Don Wildman

But as you say, the ghost dance, which had been so much of the phenomenon at this time, was lost in this and the more positive story of it was lost.

Let's talk about that.

I mean, Wounded Knee happens and we're moving past this.

How does the ghost dance move on into even into modern culture today?

Yeah.

Well, it speaks to the resilience of that whole civilization and those cultures, which have been remarkably strengthened over the last century, for sure.

Quite the opposite of what was expected to happen back in the 19th century, which was, as you call it, assimilation.

That's true of so many different societies.

That's how it used to be seen.

And that had so much to do with Christianity and how to help these people through changing them.

Now it's seen differently.

There's a patchwork of conversation about that whole subject because reservations are troubled places in so many places.

But in others, it's a different story.

It's a fascinating and pluralistic world we're talking about here.

And that's now the fair way to discuss it.

Gregory Smoke is a professor of history at the University of Utah, who has in the past also taught at Colorado State and Minnesota.

He's the author of Ghost Dances and Identity, Prophetic Religion and American Indian Ethnogenesis in the 19th Century.

He has worked with Native nations, authoring research projects for Park Service, as well as numbers of indigenous nations.

And as I mentioned, past president of the National Council of Public History.

Thank you, Greg.