Youth gather to recapture their roots
By Gabriel Lagarde
Kids surrendered their cellphones and spent a week immersed in nature, Ho-Chunk culture and each other’s company during the Recapture Our Roots Youth Camp 2016, June 13 to 17 at North Wood County Park, near Arpin.
Roughly 64 Ho-Chunk students, ranging from sixth graders to high school seniors, participated in a number of activities that emphasized traditional practices, which included everything from lessons in the Ho-Chunk language to the game of lacrosse to dress making, among other events.
There was a concerted effort by the organizers to incorporate these lessons into every aspect of the camp, Nakoosa Youth and Learning director and 2016 camp director Angeline Decorah said. She said the camp brings together resources from across the state that are not available to all Ho-Chunk students.
“We have centers in Milwaukee, we have centers in Madison. Their students might not have the same opportunities for cultural resources, they might not have the same access to elders or fluent Ho-Chunk speakers,” Decorah said. “This gives them that opportunity.”
Camp organizers also held campfire discussions in which older members of the nation were able to impart tenets and knowledge of Ho-Chunk culture to the younger generation.
Many students expressed a positive reaction to the absence of technology and the isolated atmosphere of the camp.
“This year they’re definitely making it intimate (with nature),” said Olivia Prescott, a seventh-grade student at Walden III Middle High School in Racine. “They’re having us sleep in tents, they’re not allowing us to use our phones.”
Maren Smith, a senior at Black River Falls High School, said she was fascinated by the cultural and spiritual connections within traditional Ho-Chunk sports and the strong sense of community the youth camp inspired.
“Playing lacrosse and doubleball, they call it the creator’s game, the healing game,” she said. “(The camp) is just about working together, helping one another.”
Victor Heintz, a seventh-grade student at Logan Middle School in Lacrosse, said he appreciated the Ho-Chunk language lessons, which were unavailable at his local Youth and Learning Center.
La Crosse Youth and Learning Center director Henry Greengrass said language is a prime example of Ho-Chunk culture, which includes a rich oral history stretching back three ice ages, in terms of its intrinsic value to the modern Ho-Chunk people and their sense of identity.
“Once our language is lost we are no longer Ho-Chunk, we are no longer our own people,” he said.
Greengrass said the survival of the Ho-Chunk language is more important than ever in the face of generational trauma and modern cultural homogenization.
This marks the fifth year and the fourth week-long youth camp for Ho-Chunk students put on by Ho-Chunk Nation Youth Services. Last year, the format was limited to a day camp before the return to the week-long schedule for the 2016 edition.
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