1990 - “There was very casual kind of showmanship presented which we found insulting,.. But in terms of the style of singing and dancing, this was hilarious. Watching their dance, our people were swept with laughter.”
Anglo 'tribe' dances controversial steps
1990, Aug 5 Arizona Republic
Prescott -- Seminaked, jaws thrust forward, mouths gaping, each of the 20 men takes a 6-foot-long bull snake from a man they call a priest. Each grips a reptile with his teeth. 4 inches from its head and darting forked tongue. And then they dance.....For one night in each of the past 70 years, 20 men of Prescott have asked audiences at the Smoki Snake Dance, to believe they are Indians out of Arizona;s past.
Their annual costumed dance is one of Arizona's oldest non-Indian traditions and the biggest money-making event of the year in this mile-high city.
The name Smoki -- pronounced "Smoke-Eye" -- is based on Moqui, an antiquated Anglo name of the Hopis.
Although Smokis insist that their motives are respectful, many Indians view the dance -- based on the ancient Snake Dance of the Hopis -- as a long-running insult to Native American piety.
And even some non-Smoki Anglos consider the group a curious remnant of Arizona's past, when the dominant Anglo culture tended to ignore Indians' sensitivities about how their customs were treated.
The name Smoki -- pronounced "Smoke-Eye" -- is based on Moqui, an antiquated Anglo name of the Hopis.
And even some non-Smoki Anglos consider the group a curious remnant of Arizona's past, when the dominant Anglo culture tended to ignore Indians' sensitivities about how their customs were treated.
More than 3000 people are expected to watch the Smoki People perform… Their Snake Dance has always been the climax to a series of dances mimicking a mixture of Native American ceremonials.
Smoki chiefs, Hopis Confer
And despite past Indian protests, 70 successive Smoki chiefs – they’re elected annually – have remained steadfast to their credo that the Smokis are attempting to preserve ceremonies vanishing from Indian culture.
In the case of the Snake Dance, for example, Smoki officials have met repeatedly with Hopi leaders since the 1930’s yet have gone on imitating the dance despite the Hopis’ concerns.
“We haven’t backed down on dances because any group has asked us to,” said this year’s Smoki chief, a 57-year-old Prescott surveyor who asked to be identified only by his “Indian name” of Iron Eagle.
“We are not trying to preserve today’s culture,” the silver-haired Iron Eagle’s said. “If you go to the Hopis or the Navajos, you see what they do. We do what we do.” ……
The Smokis insist on accuracy, Iron Eagle said. One of this year’s dances – the Zuni Kianakwe Dance – has not been performed in 100 years, he said. Smoki members, using an 1883 US Bureau of Ethology report, recreated it.
At last year’s ceremonials, Iron Eagle said, 30 Hopis arrived to bless the snakes with corn meal. It was an indication, he said, that the Hopis – who believe that snakes carry prayers for rain from the pious to heaven – felt at case with the dancing.
And despite past Indian protests, 70 successive Smoki chiefs – they’re elected annually – have remained steadfast to their credo that the Smokis are attempting to preserve ceremonies vanishing from Indian culture.
In the case of the Snake Dance, for example, Smoki officials have met repeatedly with Hopi leaders since the 1930’s yet have gone on imitating the dance despite the Hopis’ concerns.
“We haven’t backed down on dances because any group has asked us to,” said this year’s Smoki chief, a 57-year-old Prescott surveyor who asked to be identified only by his “Indian name” of Iron Eagle.
“We are not trying to preserve today’s culture,” the silver-haired Iron Eagle’s said. “If you go to the Hopis or the Navajos, you see what they do. We do what we do.” ……
The Smokis insist on accuracy, Iron Eagle said. One of this year’s dances – the Zuni Kianakwe Dance – has not been performed in 100 years, he said. Smoki members, using an 1883 US Bureau of Ethology report, recreated it.
At last year’s ceremonials, Iron Eagle said, 30 Hopis arrived to bless the snakes with corn meal. It was an indication, he said, that the Hopis – who believe that snakes carry prayers for rain from the pious to heaven – felt at case with the dancing.
Dance ‘hilarious’ to Hopis
Lee Jenkins, the Hopi Tribe’s cultural-preservation officer, attended last year’s dance. Jenkins also attended a separate meeting last year between the Hopis and the Smokis.
