Reviewed by:

• Walks on the Ground: A Tribal History of the Ponca Nation by Louis V. Headman
• Beth R. Ritter

Respected Southern Ponca elder Louis Headman has produced the most remarkable book I have ever encountered in more than three decades of research as a Ponca scholar. Just as Chris Eyre famously commented on the iconic film Atanarjuat, "this is an inside job." Walks on the Ground is a rare and precious addition to the scant historical and ethnographic literature on the Ponca, particularly the Southern Ponca Tribe. Intensely rooted in the language and worldview of the Ponca, Headman has been systematically collecting scraps of Ponca language and culture to weave into this narrative history for more than seventy years. As Sean O'Neill notes in his foreword, as a distinguished elder and one of the last fluent Ponca speakers, Louis Headman speaks with both authority and intimacy.

Ponca scholars and scholars of the Indigenous peoples of the Great Plains will experience many "aha" moments! The treatment of the fraternal order of the Heđúškà society (whose songs and dances form the backbone of modern pan-Indian powwow culture), as well as the unique history of how the Southern Ponca adopted and adapted the Native American Church in the early twentieth century, are worth the price of admission alone. Headman's exploration of the Heđúškà society, songs, and dances are one of the true strengths of this volume. Headman explains that Poncas are singers and that their oral history is embedded in Heđúškà songs that include feats of bravery on the battlefield but also chronicle important events and even notable individuals who exemplified Ponca/Heđúškà values. This insight serves to highlight just how critical it is to revitalize the Ponca language.

Sadly, this volume also reveals the intentional dismantling of Ponca culture and language, most especially through the Indian boarding school movement. The poignancy of forced removal (1877) and the resulting diaspora between the Northern and Southern Ponca peoples is striking. Culture is resilient and the Southern Poncas continued to sing the songs and tell the stories with the place-names of their former village sites and sacred sites in the north. Interestingly, they also sought to reproduce their traditional lifeways from the Niobrara-Missouri homeland by gravitating toward the Arkansas, Salt Fork, and Chikaskia Rivers, where they continued to celebrate their ceremonies and riverine adaptations.

This is a true reference volume that Ponca scholars will return to time and again. There are important chapters on the Ponca giveaway, family structure and kinship system, clans, Ponca names, the spirit world, funeral rites, Ponca medicine, Ponca warriors and political governance.

There are many audiences for this volume, [End Page 247] but, read in tandem with Headman's Dictionary of the Ponca People (2019), it speaks most powerfully to the children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of the Ponca people. Here are the embers left to rekindle Ponca culture and language!

审阅者：

• 《在地上行走：庞卡民族的部落历史》，路易斯·V·海德曼 (Louis V. Headman)
• 贝丝·R·里特

受人尊敬的南方庞卡长老路易斯·海德曼 (Louis Headman) 创作了一本我在作为庞卡学者三十多年的研究中遇到过的最出色的书。正如克里斯·艾尔（Chris Eyre）对标志性电影《Atanarjuat》的著名评论一样，“这是一项内部工作。” 《在地面上行走》是对庞卡人（特别是南部庞卡部落）的历史和民族志文献的稀有和珍贵的补充。海德曼深深植根于庞卡语言和世界观，七十多年来一直在系统地收集庞卡语言和文化的碎片，将其融入这段叙事历史中。正如肖恩·奥尼尔（Sean O'Neill）在前言中指出的那样，作为一位杰出的长者和最后一批能说流利的庞卡语的人之一，路易斯·海德曼（Louis Headman）的讲话既权威又亲切。

庞卡学者和大平原原住民学者将经历许多“顿悟”时刻！处理Heđúškà社会的兄弟会（其歌曲和舞蹈构成了现代泛印度巫术文化的支柱），以及南庞卡人在二十世纪初如何采用和改编美洲原住民教会的独特历史，仅门票价格就值了。海德曼对Heđúškà社会、歌曲和舞蹈的探索是本书的真正优势之一。海德曼解释说，庞卡是歌手，他们的口述历史嵌入在Heđúškà歌曲中，这些歌曲包括战场上的英勇事迹，也记录了重要事件，甚至是庞卡的典范的著名人物/Heđúškà价值观。这一见解凸显了振兴庞卡语言的重要性。

可悲的是，这本书还揭示了对庞卡文化和语言的有意瓦解，尤其是通过印度寄宿学校运动。强制迁移（1877 年）以及由此造成的北方庞卡人和南方庞卡人之间的离散是令人震惊的。文化具有弹性，南方庞卡斯人继续用他们以前的村庄遗址和北方圣地的地名来唱歌曲和讲述故事。有趣的是，他们还试图通过前往阿肯色河、盐叉河和奇卡斯基亚河来重现尼奥布拉拉-密苏里州家乡的传统生活方式，在那里他们继续庆祝他们的仪式和河流适应。

这是一本真正的参考书，庞卡学者会一次又一次地回顾。其中的重要章节涉及庞卡赠品、家庭结构和亲属制度、宗族、庞卡名字、精神世界、丧葬仪式、庞卡医学、庞卡武士和政治治理。

这本书有很多读者，[完第 247 页] ，但是，与 Headman 的《庞卡人词典》 （2019 年）一起阅读，它对庞卡人的子孙和曾孙的影响力最大。这是重燃庞卡文化和语言的余烬！