Post by Okwes on Dec 28, 2007 12:18:45 GMT -5
Paying to teach and play Indian
SAN FRANCISCO - They climb mountains on a quest for a vision. They
beat drums and shake rattles. They pray in sweat lodges. Some study
for years and later teach others the spirituality they paid to learn.
They are a growing population. But they are not Native. And as self-
proclaimed medicine men and women or shaman - referred to by some
critics as ''plastic medicine men'' or ''shake and bake shaman'' -
they often charge for spiritual services.
That, for many Natives here, is a big problem.
''Even if they're not charging for money, they have no idea about our
people's ways, they have no idea what they're doing and how
catastrophic it can be,'' said Jimmy Red Elk, 32, a traditional
Oglala Lakota who lives in Los Angeles. ''It's really bad out here.''
The liberal-leaning state has always been abundant with New Age
centers and people who advertise Native-themed services ranging
from ''Native healing and ceremonies'' to ''pilgrimages to sacred
places.''
Over the past two decades, such centers and retreats run by non-
Natives have spread across the state - and the country - sometimes
with deadly results. In 2002, two people died after spending more
than an hour in a sweat lodge in southern California run by the group
the Shamanic Fellowship.
Traditional elders, activists and groups have written resolutions and
held protests denouncing such services. Some have even forcibly shut
down questionable practitioners by dissembling their sweat lodges.
But such practices have only increased. And, in recent years, even
more groups have sprouted up online.
''Our ways are not for sale!'' wrote D'Shane Barnett, 31, a member of
the Mandan and Arikara tribes, in an e-mail sent recently to
dozens. ''People cannot claim to understand our ways with one breath
and then offer to sell them with their next breath.''
Barnett, a special projects officer at the Native American Health
Center in Oakland, was referring to an e-mail he received by mistake,
intended for a company called Native American Nutritionals. From
their site he had been lead to another, thenativehealer.com.
There, he found an offer of ''spiritual adoption'' for a $90 donation
and $5 in monthly payments by the Nemenhah Band and Native American
Traditional Organization of the Oklevueha Native American Church of
Sanpete.
The group is an ''independent band'' which offers enrollment in an
online college where people can pay to qualify as medicine men or
women, healers and Native practitioners, according to their Web site.
Courses range from online lessons in smudging to a six-hour ''Unipi
Ceremony Practicum,'' which requires a mentor to ''come to your
lodge.''
Each member receives a ''ministerial card'' that is valid as long as
they are progressing and ''making regular offerings,'' according to
the Web site.
Similar Native-themed services are offered for a price across the
country. In Washington, Tana ''Blue Deer Woman'' Hamiter offers
vision quests for $300 on www.onwingsofflight.com. A ''Southwest
Spirit Quest Tour'' offered by www.divine lightministries.com
includes ''a night spent in a traditional Navajo hogan''
and ''authentic Native ceremonies.''
''My first reaction was anger,'' Barnett said. ''But when I spoke
with a couple of different medicine people, the way they explained it
to me is that I need to pity these people. What they are doing is
filling a void.''
Though it may not appear so, seekers of Native spirituality are often
well-intentioned, said Ann Riley, a shamanic counselor in the East
Bay.
''The yearning for a spiritual connection is common,'' said Riley,
70. ''Americans are very drawn to the Native American spirituality
because it's the indigenous spiritually of this continent.''
Riley is a white, retired schoolteacher who for 15 years has
studied ''shamanism'' - which she defines as a technique for
connecting with ''spirits for healing and problem solving'' - with a
shamanic center in Marin.
Today, she charges $75 for a 1 and 1/2 - 2 hour session, during which
she uses a drum or rattle to help students ''enter an altered state''
from which they connect with spirits, she said. It usually takes four
to five lessons, she explained.
At her El Cerrito office she holds drumming circles and long-distance
group healing. Her students include teenagers and ''lots of
psychologists,'' she said.
She has known self-proclaimed spiritual leaders who have gotten sick
by taking hallucinogenic drugs from South America or Mexico in
ceremony.
''Sometimes white Americans go to some other culture or read about
something and think they know how to do it,'' she said. ''It's really
something that you have to immerse yourself in. I see it really as
lack of respect.''
Philip Scott, 44, said he has immersed himself in ''the Native Path
for more than 25 years,'' in an ad in the New Age magazine Open
Exchange.
Today, the founder of the Ancestral Voice - Center for Indigenous
Lifeways in Novato, he offers services including ''Rites of Passage''
ceremonies and classes in ''Native drum and flute.''
Scott said he is of European and Cherokee ancestry, though he isn't
sure how much. And, he is Lakota not ''by blood ancestry, but by
affiliation,'' he said. After years of studying various spiritual
practices, he had a dream about the Sun Dance, he said. He received
permission to dance in South Dakota, he explained.
''During my third Sun Dance, the spirits came to me and said I need
to create a center,'' he said. Scott said he was ''bonneted'' at a
Texas Sun Dance as a ceremonial leader.
Today, Scott holds Sweatlodge ceremonies - some of which have
included newborn babies, he said - and doctoring, birthing and death
ceremonies in the Lakota tradition. He has taught ''warriorship
practices'' to youth and has worked as a Native spiritual adviser at
the Napa State Hospital in Marin.
And he takes people on vision quests. ''I help people learn how to be
human, responsible stewards of the Earth,'' he said. ''I listen to
the directions the ancestors give me.''
Scott is earnest, saying he rarely receives criticism, and that
people's doubts quickly dissipate when they see him in action.
''There is a lot of appropriation of Native practices and
tradition,'' he said. ''There has to be that level of intent and
experience that you bring. In time, the spirits will make clear who
is legitimate and who is not.''
