Oglala Sioux use of Medical Herbs

Authors

George Robert Morgan, Chadron State College
Ronald R. Weedon

Date of this Version

1990

Document Type

Article

Comments

Published in Great Plains Quarterly [GPQ 10 (Winter 1990): 18-35] .Copyright 1990 Center for Great Plains Studies, University of Nebraska—Lincoln.

Abstract

Despite the turmoil of Sioux cultural losses since contact with Anglo-European culture, the Oglala Sioux have maintained an interest in herbal medicines, although with each passing generation the number of plants actively used for curing has diminished. Fewer people have been learning the identification of plant medicines and their uses, the procedures for preparing plants, and the techniques of herbal cures. Many of the older Sioux blame reservation boarding schools for the disruption of cultural transmission, but other factors have been at work as well.