Post by blackcrowheart on Feb 14, 2006 13:24:06 GMT -5
Jicarilla jingle dress Dancers celebrate 119-year-old nation
By Erny Zah The Daily Times
Feb 13, 2006, 06:00 am
www.daily-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060213/NEWS01/60\
2130313
<http://www.daily-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060213/NEWS01/6\
02130313>
DULCE -- When Kerry Cesspooch started jingle dress dancing, a healing
powwow style of dance, her 11-year-old niece, Antonia Carlos, needed a
liver transplant and wasn't expected to live. That was nearly 10 years
ago, and her niece is still alive today.
"She knows I dance for her," said Cesspooch, a Northern Ute from Fort
Duschene, Utah.
<http://gcirm.gannettnetwork.com/RealMedia/ads/click_lx.ads/gci-nm-silve\
rcity.com/promo/all/1981389272/300x250_1/OasDefault/gci-promo-shoplocal-\
2006/300x250_01062006.gif/33653036386230613433636661656330?cid=scsunnews\
&> Cesspooch was one of more than 200 dancers that participated in the
annual Jicarilla Day Powwow held in Dulce on Saturday and Sunday. The
powwow concluded a week of festivities commemorating a presidential
executive order that was signed 119 years ago to give the Jicarilla
Apache Nation its present day reservation.
Starting in 1880, the Jicarilla Apaches started negotiations for a
reservation, and though promises were made by the federal government,
the Jicarilla Apaches didn't have a reservation of their own until Feb.
11, 1887. President Grover Cleaveland gave the executive order.
"It's been 119 years since they put the Apaches on this pasture
(reservation). That's one heck of a pasture," said Taylor Monarco Jr., a
Jicarilla Apache, about the beauty of the land the federal government
gave the Apaches.
Now the celebration of the executive order ended this year with a
powwow. And just like the Jicarilla's reservation has it's story, so
does the origins of the jingle dress.
The jingle dress dance has roots in a story where a man was healed,
Cesspooch said.
She said the way the story was told to her, a young woman who wanted to
help an ailing man had a dream of a specific dress that would heal the
man. The young woman made this dress and danced "to bring healing and
good things for the people," she said.
Cesspooch drove 11 hours from Fort Duschene, Utah, with her mother and
son to share her dancing. This was her first time in Dulce.
"I like the mountains here," she said.
She was rehearsing a team dance routine with two other jingle dress
dancers, Tashina and Teri John, who are sisters originally from Rock
Point, Ariz.
Counting their steps in four, the jingles, made from snuff can lids,
wrapped their hand sewn dresses in horizontal rows. With each step, the
jingles sloshed with a hollow aluminum sound. At each fourth step, the
trio would turn to one side or the other, and sometimes change their
dancing direction.
Cesspooch's toddler son interrupted their practice by walking up to his
mother. But the interruption was brief as she would pick him up and
continue dancing counting her steps with the other dancers.
"We always go to Dulce," said Tashina, 22, who is a San Juan College
student and commutes from Sanostee.
A rainbow colored geometrical design wrapped her waistline.
"It's a rainbow. It represents the old people," she said about for
dress. It was the first dress she designed.
The elderly is one of the other reasons Cesspooch said she dances.
"I dance for all the old people and the other who couldn't dance," she
said.
Teri, 16 and a student at Aztec High School, shares those sentiments.
"We dance for our grandma," she said, referring to the reasons why her
and her sister dance.
For the John sisters, their parents often took them to powwows, which
served as a way to keep the pair out of trouble.
As much good as powwows serve, Cesspooch also acknowledged that the
powwow scene has change over the years, and it isn't necessarily for the
good.
With the popularity of gaming as a revenue for many Indian Tribes across
America, many tribes have invested their money into contest powwows. At
some powwows, powwow drum groups can win as much as $15,000 and dancers
can pull in over $1,000 in a weekend of dancing.
"(Powwows) are becoming more commercial," Cesspooch said. She said it
seems that powwows have begun to compete with each other to see not only
the biggest powwow, but which powwow attracts the best drums and
dancers.
The Jicarilla Day powwow invited two New Mexico drum groups as the host
drums and several dancers from the Four Corners area. But there were
also participants who came from Oklahoma, Montana and Alberta, Canada.
The two drums were Southern Outlawz from Shiprock and Black Eagle from
Jemez. Black Eagle won a Grammy in 2004.
Groups like Cesspooch's dancing trio entered in a team dance competition
with the hopes of winning.
"It's my routine," Cesspooch said. She said she tried the routine with
other dancers at an earlier powwow in Delta, Colo., and won first place.
"So hopefully, it'll win us first place this time."
But she said winning is secondary to giving people happiness ad help
with her dancing.
Like the help she has given to her niece.
"She's still sick," Cesspooch said.
So every time Cesspooch puts on her jingle dress and dances, she said
she prays.
