Hoop Dancing, Heard Museum, and Hampton, VA
The 
Heard Museum World Champion Hoop Dancer competition which “draws together top Native hoop dancers from throughout the United States and Canada ” was amazing. According to the Heard brochure, “(The hoop) is symbolic to all Native people. It represents the Circle of Life and the continuous cycle of summer and winter, day and night, male and female…. During performances, dancers will incorporate speed and agility as they manipulate their bodies through one to more than 50 hoops.”
After spending most of the day with the women and men hoop dancers, we toured the museum. The Heard has a powerful exhibit about the “boarding schools for American Indians” in particular the Hampton (VA) boarding school (1878-1923). If you are ever in Phoenix. Visit the exhibit. Through photographs and voice-overs you will see young people forced to wear military uniforms and march, separated from their families, forbidden to practice their religion. They were told that the Indian way of life was savage and inferior to the white way. They were taught that they were being civilized or “raised up” to a better way of life. (Source)
Armstrong’s (the founder of Hampton Institute) dual mission at Hampton quickly became clear–”uplift” the Negro from his state of degradation; “civilize” the savage and teach him how to work. Members of both races would be taught to dress, speak, work, behave as whites– despite the fact that they were offered no guarantee that they would ever be offered powers and privileges equivalent to those enjoyed by whites.
I am glad that I had the opportunity to celebrate the dancers and the continuing of their tradition inspite of what was an attempt to “civilize’ them. Today, Hampton Institute is one of the Historically Black Colleges and Universities.
From today’s Hampton Institute website:
In 1878, Hampton established a formal education program for Native Americans, beginning the Institute’s lasting commitment to serving a multicultural population. Hampton’s historic Native American education program spanned more than forty years, with the last student graduating in 1923. Recent initiatives have attracted Native American students to renew their ties with Hampton.
I guess it is all about interpretation.