Tibbits Entertainment Series presents a Pow Wow Exhibition at Tibbits Opera House

Tickets for this event are $10. Doors will open and seating for this event will begin 30 minutes prior to showtime.

Please join us in learning and experiencing the Native American culture through a narrated Pow Wow exhibition. The drum group will present a Great Lakes Northern style of singing. They are Potawatomi Anishinaabe, formally one of the Three Fires people. The of nations of the Three Fires are Potawatomi, Ojibway, and Ottawa. The event will include invited dancers and singers, along with artwork, Native American made crafts, and apparel vendors.

The exhibition is a formal celebration of the Native American culture with revitalization of singing, dancing and storytelling of the ancestors. The Drum is the heartbeat of Mother Earth. The ancestors of the Native Americans danced for hunting, for battle, for love. They danced for the spirit of all living things. The indigenous people honor their ancestors in a celebration through Pow Wows. It is a time for happiness and healing. It is a time for family. Pow Wows are honored through the songs and dance styles and a show of respect of others. Alcohol and drugs are not permitted.

There were policies to ban native American culture and lifeways. The Indian Removal Act signed by President Andrew Jackson in 1830 forced Native Americans from their homelands to reservations west of the Mississippi River. It started the assimilation of Native Americans, removing children to industrial boarding schools, and stripping from them their culture and language. Colonized and forced to read and write English, they lost their heritage, language and the celebrations of their ancestors. Pow Wows were illegal. It wasn’t until 1978 that the American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1978 (AIRFA) protected the rights of Native Americans to exercise their traditional religions, ensuring access to sites, use and possession of sacred objects, and the freedom to worship through ceremonials and traditional rites.

Pow Wows are always an honor to have a way to revitalize the celebration of Native American culture. Come learn and celebrate the meaning behind the different dances, the prayers they represent, hear the singing of beautiful songs and what they represent. All are welcome to join in healing of the nation.

The original name in the Potawatomi language is Bode’wadmi translate Firekeepers. The language is Bode wad mi mowen (if sounded out correctly). Potawatomi is an English version of the actual name.