Crow Dog: Four Generations of Sioux Medicine Men

From the coauthor of Lakota Woman comes a powerful epic that traces the tumultuous clans of the Sioux nation. Leonard Crow Dog provides a rare glimpse of American Indian mysticism. The famous sun dance and the many ceremonies and rituals that still play an important role in Lakota life are described in dramatic detail. of photos. n nI am Crow Dog. I am the fourth of that name. Crow Dogs have played a big part in the history of our tribe and in the history of all the Indian nations of the Great Plains during the last two hundred years. We are still making history.n nThus opens the extraordinary and epic account of a Native American clan. Here the authors, Leonard Crow Dog and Richard Erdoes (co-author of Lakota Woman) tell a story that spans four generations and sweeps across two centuries of reckless deeds and heroic lives, and of degradation and survival.n nThe first Crow Dog, Jerome, a contemporary of Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, was a witness to the coming of white soldiers and settlers to the open Great Plains. His son, John Crow Dog, traveled with Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show. The third Crow Dog, Henry, helped introduce the peyote cult to the Sioux. And in the sixties and seventies, Crow Dog's principal narrator, Leonard Crow Dog, took up the family's political challenge through his involvement with the American Indian Movement (AIM). As a wichasha wakan, or medicine man, Leonard became AIM's spiritual leader and renewed the banned ghost dance. Staunchly traditional, Leonard offers a rare glimpse of Lakota spiritual practices, describing the sun dance and many other rituals that are still central to Sioux life and culture. n