Here is the link to this story.
www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096415228
SAN FRANCISCO - They climb mountains on a quest for a vision. They
beat drums and shake rattles. They pray in sweat lodges. Some study
for years and later teach others the spirituality they paid to learn.
They are a growing population. But they are not Native. And as self-
proclaimed medicine men and women or shaman - referred to by some
critics as ''plastic medicine men'' or ''shake and bake shaman'' -
they often charge for spiritual services.
That, for many Natives here, is a big problem.
''Even if they're not charging for money, they have no idea about our
people's ways, they have no idea what they're doing and how
catastrophic it can be,'' said Jimmy Red Elk, 32, a traditional
Oglala Lakota who lives in Los Angeles. ''It's really bad out here.''
The liberal-leaning state has always been abundant with New Age
centers and people who advertise Native-themed services ranging
from ''Native healing and ceremonies'' to ''pilgrimages to sacred
places.''
Over the past two decades, such centers and retreats run by non-
Natives have spread across the state - and the country - sometimes
with deadly results. In 2002, two people died after spending more
than an hour in a sweat lodge in southern California run by the group
the Shamanic Fellowship.
Traditional elders, activists and groups have written resolutions and
held protests denouncing such services. Some have even forcibly shut
down questionable practitioners by dissembling their sweat lodges.
But such practices have only increased. And, in recent years, even
more groups have sprouted up online.
''Our ways are not for sale!'' wrote D'Shane Barnett, 31, a member of
the Mandan and Arikara tribes, in an e-mail sent recently to
dozens. ''People cannot claim to understand our ways with one breath
and then offer to sell them with their next breath.''
Barnett, a special projects officer at the Native American Health
Center in Oakland, was referring to an e-mail he received by mistake,
intended for a company called Native American Nutritionals. From
their site he had been lead to another, thenativehealer.com.
There, he found an offer of ''spiritual adoption'' for a $90 donation
and $5 in monthly payments by the Nemenhah Band and Native American
Traditional Organization of the Oklevueha Native American Church of
Sanpete.
The group is an ''independent band'' which offers enrollment in an
online college where people can pay to qualify as medicine men or
women, healers and Native practitioners, according to their Web site.
Courses range from online lessons in smudging to a six-hour ''Unipi
Ceremony Practicum,'' which requires a mentor to ''come to your
lodge.''
Each member receives a ''ministerial card'' that is valid as long as
they are progressing and ''making regular offerings,'' according to
the Web site.
Similar Native-themed services are offered for a price across the
country. In Washington, Tana ''Blue Deer Woman'' Hamiter offers
vision quests for $300 on www.onwingsofflight.com. A ''Southwest
Spirit Quest Tour'' offered by www.divine lightministries.com
includes ''a night spent in a traditional Navajo hogan''
and ''authentic Native ceremonies.''
''My first reaction was anger,'' Barnett said. ''But when I spoke
with a couple of different medicine people, the way they explained it
to me is that I need to pity these people. What they are doing is
filling a void.''
Though it may not appear so, seekers of Native spirituality are often
well-intentioned, said Ann Riley, a shamanic counselor in the East
Bay.
''The yearning for a spiritual connection is common,'' said Riley,
70. ''Americans are very drawn to the Native American spirituality
because it's the indigenous spiritually of this continent.''
Riley is a white, retired schoolteacher who for 15 years has
studied ''shamanism'' - which she defines as a technique for
connecting with ''spirits for healing and problem solving'' - with a
shamanic center in Marin.
Today, she charges $75 for a 1 and 1/2 - 2 hour session, during which
she uses a drum or rattle to help students ''enter an altered state''
from which they connect with spirits, she said. It usually takes four
to five lessons, she explained.
At her El Cerrito office she holds drumming circles and long-distance
group healing. Her students include teenagers and ''lots of
psychologists,'' she said.
She has known self-proclaimed spiritual leaders who have gotten sick
by taking hallucinogenic drugs from South America or Mexico in
ceremony.
''Sometimes white Americans go to some other culture or read about
something and think they know how to do it,'' she said. ''It's really
something that you have to immerse yourself in. I see it really as
lack of respect.''
Philip Scott, 44, said he has immersed himself in ''the Native Path
for more than 25 years,'' in an ad in the New Age magazine Open
Exchange.
Today, the founder of the Ancestral Voice - Center for Indigenous
Lifeways in Novato, he offers services including ''Rites of Passage''
ceremonies and classes in ''Native drum and flute.''
Scott said he is of European and Cherokee ancestry, though he isn't
sure how much. And, he is Lakota not ''by blood ancestry, but by
affiliation,'' he said. After years of studying various spiritual
practices, he had a dream about the Sun Dance, he said. He received
permission to dance in South Dakota, he explained.
''During my third Sun Dance, the spirits came to me and said I need
to create a center,'' he said. Scott said he was ''bonneted'' at a
Texas Sun Dance as a ceremonial leader.
Today, Scott holds Sweatlodge ceremonies - some of which have
included newborn babies, he said - and doctoring, birthing and death
ceremonies in the Lakota tradition. He has taught ''warriorship
practices'' to youth and has worked as a Native spiritual adviser at
the Napa State Hospital in Marin.
And he takes people on vision quests. ''I help people learn how to be
human, responsible stewards of the Earth,'' he said. ''I listen to
the directions the ancestors give me.''
Scott is earnest, saying he rarely receives criticism, and that
people's doubts quickly dissipate when they see him in action.
''There is a lot of appropriation of Native practices and
tradition,'' he said. ''There has to be that level of intent and
experience that you bring. In time, the spirits will make clear who
is legitimate and who is not.''
Here is the link to this story.
www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096415228