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The photographs, text, video and audio below are from the August edition of National Geographic magazine, all courtesy of the magazine. The photography is by Aaron Huey, whose work we have highlighted before at the sad red earth, the story by Alexandra Fuller. Huey has spent the past seven years documenting the lives of the Oglala Lakota people on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. It is an important record of Native life today after a history of conquest.
“Riders take a break during a day of activities to mark the 1876 defeat of Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer.”
“Three-year-old C. J. Shot bathes among dishes. The Oglala concept of tiospaye—the unity of the extended family—means that homes are often overcrowded, especially with the severe housing shortage on the reservation. In 2008, when this photograph was made, 22 people lived in the three-bedroom house. “These houses aren’t who we are,” says Oglala activist Alex White Plume.”
“A passenger barely has room for the journey home as a car is loaded with used clothing donated by a Colorado-based Native American charity. Contrary to popular myth, Native Americans do not automatically receive a monthly federal check and are not exempt from taxes. The Oglala Lakota and other Sioux tribes have refused a monetary settlement for the U.S.’s illegal seizure of the Black Hills, their spiritual home.”
“Lenny Jumping Eagle rides in a celebration of the defeat of Colonel Custer in the Battle of the Greasy Grass (the Battle of the Little Bighorn), June 25-26, 1876. Every year dozens of long-distance rides or horse races on and beyond the reservation commemorate great leaders, sacred lands, and historic events.”
“After intense communication with the spirits, participants emerge from a steaming inipi, or purification (sweat) lodge. This ceremony was held by Rick Two Dogs, a medicine man descended from American Horse.”
Audio interviews and photos by Aaron Huey
CELEBRATING CUSTER’S DEFEAT (0:48)
“I think to be a warrior, you
have to be strong in your mind.”
CARRYING ON THE RESISTENCE (1:09)
“No matter what happens, we
are going to stand till the end.”
THE HEYOKA’S POWERS (0:48)
“Some call me a seer … someone that
came back to finish his destiny”
HOPE FOR THE FUTURE (0:59)
“The Native Youth Movement is the voice
of the younger generations to come.”
You can view more of Aaron Huey’s photography from Pine Ridge here.
Related articles
- Impoverished SD Indian Tribe Debates Development (abcnews.go.com)
- Impoverished Oglala Sioux Tribe debates development (rapidcityjournal.com)
- Lakota People’s Law Project Praises National Geographic’s Portrait of Lakota Resilience and Calls on BIA to Host Summit on Child Welfare (prweb.com)
- How a TED collaboration is helping residents of Pine Ridge Indian Reservation tell their own story (ted.com)
- Wounded Knee National Monument (taishalwalker.com)
- Six Pawnee Scouts: a Homecoming (sadredearth.com)
- A Lost Covenant (sadredearth.com)
- Thomas Jefferson, Architect of Deception (sadredearth.com)
- I Am a Man: When American Indians Were Recognized as People Under U.S. Law (sadredearth.com)
- Ethnic Cleansing in the United States, Historic & Contemporary (sadredearth.com)
- Massacre of the Cheyenne (sadredearth.com)
