HA 253 Final Terms (Fall 2025 w/ Laura Smith @ Michigan State U)

Trickster

A trickster is a character in folklore and mythology who uses cunning and deception to outsmart others, often challenging the status quo and societal norms. These figures play a critical role in storytelling, providing comic relief and provoking thought.

Crest

Figures of animals, birds, sea creatures, and mythic beings—that immediately identify the moity and often the lineage of the owner

Potlatch

Gift-giving ritual where families or entire communities publicly acknowledge high-ranking or chiefly family powers. 

Copper

Frequently presented at potlatches, metal material came to the region via Euro trade, very valuable, might be worth 1,000-9,000 blankets
1,000-900 blankets

Canadian Indian Act of 1884

In 1884, the Canadian government outlawed the potlatch, so there was less carving of any of the objects related to those ceremonies

Totem Poles

Symbolic poles that are unique to the tribes of the North West Coast.

Ellen Neel

(Kwakwaka’wakw)
-first woman carver?
-Mungo Martin’s niece
-carving for the tourist market and
private commissions
-a business owner in the 1950s

Formline Style

invention and variation
among artists was accepted
-apprentice-type training

Tseka

first of two winter cycles of ceremonials which include potlatches. reenact shamanic encounters with other-than-human beingsdenosaunee

Hamat’sa

One of the highest-ranked Tseka dances is the hamat’sa, or cannibal dance; a dance to initiate new members into the Hamat’sa society. Male initiates above, in the wild or cannibalistic state

Yek

a vision quest to gather spirit helpers

Relocation Program 1950s

Extreme poverty of the Inuit in northern Canadian territories. Decline of the fur trade, poor hunting. The government sets up permanent settlements; it encourages, sometimes coerces. Inuit relocation to them

James Houston

1948-1949 Houston – a writer and artist on a painting trip. Visits Inukjuak (Port Harrison) on Hudson Bay. Becomes interested in small stone carvings, collects some. Takes them back to Montreal

Stonecut Prints

Printing was introduced by Houston and other non-Inuit artists/teachers. Inspired by Japanese woodcut printing techniques. Long-standing graphic/drawing practices, as well as stone/bone/wood. Sculpture practices make stonecut prints seem “traditional” while also modern.

Kelek (Inviting-Fest)

The final winter ceremony is most closely associated with masks. Orchestrated by the village shaman. A festival to get the hunters ready for a new season. Singing of songs to honor the animals and call them out, accompanied by performances of masked dancers.

Inua

The term for bladder contained the essence or soul of the animal.

Amat

pouch in hood for infant

Kiniq

V-form front apron

Aesthetic

a set of principles underlying and guiding the work of a particular artist or artistic movement.

Bow Drill

Pictographic style. Sketch-like, shorthand. Symbolic, not concerned with
naturalistic (like nature) details, Subjects. Representing hunting tallies, or common. Activities, like a diary.

Performance Art

Differs from traditional theater in its rejection of a clear narrative, use of random or chance-based structures, and direct appeal to the audience. Historically, performance art has been a medium that challenges and violates borders between disciplines and genders, between private and public, and between everyday life and art, and that follows no rules. The term encompasses a broad range of artistic practices that involve bodily experience and live action

Oka Crisis

A land dispute between a group of Mohawk people of Kanehsatake and the town of Oka, Quebec, Canada, which began on July 11, 1990, and lasted until
September 26, 1990.

Encomienda System

“Mission System.” in exchange for protection and education (i.e. agricultural training, construction, brick making, candle making, laundry) provided by the Franciscans, the Indians would give their labor. A type of slave labor system for the commercial and agricultural activities that turned missions into profitable enterprises by the early 19th century

Arts and Crafts Movement

revived interest in handmade objects: furniture, textile design, carpets, wall coverings, basket weaving, ceramics. sought an antidote to excessive industrialization/mechanization of modern life. Nostalgia for a lost past.

Degikup

A type of basket from California

Louise Keyser

A Washo woman famous for her Degikup basket design

Coiling Method

A type of basket weaving method that involves coiling the weave to create a pattern.

Big Horn Medicine Wheel

Large circles of boulders are commonly found on hills. Big Horn was built on a mountaintop more than 9600 feet, an observatory? Some “spokes” are aligned with celestial events, thus possibly served as a calendar.

