For Immediate Release

November 6, 2023

Mobridge, SD - Last week, Mobridge-Pollock 4th and 5th grade classes as well as K-3rd grade Tiger Kids students had the opportunity to learn about Lakota culture and arts from Ms. Starr Chief Eagle, an American Indian Culture Interpreter and enrolled member of the Rosebud Lakota Sioux Tribe. Chief Eagle and students performed the hoop dance for the public on the night of Wednesday, November 1 at 6:30 p.m. at the Mobridge-Pollock Middle School Theater.

For the Lakota people, the hoop dance is said to go back as far as their creation story. As Chief Eagle explains in a beautiful video on her website, the first Lakota people put a finger to the horizon line and followed it until it created a hoop around all of them. The hoop dance embodies the balance between father sky and mother earth, who met along that hoop line, and about having respect for that balance. It’s also about taking care of the sky and earth just as they take care of us.

The students worked hard Monday through Wednesday to learn the basics of the hoop dance and crafting their own bead necklaces. In the Lakota culture, the hoop dance is an embodiment of teachings to live by and a way to tell the dancer’s story and send a message to the rest of creation. A freewill donation was encouraged to help MCDC bring additional artist residencies to Mobridge in the future.

Ms. Chief Eagle’s week-long residency was made possible through collaboration between the SD Arts Council’s Artists in Schools and Communities program, Grand River Casino, Mobridge Community Development Corporation, and the Mobridge-Pollock School District. For more a copy of the evening’s program, including directions on how to make your own hoop, please click here.