Tent of Many Voices: M09010506TEG

go we've been traveling since January of 2003 started in monachello and so we've made it here to Hamilton and uh it's been a great reception here so far so thank you very much lots to do and see we have our exhibit tent over here replicas of the keelboat The Dugout and the proges um we are joined by our federal Partners the Bureau of Land Management with their little white tent uh the US forest service over there um the National Guard back behind us with their camouflage tent hope you can find that so anyway um please walk around and take it all in and enjoy yourselves and enjoy the fair the tent of many voices this tent was a place designed to uh bring in different people of professional backgrounds and cultures to share with us their knowledge and wisdom as it relates directly and sometimes indirectly with the lwis and Clark and Expedition and so for this hour I'd like to welcome Mary Jane Charlo uh she is the native Adventures manager and member of the um Salish cut tribe and so I'm going to let her tell you more about um the native Adventures program and she's going to be talking about Lewis and Clark animals so let's welcome Mary Jane to our stage good afternoon um I work at the people Center I don't know if you know what that is it's the cultural visitors center for the Confederate Salish and cutney tribes on the Flathead reservation which is north of Missoula uh Native Adventures is a tourism program for the tribes and that's what I do I schedule tours tours and set up trips for group large groups and small groups and it's pretty much wide open depending on on the person on what they want to do and how long they want to stay what I'm going to do today is Give the names and Salish of these animals hi Mary give the names of the animals in Salish and then do the sign language for them okay I've been I've been learning the sign language for about three four years since I finished a class with Johnny AR Le one of our cultural uh teachers up on the reservation I took a cultural leadership class with him for two years it was a two-year class and it was teaching the about the culture and the history through language okay through the Salish language one of the ways that he taught us the language and different words and how how to speak and stuff I'm not fluent by any means one of the ways was he talked sign language while he spoke the Salish so you were able to comprehend more what he was saying without the English kind of like being in Stuck in the Middle there um so that's where I started learning about the animals my granddaughter who was who's 11 years old we just finished doing the explore the Big Sky and Great Falls and she worked with me for 5 days straight 7 hours a day doing this okay she was supposed to come today but her cousin from Minnesota showed up she hadn't seen her cousin all summer and it was her cousin's birthday today so she ditched out on me so I'll do this by myself okay so we'll just start from this end oh let's get this one down here I don't have all of the puppets and I don't have all of the sign language for them but most of them I do when you're speaking sign language all of the sign hi R hey there's my cousin there's like all the sign language takes part right in between your waist and your neck this is the hand that is kind of like your base you use it for measuring and you use it for this hand to do the action on you know so right in between here and here unless it's something specifically where you would use like today like that or this afternoon so like this hand you you'd use this hand on it going like evening and morning like this okay so I'll start with the signs here okay this one is the black bear and flamp Cat and okay the sign for that black bear is his little round ears that's what it is okay that and here we have a little black bear right okay the sign for that one is little black bear okay this M mahuya what is it yeah some participation here okay the sign for raccoon I take my I could see better if I put this over my glasses this is a mahuya his banded eyes and what do you think it is for little mahuya right little mahuya okay this one is the grizzly bearin we have a sound in our language that comes from your throat it's written as an X in the international alphabet can you it's just expelling air from your throat okay the sign for the grizzly bear is two signs it could be this one because they Mark the territory scratching trees or this so some okay this one okay this one is the one I have a hard time remembering all of them okay we don't have the adult deer the Bucks and we don't have the adult do we have the little deer so that just starts me out on on the black tail or the mule deer the the buck is pu pu for a mu there okay um how many of you hunt okay you know the difference between a mule deer and a white tail okay mule deer's horns spread out they spread so this is a sign for the for the male black tail pu pu the male white tail got that X in there again A W sound is the white tail curved forward okay the black tailed D is St big ears the white tail D is because when they turn around they run they're flagging their tail a danger okay the elk we don't have an elk but the bull elk is tet and that's just like a big like this tett and the cow SN well easy to remember okay don't have the sign language for this but everybody knows what this is anyways this is um St everybody knows what this one is this one has all of our animals and all of um all of our animals you all have stories for all of them and in our creation stories animals came before people people which is when I was working with a lot of kids and and I always like to tell them our creation stories parallel with angl Christian Christianity you know animals came first right okay and people always say trying to say well leis and Clark followed old Indian Trails you know our elders say well actually they were animal Trails the animals knew the quickest and easiest routes to get somewhere you know they didn't go over the highest mountain and all the way down the deepest valleys you know they were smarter than that so actually Le and Clark followed animal trails and this this little uh animal here has human traits you know like when somebody is nervous and they start to fidget you