revived.
Hunting timpsila, a root that was a staple in traditional Lakota culture, has become a popular spring event for many Lakota, who stress hunting it sustainably so that it will expand rather than become more rare.
Spiritual practices and ceremonies can also be a part of culture. Lakota have very unique ways of expressing spirituality. Their prayers are deep. Sundance ceremonies are prayers that last for days.
Horse culture is a key part of Lakota identity. The Lakota were master horse people and many still are. This has given many tribal members pride, a sense of their value, a sense of place, and a reason to improve their situation and has touched many others as well.
This culture is being revived in many ways; driving through the reservation, you might see Lakota on horseback, traveling from one town to the next.
Traditional races and games are a big draw too. These races have gone national with the Horse Nations event held in different locations each year.
One way that spirituality is expressed through horse culture is through long rides (50-400 miles) to destinations that have deep significance. These long rides represent ceremony, meditation and prayer, and build community.
A 300 mile winter ride.
Arriving at the destination Mankato, Minnesota.
This ride was started as a means to heal an injustice where 38 Lakota were hanged over a century ago for a crime that was not committed, in the town of Mankato, MN. The ride was a form of prayer, meant to heal this wound, for all involved. When they arrived in Mankato, townspeople lined the street to honor them, and many Lakota were invited into their homes. This truly was a healing action.
It is also a warrior action - riding 300 miles in winter is no easy feat. The warrior culture has evolved for some to mean the development of inner strength, the ability to withstand hardships, and still retain humanity and love.
The main project we worked with on the reservation was the Oglala-Lakota Cultural and Economic Revitalization Initiative, or “OLCERI”.
Traditional foods, “inner warrior” culture and other spiritual components were woven into the design of the project. The head of the project, Lakota Bryan Deans, incorporated permaculture principles through a lens of the cultural worldviews of the Lakota.
Bryan Deans, creator of the OLCERI project.
Though I organized, funded and provided resources for a number of projects there, the cultural aspects had to be created by Lakota, and were key to capturing imaginations and getting others interested in incorporating those principles, and building community.
I’ll share a practical example of including cultural elements into the design. I was designing a food forest on the site. Because the Lakota have such a strong horse culture, and many horses are semi-wild and not always contained by fencing, it was important to design systems that were non-toxic to horses.
akota horses are often semi-wild and athletic, and can get over fences if they really want to, ending up in gardens, orchards, and yes, outdoor classrooms.
So we put together an extensive list of useful plants that are, however, toxic to horses in order to avoid bringing them into the ecosystem. One example is walnuts. Walnut trees harbor juglone, a chemical in the tree’s roots, branches and leaves.
This is toxic to many plants and animals, but extremely so for horses. It’s so toxic that if they stand underneath a walnut tree for any length of time, it’s possible for them to get laminitis, a hoof disease that can be crippling.
We had considered including a walnut orchard but decided to skip it because of the risk of horses being tempted to stand in the shade of the trees. Trees are rare in the prairie and summer days are hot. Walnuts live for hundreds of years.
How could we design a system to ensure horses would not end up hanging out under them for extended periods of time? The best way was to simply not plant them. Instead, we looked at other nuts we could plant like pine, or seeds like sunflowers.
Garden at OLCERI. Compost toilet is being built in the background using tipi poles.
The paint design on this cob oven and bench includes symbols meaningful to Lakota.
Events were created incorporating Lakota music, round structures and other cultural elements along with education about food growing and natural building.
Traditional pow wow structure is used as an outdoor classroom, event space and of course, for pow wow celebrations. The parachute in the middle was donated and installed to provide additional shade in response to a heat wave during a multicultural event, the Indigenous Wisdom and Permaculture Skills Convergence.
Permaculture principles are universal, and translatable into just about any cultural situation. But use and acceptance often requires an understanding and honoring of cultural realities. Designing in the context of the local culture can help the project to succeed.