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Louise Flood
Henry Crow Dog is Leonard Crow Dog’s father. Henry follows the precedent of traditionalism and resistance against white society that the first Crow Dog set. When Leonard was a young man, Henry chased away white missionaries who tried to force Leonard to attend the local missionary school—Henry, along with other Crow Dog elders, had noticed Leonard’s spiritual gifts and had chosen him to become a medicine man. In the early 1900s, Henry experienced religious persecution when government officials chased him from the town where he and his family were living for holding a peyote ceremony. He refused to assimilate to white society and chose isolation instead, which allowed him—and his family—to maintain Lakota cultural traditions. He was such a traditionalist, in fact, that he did not accept Mary as Leonard’s wife for some time. In his eyes, she was not Lakota enough. His unwelcoming treatment of Mary reflects an issue that is common among biracial and bicultural people: they often feel unaccepted by both sides of their identity.
Henry Crow Dog Quotes in Lakota Woman
The Lakota Woman quotes below are all either spoken by Henry Crow Dog or refer to Henry Crow Dog. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 12
Quotes
Beside being tumbled headfirst into this kind of situation, still in my teens, with a brand-new baby and totally unprepared for the role I was to play, I still had another problem. I was a half-blood, not traditionally raised, trying to hold my own inside the full-blood Crow Dog clan which does not take kindly to outsiders. At first, I was not well received. It was pretty bad […] [Henry Crow Dog] told me that, as far as he was concerned, Leonard was still married to his former wife, a woman, as he pointed out again and again, who could talk Indian.
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Chapter 14
Quotes
In May 1974, Old Henry and Leonard put on a Ghost Dance […] It was supposed to be a ritual for Sioux only, but somehow, through the “moccasin telegraph” which always spreads news among Indians in a mysterious way, everybody seemed to know about it, and many native people from as far away as Alaska, Canada, Mexico, and Arizona suddenly appeared in order to participate.
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Henry Crow Dog Quotes in Lakota Woman
The Lakota Woman quotes below are all either spoken by Henry Crow Dog or refer to Henry Crow Dog. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 12
Quotes
Beside being tumbled headfirst into this kind of situation, still in my teens, with a brand-new baby and totally unprepared for the role I was to play, I still had another problem. I was a half-blood, not traditionally raised, trying to hold my own inside the full-blood Crow Dog clan which does not take kindly to outsiders. At first, I was not well received. It was pretty bad […] [Henry Crow Dog] told me that, as far as he was concerned, Leonard was still married to his former wife, a woman, as he pointed out again and again, who could talk Indian.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 14
Quotes
In May 1974, Old Henry and Leonard put on a Ghost Dance […] It was supposed to be a ritual for Sioux only, but somehow, through the “moccasin telegraph” which always spreads news among Indians in a mysterious way, everybody seemed to know about it, and many native people from as far away as Alaska, Canada, Mexico, and Arizona suddenly appeared in order to participate.
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