know their their foot's going or or the they cut are going like this like this okay same thing this one does too when it starts fidgeting I think you've been there too long when you notice that when his little feet start going up and down that's when you know you should have been gone okay everybody knows a sign for this Quai what's the sign for this tatonka yeah I got it back there Tatanka remember universal sign with Indians tatonka okay this one here is what a horse good you're so smart okay this one is a hard onea Sasa okay sign for that very easy you got this hand to do the movement on this is the horse that and I have a story about this one I don't know what the sign language is for the name for this one is quick J okay okay the story with this little animal is that there was a young man who was considered slow you know like this story teaches people about every little thing every person no matter how seemingly unimportant has a place and a reason to be there so the story about this little animal starts with the young man who was considered slow you know he couldn't keep up with the rest of the young men and he couldn't run and play with them hunt ride horses or whatever and so he was always left behind and he spent a lot of time alone so one day while he was out alone and he kind of wandered back and he found realized everybody in the camp had left all the camps were gone and he he had no idea where they went you know and then he could hear some someone crying like sobbing and someone was crying like they their heart was broken he wandered down through the trees and there was this teepee he went inside the teepee and he peaked in the door and what he seen looked like with the back to him was like an old woman and she was crying her heart out and he asked her grandmother why are you crying you know and he asked her is there something I can do for you and she says my children they're gone she said I I I kept them in a in our house in the chief's pillow you know and so they're all gone and he says well we can follow them you know it's easy to follow them we'll follow the trail and the old lady wanted him just to go get the children so he took off he followed the trail and as he walked along you know they could pretty easy follow because of travo and dragging the PO horses Footprints all kinds of different ways to follow the the trail and when he found them it was getting towards night time and it was getting dark and he found the chief's teepee and he went into it you know cuz remember like he wasn't like right on the ball with everything so this is something you don't do if the door's closed you know you don't just walk into a teepee if there's a door closed on there it means that you know you it's it's private or you know you're supposed to let him know you're there so he opened the door and he walked in and he was standing over there looking at the Chief and the chief was laying there he was sleeping the chief you know you wake when you when someone's looking at you especially if you're sleeping you're going to wake up you know and he he woke up and he looked at this young man who was standing there over looking over him and he's going uh what do you want and the young man said uh can I dig in your pillow and the chief goes well sure go ahead there's nothing in there and so the young man dug inside the pillow and he found the babies and they were in like a little nest and he started leaving the chief asked did you find what you want he goes yes I did and he went all the way back and he found the the grandmother and he told her grandmother I found your children and she was so happy you know and she had tears coming down she was so joyful and he goes here they are he goes I don't know if they're all there because I didn't know how many you had you know and she's so happy and she counts the mom goes they're all here and she said for this I'll give you a a a great reward you know and what she told him what she gave him uh the gift that she gave him gave him a great ability all the young men whenever he went out on raiding party Hunting Party or whatever wanted to go with him they wanted to accompany him when the reason for that was the little mouse gave him the power to go in places and not be seen and to leave the same way so that's the one of the story about the mouse do you like it okay everybody is all just really listening okay okay this one is messed up okay my what big teeth you have okay what is it okay it's a wolf okay this is easy and seen andsen when you say the word cats the on the end cat okay anden that's the sound that's in in this word and seen is the wolf okay let me think I remember the oh yeah okay this is a sign for Wolf okay you change it slightly to it changes to Hunter all right okay and this is the wolf's little brother coyote okay we call him Cula Cula to us is a real important person in in our cultural in our like histor histor historical stories our creation stories and everything you um and the beginning create I can't tell coyote stories because we're not supposed to tell them in the summer months until after the first snowfall and stop talking about him after the first Thunder but um in our creation stories uh long time before people were even here um there were spirits you know and people might think of them as U uh God or or whatever you know but there were Spirits out there and they created animals and the and God we call God or kultin or whatever people call everybody every culture has a name for God all right but cre the spirits um decided that they were going to have people so they created the animals first and they told these animals we're creating you and we're putting you on Earth because man is coming and he's going to be born naked and he's not going to know anything he's not going to take care of himself and he's not going to know anything so you're going to be put on the earth to help him okay how do these animals help us all right everybody always heard stories about people going out seeking vision you know fasting and praying for 4 days or however days you know and and they get a vision and some people says it's delirium you know and whatever you know but you know I believe in my tradition traditional ways and I believe you know we had our ways way before you know