In Sitting Bull and the Paradox of Lakota Nationhood, Gary C. Anderson presents a innovative biography that efficiently uses the life and experiences of Lakota Chief Sitting Bull to uncover the fractural intricacies of Lakota political, religious, and cultural structure. Anderson brings a powerful combination of ethno history, documents, and first hand accounts into play throughout the biography, seamlessly exposing the harsh realities of the plains and the paradox that was the Lakota nation.
If any one common phrase could describe the greatest conflict of the Lakota nation, it is “United we stand, divided we fall.” Nationhood is a paradox to the Lakota people. They are unable to come together to face threats like the nation Sitting Bull spends his life trying to achieve. In a moment of truth, the Lakota nation, gathered together for the Sun Dance, destroys American troops under Custer. Despite the unshakable power offered by an unified Lakota, “By August…the great village broke up…the dispersal signaled the beginning of the end for Lakota nationhood.” (113) In Little Big Horn, Sitting Bull catches a glimpse of unity, leaving him with a haunting, driving dream of freedom that follows him to the grave.
Anderson plunges into the meat of the matter by covering Sitting Bull’s meteoric rise to power in the crucial years preceding the decimation of his people. He unfolds the complex societies and relationships between the tribes through Sitting Bull’s interactions with Lakota male sodalities, family, and other power players within the nation, setting the stage and preparing his audience for the destructive force of factionalism that splits the Lakota.
Faced with the deadly threat of an aggressively expansive United States, the Lakota nation shatters, divided on how to respond to the threat.
While Sitting Bull and the Paradox of Lakota Nationhood is a biography about Sitting Bull, it covers the struggles of the entire Lakota nation and raises eerie similarities to the stark factions that exist in the American government today. Anderson brings into focus the power struggles and disagreement, among both the tribes and even Sitting Bull’s own following. Unable to stand together, chiefs like Red Cloud of the Oglalas accept the treaties and reservations offered by the United States and others take what they see as the only path to freedom. The actions of Red Cloud and Sitting Bull highlight a terrible truth: leaders can divide a nation, even while trying to protect and help the same people.
Anderson’s work has an interesting twist when it comes to the spirituality aspect of Sitting Bull’s life. Sitting Bull gains influence and position not only through his leadership abilities, but also through his status as a “wicasa wakan,” a man who possessed the ability to see visions, to understand the past, and to communicate with animals. Unlike a traditional historian, Anderson gives Sitting Bull full credence, full faith when it comes to his mystical abilities, allowing the reader a refreshing look into Lakota religious outlook.
Sitting Bull drives home more information about the Lakota in 196 pages than most students learn in their lifetimes. Its small size, innovative approach, and excellent writing provide a text that could truly serve a political science or history undergraduate in exploring a fascinating conflict of the past.