"I think prayers are very important, not only for yourself but for the
other people," she said.
By Erny Zah The Daily Times
Feb 13, 2006, 06:00 am
www.daily-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060213/NEWS01/60\
2130313
<http://www.daily-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060213/NEWS01/6\
02130313>
DULCE -- When Kerry Cesspooch started jingle dress dancing, a healing
powwow style of dance, her 11-year-old niece, Antonia Carlos, needed a
liver transplant and wasn't expected to live. That was nearly 10 years
ago, and her niece is still alive today.
"She knows I dance for her," said Cesspooch, a Northern Ute from Fort
Duschene, Utah.
<http://gcirm.gannettnetwork.com/RealMedia/ads/click_lx.ads/gci-nm-silve\
rcity.com/promo/all/1981389272/300x250_1/OasDefault/gci-promo-shoplocal-\
2006/300x250_01062006.gif/33653036386230613433636661656330?cid=scsunnews\
&> Cesspooch was one of more than 200 dancers that participated in the
annual Jicarilla Day Powwow held in Dulce on Saturday and Sunday. The
powwow concluded a week of festivities commemorating a presidential
executive order that was signed 119 years ago to give the Jicarilla
Apache Nation its present day reservation.
Starting in 1880, the Jicarilla Apaches started negotiations for a
reservation, and though promises were made by the federal government,
the Jicarilla Apaches didn't have a reservation of their own until Feb.
11, 1887. President Grover Cleaveland gave the executive order.
"It's been 119 years since they put the Apaches on this pasture
(reservation). That's one heck of a pasture," said Taylor Monarco Jr., a
Jicarilla Apache, about the beauty of the land the federal government
gave the Apaches.
Now the celebration of the executive order ended this year with a
powwow. And just like the Jicarilla's reservation has it's story, so
does the origins of the jingle dress.
The jingle dress dance has roots in a story where a man was healed,
Cesspooch said.
She said the way the story was told to her, a young woman who wanted to
help an ailing man had a dream of a specific dress that would heal the
man. The young woman made this dress and danced "to bring healing and
good things for the people," she said.
Cesspooch drove 11 hours from Fort Duschene, Utah, with her mother and
son to share her dancing. This was her first time in Dulce.
"I like the mountains here," she said.
She was rehearsing a team dance routine with two other jingle dress
dancers, Tashina and Teri John, who are sisters originally from Rock
Point, Ariz.
Counting their steps in four, the jingles, made from snuff can lids,
wrapped their hand sewn dresses in horizontal rows. With each step, the
jingles sloshed with a hollow aluminum sound. At each fourth step, the
trio would turn to one side or the other, and sometimes change their
dancing direction.
Cesspooch's toddler son interrupted their practice by walking up to his
mother. But the interruption was brief as she would pick him up and
continue dancing counting her steps with the other dancers.
"We always go to Dulce," said Tashina, 22, who is a San Juan College
student and commutes from Sanostee.
A rainbow colored geometrical design wrapped her waistline.
"It's a rainbow. It represents the old people," she said about for
dress. It was the first dress she designed.
The elderly is one of the other reasons Cesspooch said she dances.
"I dance for all the old people and the other who couldn't dance," she
said.
Teri, 16 and a student at Aztec High School, shares those sentiments.
"We dance for our grandma," she said, referring to the reasons why her
and her sister dance.
For the John sisters, their parents often took them to powwows, which
served as a way to keep the pair out of trouble.
As much good as powwows serve, Cesspooch also acknowledged that the
powwow scene has change over the years, and it isn't necessarily for the
good.
With the popularity of gaming as a revenue for many Indian Tribes across
America, many tribes have invested their money into contest powwows. At
some powwows, powwow drum groups can win as much as $15,000 and dancers
can pull in over $1,000 in a weekend of dancing.
"(Powwows) are becoming more commercial," Cesspooch said. She said it
seems that powwows have begun to compete with each other to see not only
the biggest powwow, but which powwow attracts the best drums and
dancers.
The Jicarilla Day powwow invited two New Mexico drum groups as the host
drums and several dancers from the Four Corners area. But there were
also participants who came from Oklahoma, Montana and Alberta, Canada.
The two drums were Southern Outlawz from Shiprock and Black Eagle from
Jemez. Black Eagle won a Grammy in 2004.
Groups like Cesspooch's dancing trio entered in a team dance competition
with the hopes of winning.
"It's my routine," Cesspooch said. She said she tried the routine with
other dancers at an earlier powwow in Delta, Colo., and won first place.
"So hopefully, it'll win us first place this time."
But she said winning is secondary to giving people happiness ad help
with her dancing.
Like the help she has given to her niece.
"She's still sick," Cesspooch said.
So every time Cesspooch puts on her jingle dress and dances, she said
she prays.
"I think prayers are very important, not only for yourself but for the
other people," she said.