Native Horse Now Airing on PBS
Native Horse opens in the Lakota Nation, Pahá Sápa (Grey Horn Butte - aka Devils Tower). In the Lakota culture, Sungwakaη (Horse) is a sacred being that holds an integral place in life ways and history. Nupa and Zuya White Plume, Lakota of the Sung Nagi Okolakiciye (Horse Spirit Society) ride like the wind, showing how natural and elegant Native riders are in this modern age, maintaining a soul connection with their great Lakota history. Tokala Black Elk, a descendent of the Lakota wičháša wakȟáŋ (Holy Man) Black Elk, leads viewers through the film as narrator. His profound deep voice explains Lakota’s historical and spiritual connection to horses as well as contemporary times in the Oglala Nation.
Wendell Yellow Bull, of Taku Skan Skan Wasakliyapi: Global Institute for Traditional Sciences and a direct descendent of Chief Red Cloud, shares ancient Lakota knowledge. Saginaw Grant, Sac and Fox Nation wisdom keeper, shares his reverence for the Horse and how it contributes to the well-being of people. Karen Ducheneaux, a Lakota of the Tatanka Wakpala Community and experienced horse person, shares valuable insight into how Horses empower Lakota youth and the Nation. Raoul Max Trujillo, Apache artist, explains the vital importance of Horses and the empowerment they bring. Adam Joaquin Gonzalez (Comanche) makes his living with horses and has appeared in many television and Hollywood films as a featured American Indian horsemen. Tokala Black Elk sings sacred Lakota Horse songs, shares history, and explains how Horse culture plays a critical role in Lakota life ways and spirituality. The voices of these Indigenous people give a powerful and unique historical point of view.
"Native Horse" travels to the Yukon Beringia Museum in Canada to interview Dr. Grant Zazula and other scientists who are studying Horse remains that were unearthed in the melting permafrost. Their findings are re-writing history! Tyler Murchie from McMaster University in Canada has been studying frozen earth cores from the Yukon and has discovered DNA from both Woolly Mammoths and Ice Age Horses, genus Equus, that are about 6,000 years old, which blows up the whole paradigm of these animals going extinct in the Holocene Epoch roughly 12,000 years ago. The new data implies that horses may have persisted in North America well after the classical Late Pleistocene extinction event.
Alex White Plume (traditional Lakota, leader of the Sitanka Wokiksuye Tiospaye, and a creator of the Bigfoot Memorial Ride to Wounded Knee) explains how reconnecting with the Horse Nation helped the Lakota people return to their spiritual and cultural ways after the 1973 Goon Wars on Pine Ridge Reservation. “Native Horse” joins the sacred memorial ride to Wounded Knee, where riders travel through blinding snowstorms and harsh conditions to honor their ancestors and way of life, empowering themselves and the Lakota Nation.
Trailers for Native Horse:
Tokala Black Elk (a direct descendent of the Lakota wičháša wakȟáŋ (Holy Man) Black Elk) brings incredible Lakota knowledge, language and history in his deep Oglala voice and storytelling. Having grown up on Pine Ridge, Oglala Nation in South Dakota, Tokala knows the beauty and tragedy of Rez life. Between Alex White Plume (Sitanka Wokiksuye Tiospaye), Tokala, and Karen Ducheneaux of the Tatanka Wakpala, reflecting on the 1973 Goon Wars and how the Rides to Wounded Knee helped to revive the Nation, this film gives the viewer an immersive sense of being there as we hear from people who actually lived it! These people share from the heart and soul. Producer Kleinert had the honor to work with Alex, Karen & Tokala 20 years earlier on his film “Spirit Riders: Riding to Mend The Sacred Hoop.” To have made sacred horse journeys with these people and documented their stories while riding across Lakota country seems to take us right there beside them.
Jill Momaday, Associate Producer for “Native Horse,” is a Kiowa Producer/Director. Her film “Return to Rainy Mountain” won numerous awards and features her father, Dr. N. Scott Momaday. Jill offered tremendous insight into some of Scott’s greatest writings and poems. Dr. Momaday’s contribution to Horse Nation and our higher consciousness is so eloquently explained by him in his interview in “Native Horse.”
"Native Horse" was inspired and created by the authentic, lived experiences of Lakota Elders, knowledge keepers, and horse people—Alex White Plume, Tokala Black Elk, and Karen Ducheneaux, among others. Producer James Anaquad Kleinert first became close with Alex, Karen, and Tokala in the 1990s and early 2000s, having joined them on the sacred Bigfoot Memorial Ride to Wounded Knee several times. These Lakota people were entirely at ease in their interviews, speaking authentically and powerfully as they shared their perspectives about the issues they see as most important to the story of "Native Horse.”
The narrative of "Native Horse" is told through the lens of traditional Indigenous knowledge of the Tribal people of the Great Plains, as well as through the lens of the Western scientific method. Paleontologists are starting to reach conclusions similar to traditional Lakota knowledge, albeit through their very different Western scientific methods. "Native Horse" shows the differences and overlaps in these two ways of learning, understanding, and passing on valuable information.
Mitakuye Oyasin,
James.