American Indian Cultural Assessment History Research Paper (Research Paper Sample)

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The Lakota Tribe
The Lakota tribe who are also referred to as the people from the nation of the standing rock is one of the native tribes inhabiting the northern regions of America before the arrival of the alien European communities (Gibbon, 119-130). This tribe is also referred to as the Sioux tribe and it is farther subdivided into three subgroups based on the geographical regions and their languages. This subtribes of the Lakota tribe include the Dakota Santee who resided in the east Dakota region, the Lakota of Tenton, the western regions of the Dakota and the Nakota of Yankton residing in the central Dakota regions. The native meaning of the words Lakota and Dakota simply means allies or friends (Gibbon, 119-130).
This Sioux speaking people moved to the lower regions of the great Mississippi region and the valleys of the Ohio regions. Their main economic activity was agriculture, a significant aspect that influenced them to settle around the Mississippi river regions and the Ohio valley, areas that were lucrative for crop farming due to their rich agricultural soils and availability of water (Ostler, 90-110). This tribe was also an active participant of the mound-building era that lasted from 9th to the 12th CE. In the later years of the 1600 and 1700 CE, this tribe lived in the upper regions of the Mississippi river which are now Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin and Dakota. The constant intertribal conflicts between the Lakota and the Cree tribe forced the Lakota to relocate to the west and they settled in the Great Plains around 1750 CE (Haukoos et al., 72-82).
Traditional Crafts
The Lakota people had extensive skills in various kinds of artwork such as carving, quill-working, leather industries and beadworks. These were tribal skills which were passed on from one generation to the other and surprisingly, some Lakota remnants still possess these skills to date. They used these skills for economic and social purpose an example being the drums used in cultural dances and religious ceremonies and leatherworks used for processing hides used in painting and cloth production (Haukoos et al., 72-82).