The clothing of the white man adopted by
the Lakota [Sioux] had much to do with the physical welfare of the tribe, and at
the Carlisle School where the change from tribal to white man's clothing was
sudden and direct, the effect on the health and comfort of the children was
considerable. Our first resentment
was in having our hair cut. It has
ever been the custom of Lakota men to wear long hair, and old tribal members
still wear the hair in this manner. On
first hearing the rule, some of the older boys talked of resisting, but
realizing the uselessness of doing so, submitted.
But for days after being shorn, we felt strange and uncomfortable.
If the argument that has been advanced is true, that the children needed
delousing, then why were not girls as well as boys put through the same process?
The fact is that we were to be transformed, and short hair being the mark
of gentility [nobility] with the white man, he put upon us the mark, though he
still retained his own custom of keeping the hair covering on his face.
Our
second resentment was against the trousers, based upon what we considered the
best of hygienic reasons. Our
bodies were use to constant bathing in the sun, air, and rain, and the function
of the pores of our skin, which were in reality a highly developed breathing
apparatus, was at once stopped by trousers of heavy sweat-absorbing material
aided by the worst of all torments -- red flannel underwear.
For the stiff collars, stiff front shirts, and derby hats no word of
praise is due, and heavy, squeaky, leather boots were positive tormentors, which
we endured because we thought that when we wore them we were "dressed
up." Many times we have been
laughed at for our native way of dressing, but could anything we ever wore
compare in the utter foolishness to the steel-ribbed corset and the huge bustle,
which our girls adopted after a few years in school?
Certain
small ways and observances sometimes have connection with larger and more
profound ideas, and for reasons of this sort the Lakota disliked the
pocket-handkerchief and found the white man's use of this toilet article very
distasteful. The Indian,
essentially an outdoor person, had no use for the handkerchief; he was
practically immune to colds, and like the animal, not addicted to spitting.
The white man, essentially an indoor person, was subject to colds,
catarrh [wheezing], bronchitis and kindred diseases. He was a cougher and a spitter, and his constant use of
tobacco aggravated the habit. With
him the handkerchief was a toilet necessity.
So it is easy to see why the Indian considered the carrying of a
handkerchief an uncleanly habit.
According
to the white man, the Indian choosing to, return to his tribal manners and dress
"goes back to the blanket”. True, but "going back to the
blanket" is the factor that saved him from, or at least stayed, his final
destruction. Had the Indian been as
completely subdued in spirit as he was in body he would have perished within the
century of his subjection. But is
it the unquenchable spirit that saved him -- his clinging to Indian ways, Indian
thought, and tradition that has kept him and is keeping him today.
The white man's ways were not his ways and many of the things that he has
tried to adopt have proven disastrous and to his utter shame.
Could the Indian have forestalled the flattery and deceit of his European
subjector and retained his native truth and honesty; could he have shunned
whiskey and disease and remained the paragon of health and strength he was, he
might today be a recognized a man instead of a hostage on a reservation.
But many an Indian has accompanied his own personal salvation by
"going back to the blanket." The
Indian blanket, or buffalo robe, a true American garment, and worn with the
significance of language, covered beneath it, in the prototype [model] of the
American Indian, one of the bravest attempts ever made by man on this continent
to rise to the heights of true humanity.
To
clothe a man falsely is only to distress his spirit and to make him incongruous
and ridiculous, and my entreaty to the American Indian is to retain his tribal
dress.
Luther
Standing Bear telling about his experiences at the Carlisle School his
autobiography, Land of the Spotted Eagle (1933), pp. 189-91.