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Wovoka (Jack Wilson)

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Wovoka (1858-September 20, 1932),[1] known also as Jack Wilson, was a Paiute prophet and spiritual leader. Raised on both Christian and Great Spirit traditions,[2] he is best known for having a religious experience in 1889 that inspired the Ghost Dance, a Pan-Indian religious movement suppressed by the United States Army at the Wounded Knee Massacre.[3] Following the massacre, Wovoka lived a quite life with fellow Paiutes in his longtime home near Mason, Nevada, maintaining connections with several Native American tribes across the United States until his death.[4]

Early Life

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Wovoka was born in approximately 1858 on the Walker River in Mason Valley, Nevada. His name translates to "The Cutter."[5] His father Tävibo, a Nevada Paiute, was also rumored to have prophetic visions, and early historiography mistakenly attributed several inter-tribal dances in the San Joaquin Valley in the mid 1870's to Wovoka's father.[6] Nonetheless, his father still relayed to him traditional Paiute spirituality through oral histories. After Tävibo's death in 1870, Wovoka elected to stay his homeland and was soon adopted by the David Wilson, where he was hired on as a ranch hand.[5] A pious Christian family, the Wilsons took Wovoka under their wing and over time he was invited to sit at the family table. There he was given a new name, Jack Wilson, and he learned about the teachings of Jesus, which he later incorporated into his syncretic sermons in the Ghost dance.[2]

Anthropologists, historians, and theologians alike provide conflicting accounts on when and how Wovoka had his vision. One scholar of religions, Tom Thatcher, cites James Mooney's Smithsonian-sponsored anthropological report to claim that Wovoka received his first vision while chopping wood for David Wilson in 1887.[7] Conversely, historian Paul Bailey utilized Mooney's work along interviews with Wovoka's contemporaries and interpreters to assert that he received the vision after entering two-day trance, awaking in tears.[8] Regardless, shortly after receiving the vision and its message, it moved quickly beyond his local Paiute community by word of mouth to Native American tribes further east.[9]

Involvement in Ghost Dance and Wounded Knee Massacre

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Before the Ghost dance reached Native Americans on South Dakota plains reservations, interest in the movement came from U.S. Indian Office, U.S. War Department, and multiple Native American tribal delegations. Many tribes would arrive in Mason to listen to Wovoka intently, but language barriers existed. Visiting tribes came from different cultures, geographies, and linguistic traditions. Few members delegations could speak Wovoka's mother tongue of Paiute. This led to the Dakota Sioux adopting a militant form of Wovoka's teachings, leading to the creation the Ghost Shirts worn by Sioux and Lakota at the subsequent massacre[6] However, Wovoka never left his home in Nevada to become an active participant in the dance's dissemination in the U.S. interior.[10]

The Ghost Dance was a circular dance that aspired to revitalize American landscapes to a bountiful condition that existed before Anglo-American settled in North America. He detailed the results that would come to the dance in a message to Cheyenne and Arapaho delegates. If practiced correctly for six weeks, Jesus would appear as a cloud, the dead ancestors would rise, an earthquake would occur, and all sickness would be alleviated. Wovoka also encouraged others to what is just to honor Grandfather, the universal creator and messiah, by choosing not to fight with their white neighbors. Yet, he also advocated to keep the dance secret from whites.[11]

Post-Wounded Knee Life and Legacy

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Wovoka was disheartened by how events unfolded at the massacre. He still remained a prominent Native American leader until his death.[6] Sometime between 1894-1896, he was reported to have been a sideshow attraction at a San Francisco Midwinter Fair Carnival. In 1917, an agent for the Nevada Agency named L.A. Dorrington tracked down Wovoka in around to report on his whereabouts to Washington. Curious to see if the former Native American messiah had any ties Native American Peyotism, Dorrington found that Wovoka was instead living a humble life in Mason. He abstained from the practice, worked as an occasional medicine man, and traveled to events on reservations across the United States.[4]

References

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  1. ^ Bailey, Paul (1957). Wovoka: The Indian Prophet. Los Angeles: Westernlore Press. p. 211.
  2. ^ a b Bailey, Paul (1957). Wovoka: The Indian Messiah. Los Angeles: Westernlore Press. pp. 27–33.
  3. ^ Calloway, Colin G. (1996). Our Hearts Fell to the Ground: Plains Indian Views of How the West Was Lost. New York: Bedford Books. pp. 199–200.
  4. ^ a b Stewart, Omer C. (1977). "Contemporary Document on Wovoka (Jack Wilson_ Prophet of the Ghost Dance in 1890". Ethnohistory. 24: 219–222 – via JSTOR.
  5. ^ a b Bailey, Paul (1957). Wovoka: The Indian Prophet. Los Angeles: Westerlore Press. p. 23.
  6. ^ a b c McCann Jr., Frank D. (1966). "The Ghost Dance, Last hope of Western Tribes, Unleashed the Final Tragedy". Montana: The Magazine of Western History. 16: 25–34.
  7. ^ Thatcher, Tom (1998). "Empty Metaphors and Apocalyptic Rhetoric". Journal of the American Academy of Religon. 66: 549–570 – via JSTOR.
  8. ^ Bailey, Paul (1957). Wovoka: The Indian Messiah. Los Angeles: Westernlore Press. pp. 79–83.
  9. ^ Bailey, Paul (1957). Wovoka: The Indian Messiah. Los Angeles: Westernlore Press. pp. 96, 103–106.
  10. ^ Bailey, Paul (1957). Wovoka: The Indian Messiah. Los Angeles: Westernlore Press. p. 171.
  11. ^ Calloway, Colin G. (1996). Our Hearts Fell to the Ground: Plains Indian Views of How the West was Lost. New York: Bedford Books. pp. 196–199.

See also

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