native americans
Falling Apart
The main health issue facing the rez is diabetes. People’s diets here are very bad. Then you have heart disease, a lot of STDs among the youth, and a lot of teen pregnancies.
And Another Thing...
NINETY-NINE percent of the people down in town ON the reservation will sit there and tell you about our spirituality and our culture, but they know nothing about it. They don’t know any more than a white man.
Island Life
When I was young, twenty years ago, families up here were strong. They were very old fashioned and they all worked together to work things out. Families today don’t seem to be the same.
VICE Pictures - Sightseeing on the Rez
That means “I am Pikuni.” Pikuni is another word for Blackfeet.
Rez Dawg!
Dogs hold a special place in the Blackfeet culture. They were the beast of burden before the horse was (horses only became an Indian thing after the white Spaniards brought them over). Blackfeet have four periods of history: Creation, Dog Days, Horse...
Medicine Pipe Tradition
The state of the nation of American Indians today is actually a lot like that of a battered woman. Anybody who has lost their identity and been continually told that they were evil practitioners of witchcraft will begin to believe it.
Fry Bread Power
Indians are not known for their healthy diets. Their history is still in their genes and their genes are very worried about being hungry.
What Happened?
I’m a doctor, but I am currently not practicing. I teach pharmacology at the local community college. I grew up on the reservation, in the towns of Heart Butte and Browning. I ended up studying medicine in kind of a roundabout way.
Welcome to Blackfeet Country
The Blackfeet tribe has about 15,500 members. 8,500 of them live on the rez. The rez is 1.5 million acres. Do the math—that makes for a lot of open space.