Gregory Smoak

Wovoka's vision was probably around the 1st of January, 1889.

It spread very rapidly.

And ironically, as it's branded as this kind of primitive vision.

backward-looking movement, the irony is it spread through the English language, native people who had learned to read and write English, and technology, the trains.

People, you took the trains to see the prophet, they went to trains there.

So this word can spread very rapidly in this modern world.

It is native people, as they always have done, are adapting to the world in which they live.

Yeah.

I mean, it is a religious ceremony that is meant to bring about a particular end.

So I guess, you know, you could call that, I mean, the ceremony itself is

was based on a traditional round dance, which is people counterclockwise, slowly shuffling.

There's no drum.

People are singing.

Round dances can be social, but they can also be ceremonial.

In this case, obviously, it's a ceremonial dance.

One thing I want to add about Wovoka, though, Wovoka means the cutter or wood cutter.

And Jack Wilson is the name that he got when he lived among the Wilson family.

And this is very indicative of life among Native people, especially in the Great Basin at that time.

Many survived by wage labor.

Wovoka is the first generation to really grow up in a colonized world.