all of a lot of other things came along and I I believe in him and one of the one of the ways this Al also will teach you about something else that we do drumming and singing okay dancing and drumming and singing are very important in our culture you know we still carry that on today in pow all right we dance and we sing like how one question I like to ask to ask kids is um how many of you read the Bible okay how many of you have read the Bible okay quite a few okay I read the Bible I was uh on fireborn Christian door door evangelism at one time um I don't do it anymore but um in the Old Testament it talked about David dancing before the Lord he's dancing before the Lord naked you know what was he doing he was praising God wasn't he okay you can draw that similarity with our dancing and our singing okay those songs were given to us by Spirits when somebody gets a song you know like you thinking of and they go seek a vision they seek counsel and they're given a song song song makers and singers are very special that's communicating between this world and that world okay people say we got a song of who's your helper okay a number of animals could be the helper they received a song their helper could be from the wind or from the I have a very close friend her her song comes from the sound of melting ice you know water so there's a lot of different things you know so with this uh little animal in the beginning of creation he was known as trickster he's very important and who is he you know when you think about it and the the analogies drawn you know he's us he's he's the foolish person who's always done the things that he wish he didn't do you know you know that's that's who this guy is and other times he's so smart you know and he is cunning most the time it doesn't end up in a good way because that's who he is you know but that's just an explanation of songs and animals trying to draw that kind of give you an idea about singing and dancing and connection between animals all animals have different traits for instance like this your animal here spell turtle okay I have a daughter that just really loves Turtles she's 22 years old on her dance outfit she has all kinds of different little turtles that she's received during the years on her belt I made her a turtle bag and in the middle of it it has a heart and I I told her the reason I made her that bag is because this animal stands for wisdom longevity and strength okay no matter what happens you know you heard about race between the hair and the turtle you know you just keep trying and you don't give up okay and so on that bag on her back was that turtle and there was a heart on there because a turtle has a very strong heart you can try to kill it and they say his heart will just keep beating and beating and beating and also like because I love her I've also put a heart on it so there's a lot of different reasons you know people make things for like their relatives or someone they care for and you'll see goes oh that looks kind of crazy I wonder what that is for you know but there's usually a good reason for it so this is SP and the sign for him is this then his little head coming in and up right and for some reason I can't remember the name for snake but this is a an simple that need there's something else too like with sign language if you want to ask a question is simply depending on the circumstances for instance if I was sitting in this chair Mary and I were sitting in this chair and we knew everybody that was in the room somebody walks in that's a stranger you know and we see that person walk in together and I might go like this to her that means so what who who is it you know or if you're buying something this is like talking for buying okay if you're buying something and you really like it and you go quinch how much see so this is always the question or you might you might see somebody you as a you know I might see you walk in and get happy to see you but you're over there and I go you know and go how are you you go good that okay this one here scal scal L scal what is it okay he's got little teeth okay we know what that is okay sign language for that put your hand out okay why right he's when he gets alarmed he slaps the water with his tail Dives they all dive down underwater to go into the into the house okay this is a frog I just learned this one I didn't know the name of this was a very good sign for this one this has a sound in it called bardel okay put your tongue behind your front teeth and blow air out the sides kids can do it easy if you tell them go they they can do it pretty okay so this one is slam SL SL SL slam SL slam SL frog okay sign language for frog that's easy it's good okay and this sne sne real easy one this big eyes okay this is an interesting sign with this one this is not very easy to say man's best friend okay a long time ago our dogs man's best friend I don't think we're that loyal because they were wolves they were kind of like tamed they hung around you fed them you know and the dogs are called and Q sound comes out of your throat and kosam okay that was D dog sign for dog the Travoy used to tie on to the dog before we had horses so that's sign for dog we were really glad to get horses you know you P put all your packed your stuff on one of these and he got to smell up his nose that he want to investigate he was gone so we were really glad to get horses okay this one here Mountain line okay this one here that's a little one okay little te me out okay what's the sign for Mountain line like a cat nose okay you make the cat nose and then the eye is watching because he's always watching okay and we don't have a bobcat but the B sign for Bobcat is also the same sign for house cat just push your nose up a little bit on the end that's Bobcat or house cat all right this that's a hard one it has that s with the X sound and a K on the end okay we all know what that is right it's not a reindeer okay okay so moose okay sign for moose okay what else I think I've gone through my stuff okay are the oh this doesn't have anything to do with my side language but here are posters um Tony and CA asked me to work with the Lewis and Clark commission and Clinton Blackwood came to me uh but about a year ago or two years ago and said he's getting a little