Greengrass Pipe Dancers

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Greengrass Pipe Dancers
Image:Http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:GGPDcovera.jpg
Author	Lionel Little Eagle Pinn
Illustrator	Matthew Atkinson
Cover artist	Matthew Atkinson
Country	United States
Language	English
Subject(s)	United States History, Native Americans Grief and healing
Publisher	Happy Camp, CA, Naturegraph Publishing
Publication date	2000
Media type	Print (Paperback)
Pages	257
ISBN	ISBN 0-87961-250-9

Lionel Little Eagle Pinn Greengrass Pipe Dancers, published in 2000, is a deeply personal history of Native Americans and the fundamental but profound processes by which they live their lifes. Pinn pushes the envelope of expression and discovery in his biographical telling of his life from 1988 to 1992. The book is presented in "5 key elements" which include his wife "Tamara Lynn Brown" who was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1987 at the age of 32. "The Healing" is describe as the second element and is initially pertains to a healing of Tamara's cancer but later becomes a healing of a familiy and native people. The third element of the book is presented in a broader sense as "The People" which brings to life the beauty and majesty of the Native American culture. The fourth element is a sigficant symbol and instrument of the ceremonial Indian life described in the book as "The Pipe Bag". The specific pipe bag of this story is thought to have been owned by legendary Lakota mystic and spirutal leader Crazy Horse. The book leads the reader through the 100 plus years of the chronological history of the pipe bag from its original owner Dr. Alexander Brown a reservation doctor of the late 1890s to his son, Vinson Brown and eventually to Pinn. The fifth more metaphsical element of the book is call "The Dance". Pinn expresses that "Life is a dance itself" and the many phases and stories are steps in that dance. The physical dance most centered in the book surrounds the traditional sun dance of the Lakota Sioux nation.

[edit] Content

The book is broken out in to three parts described as separate "books" and 77 chapters. Book One entitled "Learning the Dance" brings to live the special relationship of native people with the earth as well as among themselves. It introduces the geographics of the journey which includes the Pine Ridge and Cheyenne River Tribe reservations of South Dakota as well as the spiritual geographics of native America which is represented, in this segment of the book, in part, as the re-introduction of the sacred White Buffalo Calf Woman pipe back into ceremony after after seven years in hiding by Chief Arvol Looking Horse the 19th generation Keeper of the Pipe. Book Two opens with the return of Pinn and his wife to Greengrass, South Dakota. The purpose of these travels are to gain enlightment and instructions as to the responsibilities surrounding the keeping of Crazy Horse's pipe bag which had been passed on to Pinn. Among the teachers and guides to enlighten Pinn include Steven Old Coyote, Frank Fools Crow, Pete Catches, the Chipps family, Wallace Black Elk, Celine Not-Help-Him, Tom and Shirely Calfrobe as well as Arovl Looking Horse. Readers get a first hand viewpoint of some of the most sacred and protect ceremonies surrounding their deeply spiritual beliefs. Book Three opens with the powerful and emotional chapter called "Truth". Pinn and his wife are driving on a Washington state highway just after becoming aware of the explosive reality of Tamara's diagnosis with terminal cancer. Readers are exposed to the vulnerbilities of that transitioning time.