He and his fellow Hopis, some of them members of the tribe’s Snake Society, were not at ease at the dance, Jenkins said…
“There was very casual kind of showmanship presented which we found insulting, he said. But in terms of the style of singing and dancing, this was hilarious. Watching their dance, our people were swept with laughter.”
Radford Quamahongnewa, Snake Society priest at Shungopavi, said, “I feel they are just mocking out ceremony and religious activities, and I don’t think they should be doing it. It is our religion, our faith, our way of life.”
Interviewed last week, the chairman of Arizona’s two Apache tribes called for the end of Smoki dances imitating their ceremonies.
But Iron Eagle said, “I don’t think Indians have an interest in preserving their past. They are carrying out their ceremonials in a way that fits their society today.”
Smokis defend their dances
“You have non-Jews portraying people in Passion Plays. Well, we are educating non-Indians to this part of Arizona’s history. Our dances this year date from 700 A.D. We don’t attempt to be disrespectful.”
Bill Bork, 84, a former professor of languages of Southern Illinois University and the oldest Smoki, said, “It is not any more sacrilegious for us to do this than it is for the Chicago Symphony to give a performance of Verdi’s Requiem Mass.”
Bork will be this year’s “kisi priest,” handing the snakes to the dancers.
The roots of the Smoki go back to 1921, when Prescott’s other enduring tradition, its rodeo, was in financial trouble. The community’s leading business and professional men decided they needed a gimmick to raise funds.
They settled on a Snake Dance, using non-lethal bull snakes instead of rattlesnakes, the Smoki’s official history states, as a “sort of a stunt, a gag, or a burlesque of the sacred Hopi ceremony.”
But the next year, “a curious transformation took place,” according to the history.
“Shuck the clothes off a white man, paint his body brown, give him a live snake in one hand and a rattle in the other, state the rhythmic beating of a deep-toned tom-tom, the hackles of his neck rise and he reverts to the primitive.
“But he realizes that many Indian ceremonies are strangely moving and beautiful, and that the encroachment of our so-called white civilization may mark the end of them.”
That realization, Iron Eagle said, prompted the Smokis to amass a library of scholarly works on Indian culture and to build a museum for Indian artifacts that “we have been told is better than the collection at the Museum of Northern Arizona (at Flagstaff).”
The Smokies extended membership to the former territorial capital’s social elite – the group’s original charter said a member should be a “white man with substantial business interests” – and to other luminaries.
Former Sen Barry Goldwater was initiated 50 years ago, danced in several ceremonials, and bears the tattoos of an honorary chief.
The year’s members include a state appellate-court judge, Prescott’s mayor, several lawyers, pilots, and businessmen. But membership in city’s male Anglo elite is no longer a requirement, Iron Eagle said.
“This is not a secret society,” he said. “We do not run this town.”
Indians Copying ‘Honkis’?
Former Indian trader and Prescott resident Jim Hills, who now lives in Tucson, calls the Smoki a ‘modern dinosaur.”
“The presumption of it all has always horrified me,” Hills said, “that the white man can help Indians perpetuate their culture.”
Perhaps, he said, Indians should form a group mimicking Anglos and call themselves, “the Honkis.”
An Arizona anthropologist, who asked not to be identified because he has friends who are Smokis, said, “It is frightening to think that this paternalistic thing from Arizona’s past should still be with us.”
“It is astonishing when you consider new sensitivities to Indian needs – for example the bill in the (US) Senate to return Indian remains to the tribes.
Despite such criticisms, the Smokis have not had problems finding new members.
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| 1990, Aug 5 Arizona Republic |
New ‘renegade’ recruited
Alex Moran, 24, a recent graduate of Prescott’s Embry Riddle Aeronautical University, is a “renegade,” or first-year recruit. He is joining the Smokis, he said, “because I think it is important to continue our traditions.” …..
Women, such as this year’s “chieftess,” Doris Earle, 60, bear tattooed hash marks on their hands.
Earle freely gave her name last week while declaring that “squaws” too should be eligible to become chief, just as some Native American women are leaders of modern-day tribes. Three-quarters of the women members voted last year for full voting rights within the Smoki, she said.
Iron Eagle, however, said women are not up to leading the organization because “they fight and bicker in a group.”
Though their intent is serious and some of their practices controversial, the Smoki also have their fun. Members like to talk about their drinking parties after the dances.
Drinking before dancing is prohibited, Iron Eagle said. In fact, the chief said, dancers receive a tape-recorded “temperance lecture” before the Snake Dance performance from late founding member Gail Gardner.