concerned because there was no participation from the Salish and so I said well they probably don't want to celebrate LS and Clark because of the what came after you know it was not happy but um I told them what they would celebrate though would be if they wanted the Indians come down and have a celebration it would have to be an Indian celebration you know and I knew they wouldn't the elders wouldn't go for celebrating l Clark but what this PA is for is we have banded together with the ls and Clark B Centennial commission the circle of tribal advisers Sula and Darby ranger district and aerate Chamber of Commerce to put this power on and what this is for celebrating the diplomacy the hospitality and the generosity of Salish okay in this picture this picture was done by Jesse Henderson it was like $45,000 it's hanging in I forget where it's hanging in Helena but it shows Chief three eagles who is one of my ancestors um Charlo they the L goes from tanak before three eagles and three eagles then Victor then Chief charot then Martin and then my father Tony but it shows them here you know it's called offering of the great clearing and so we welcome them we took care of them and traded them horses is what they had in the journal but our elders say no Sint Indian would have traded for those horses you know we gave them our horses and put them out to pasture in the journals it says we they traded for excellent saish horses so what this is going to be is not exactly a reenactment of that meeting but the whole idea behind it is for visitors to come and be welcomed by the Salish again in the bitat valley 200 years later for everybody open to the public and what we're going to be doing there is Grand entry will be start Friday night at 7:00 it's all free camping's free you know you don't have to pay anything to get in and there are going to be arts and craft vendors food vendors and Native guided po out tours that's what I do back home as we have native guides take people through the PA explain the dancing and explain whatever is going on there you know and and help them so they can participate and become part of the celebration instead of just like somebody watching standing back watching on the outside okay and so that's what we'll be doing on the first night and also there'll be viewing of uh Johnny AR Le's video the L and Clark expedition meet the saor and Ponder Indians that was funded by loose and Clark Grant on Saturday we'll start with the grand entry with the snake dance okay a lot of our names were given to a lot of our different things in English have nothing to do with they about what they really are okay like the snake dance has given that name has nothing to do with snakes you know what the snake dance it's called that probably because in English when they danced in they came in this way in line dancing in okay what the snake dance represents is like a victory dance you know it's a Warrior dance a long time ago way before Horses The Warriors would come back if they returned it was successful you know they would come in they would be tired starving you know they would be WIP pretty much wiped out they'd be staggered into Camp you know and the camp would be welcoming but they would be coming in like this and so what you see on this the only time we do it is Fourth of July celebration it's the biggest celebration up on the reservation you have hundreds of dancers coming in for a snake dance on that and it's very exciting okay we have I got permission from the elders to do it down here in uh Sula you know so that's going to be something extra special to see and we'll have the I think the I'm not sure if that happened yet do you know if they're going to have that veterans ceremony okay we'll have a veterans honoring C Cy right after that grand entry and then there'll be dancing contest dancing and drumming and singing and then the welcoming ceremony is open to all visitors to participate and what we do we have what we call a giveaway dance and it's a round dance where whoever's having the giveaway is in the center and they give to whoever's dancing because remember the dancing is like a really good thing to be doing when you go to Pawa you here the announcer will say everybody get up and dance you know get up and dance for those that can't dance for those that have passed away and for those who are coming you know so dancing is very important to us so whoever comes down and dances with us you know will be honored and also at that same time we'll have the loose and clarky and actors come out and be part of that and then about 5:00 we'll have a buffalo feed none of this is is you know you're not getting charged for any of this and then later on that at night we'll have start again at 7 and then we will uh uh continue with the dancing and the drumming and and have uh I think we're having Clint Clint's going to stand up and say some words too Clint Blackwood uh is he called the director or the chair chairman of the Montana anyway he's the head loose and clar guy for Montana but U so that's going on September 9th and 10th if you wish you can come and get one of these posters to remind you if you wanted to go are there any questions anyone have any questions for Mary Jane all oh we got one over here hang on let me bring this over so everyone can hear when will that event it's the 9th and 10th but it's here in the bitteroot but where Sula grab a poster I don't know am I hooked on to something here any other questions oh Eagle did we get the eagle the eagle sorry okay you were watching mil ands milk ands yeah okay easy sign just that's we have two kinds of eagles the bald eagle and the golden eagle okay what Johnny told me in the class was the golden eagle is mainly the ones is the one that has to do with Indians more so than the bald eagle because the bald eagle is the one you always see like sitting up by himself you know all solitary the golden eagle you know if you're watching you will see him in there with the animals you know and there's different stories and pictures coyote stories of of a golden eagle sitting there surrounded by animals and they're holding a council you know they're have making decisions and stuff but any other ones any other questions all right well let's thank Mary Jane for coming and sharing with us