Celebrate Autumn with the AIHSC Traditional Cree Round Dance
Tuesday, November 22nd • 4pm-8pm, St Benedict’s Gym
• Free Event • Native Craft Vendors • Feast will be served
• Harvey Dreavor – Stickman
• Gordon Sands – Emcee
• Shane Webster – Singer
• Hand drum singers welcome
Hand drummers and singers will lead us in this traditional dance to celebrate Autumn and bring the community together! Wear your Ribbon Skirts and Roc Your Mocs!
What Is a Round Dance?
A Round Dance is a traditional First Nations community celebration. According to some sources, the Plains Cree received this dance in the late 19th century from the Assiniboine, who called it the Moving Slowly Dance.
There is a Cree belief that the Northern Lights are also spirits of the ancestors dancing in the Green Grass world. It is regarded as a good sign if the Northern Lights dance as the people dance. The Round Dance ceremony ends when the circle is broken on the last song and the people weave in and out as they dance. This is to honor the Northern Lights and announce the ceremony is ending.
Round Dances traditionally took place in long lodges called nanapawnikawmovikamik, meaning “night singing tipi,” as part of small tribal camp gatherings. The ceremony was also sometimes called Braid Bundle Dance because the braids of deceased relatives, kept in sacred bundles, were central to the meaning of the Round Dance ceremony.