Sun Dance lodge

28 rafters and 28-wheel spokes, central axis - center of world. 28 days in lunar cycle

Tohausen (Little Bluff)

Considered the greatest headman in Kiowa history, served for 33 years until his death in 1866. A great diplomat and soldier; had four wives and two painted tipis. Tipi with battle pictures was given to him by a Cheyenne chief as a token of
friendship and peace in 1840; Tohausen gave horses in return. Tipi given to nephew after Tohausen’s death, accidently burned in 1872/73. Right to remake the tipi was given to Tohausen’s nephew’s son; this remake lasted until 1890s.

Double Woman

Was the first taught the Lakota how to do quillwork. Dreams of her give women a chance to choose a skill in crafts or a less worthy occupation. Women who have the dream are especially spiritually powerful.

Arapaho Quillwork Society

Was a sacred society of seven older women, each of whom had a sacred quillworking bag. The quillwork designs were closely linked to sacred motifs; complex ritual knowledge was required in order to properly use these designs and undertake the production of quilled items. The designs were controlled by the members of the Society, on behalf of the entire Tribe. One could not simply do quillwork on one’s own, or invent new designs. The last of these women died prior World War II.

Coup

Brave Deed

Ft. Marion

St. Augustine, Florida
-72 Plains POW’s, 1875-1878
-ledger books used as evidence of Native
people’s threat to settlers
-served as hostages to ensure good behavior
of Plains communities
-some of the prisoners,
‘before and after’

Ledger art

Art that was drawn upon lined paper gifted from travelers.

Dawes Act 1887

designed to break up reservations by allotting individual
parcels of 160 acres of land to individual Natives
-encourage Natives to take up agriculture and assimilate
-blood quantum was crucial to its implementation
-Native Americans who were one-half or more Indian blood
received allotments; those who did not meet this standard
were excluded
-much tribal land was further alienated from Natives
-not enough Native could meet this criteria, so extra acreage
was made available to non-Native use/sale

illusionism

creating 3d space on a 2d canvas

flatstyle painting

stylistic similarities with ledger art: flat space,
no indication of context, environment, dance/war/hunting subjects

Indian Reorganization Act 1934

recommends end of allotment act
-support for Native self-government
-support for Native arts as a viable means of income: federal $
for training, supplies, and marketing

primitivism

pre-contact aesthetic

hogan

Athapaskan style homes, conical shaped structures,
shaped with wooden poles and covered with brush, easy style good for nomadic groups
-Pueblo influence shown in that they started covering their brush lodges with adobe

churro

A type of sheep that was brought in by the Spanish and adopted by the Navajo

hózhó

Navajo Worldview

biil

form of women’s dress worn by both Navajos and Pueblos
-2 piece dress – possibly inspired by Plains style deerskin dresses or Spanish serapes

First Phase Chief’s Blankets

Striped, simplistic design

Bosque Redondo

Reservation the Navajo were marched to

Germantowns

establishment of 3.5 million acres as Navajo reservation, 1868
-intercultural exchanges with English and German settlers

Eye Dazzlers

fine yarns allow for more detailed
weaving
-extremely dizzying use of pattern
and color
-at first hated by dealers and collectors
-preferred the old styles and natural dyes

koshares

sacred tricksters
-first beings to emerge
onto the earth’s surface
(4th world)
-each represents the 4
directions

kiva

reflective of Pueblo philosophy of origins and their worldview

sipapu

symbolic place of emergence and return

Chaco Canyon

huge trade and ceremonial center
in 11th and 12th centuries
-monumental architecture site;
connected to many outlier sites
-population estimate range:
2,000-6,000

Great North Road

connections to origins and ancestors
-overbuilt, probable use for processions/pilgrimages

polychrome

2+ colors

katsinam

supernatural or non-human entities capable of influencing the natural world
-the male members of various religious societies dressed to represent the kachinas
in dances/ceremonies.
-tihu (kachina dolls or figures) which represent kachinas, used to teach children about
about the spirits

Pueblo

a cluster of rooms, sometimes
constructed on top of each other

avanyu

Horned or water serpent

Wounded Knee Occupation 1973

approximately 200 Oglala
Lakota and followers of the
American Indian Movement
seized and occupied the town
of Wounded Knee, South Dakota,
on the Pine Ridge Indian
Reservation.
-protest followed failure to oust
corrupt tribal president
-expanded to critique US govt
failure to honor treaties
-inspires a new generation of
artists who confront legacy of
colonialism more directly

IAIA

Institute of American Indian Arts

The Submuloc Show

A Visual Commentary on the Columbus
Quincentennial from the Perspective Of America’s First People
-1992 exhibition, Quincentennial Celebration of Columbus’ arrival in the New World
-an Indigenous point of view