Museum exhibit on Native healing

Two Healing Traditions Meet on the Plains

The National Library of Medicine plans an exhibit of Native American healing practices this fall. In preparation, its physician-director met and questioned nine renowned Indian medicine men in Bismarck, ND, a rare encounter.

By Mary Annette PemberThe U.S. National Library of Medicine was here to find out. Nine medicine men and leaders had agreed to sit down to talk with the embodiment of Western medicine, Dr. Donald Lindberg, director of the Library located in Bethesda, Maryland. He and his crew were in town in April conducting interviews for the Library’s upcoming museum exhibit Native Voices: Native American Concepts of Health and Illness.

Opening in October at the Library’s headquarters, the exhibit will feature interviews of 90 traditional healers and leaders from Hawaii, Alaska and the lower 48 states. Over 50 tribes are represented in the exhibit which has been created over a period of six years. The exhibit will also be available at the Library’s Online Exhibitions and Digital Project website.Comment:  Nice to see a government body acknowledge traditional Native beliefs. Even if I don't share those beliefs myself. <g>

For more on Native health, see "Let's Move! In Indian Country" and Native CHAT Film Festival.

Below:  "Chief Leonard Crow Dog, Sicangu Lakota medicine man, spoke about the spiritual dimension of healing." (Mary Annette Pember)