Milton Daniel Mazorra Juarez

04/09/2013

Sioux Indians
The Sioux Indians were, a north american tribe of the siouan language family.Their original homelands were in Wisconsin, North and South Dakota but the earliest known homeland of the sioux was the upper mississippi valley in what is now minnesota. beggining in the 1600`s.the sioux indians actually came to North America from the continent of asia about 30,000 years ago. The name sioux actually means little snake, which was given to the tribe by the chippewa indians. Generally, the Sioux Indians were nomadic, meaning that they never really stayed in one place for a very long amount of time. Typically they followed the pattern of the buffalo, assuring them that there would be food and clothing wherever they traveled. The Spanish introduced horses to the Sioux in the 1500s. Once they began to use horses as a means of carrying articles and transportation, life became much easier, particularly since they were living a nomadic lifestyle. The tribe had chiefs designated for various aspects of life, including war, civil rules, and of course, medicine men. The men of the tribe could become chiefs eventually if they demonstrated strong warrior skills.The features of the sioux indians that particularly stand out is their long, straight jet-black hair, representative of people decending froma asia. Once the 1860`s came the fight over land got intense. The sioux indians battled the wite man in order to keep their land. Eventually, the united states government signed a traty allowing them to keep a portion of the land. Once the gold rush took place, rumors sprouted that there was gold located on sioux land. Again, a battle began and the sioux jained up whith the cheyenne tribe. The battle was led byt the legendary Sitting Bull.Their relationship with white people was that they were always in conflict because of their land, in fact the united states government set out a series of indian treaties that would force the indians to give up their lands and move further west onto, what they called reservations. The sioux became friendly with the british after the fall of the french and sopported the british against the united states in the american revolution. In 1867 a treaty was concluded by wich the sioux gave uo a large section of territory and agreed to retire to a reservation in south Dakota before 1876. The last major conflict faught by the siouc was the battle of the wounded knee, dec.29,1890, wich resulted in the massacre of more than 200 members of the tribe. Today, there are about 30,000 Sioux Indians living in South Dakota, and still other in Nebraska, Montana, and Canada. The Sioux are among the poorest people in America. Of the ten poorest counties in the country, six are in Sioux lands in North

and South Dakota. On the reservations most men have no work, many turn to drink or drugs. Most families live in poverty. They live in small houses with too many people, some without power or water. They do not eat well, so many become fat or diabetic. Many do not have safe water to drink. Cervical cancer is way too common. Half drop out of high school. They have a high suicide rate. Their men are at least twice as likely to wind up in prison as white men. There are about 150,000 Sioux. Some live in white towns and cities, some on the reservations, what is left of their country. Only 14% can speak their own language, which was not allowed to be taught at school till 1978. The Sioux had owned western South Dakota and neighbouring lands. In the middle of their lands were the sacred mountains, the Black Hills, which had silver and gold. When the whites found out, they took the mountains, robbing the Sioux of billions of dollars. Later they cut the giant faces of four white men into the side of one of those mountains, Mount Rushmore.

Sources: http://siouxme.com/stories.html http://siouxme.com/hpbody.html http://siouxme.com/bio.html http://siouxme.com/lodge/index.html http://siouxme.com/sioux.html http://siouxme.com/events.html http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/300-santee-sioux-sentenced-to-hang-inminnesota