Meskwaki Tribe: Daily Life Songs
How do Meskwaki children learn the traditional music of their ancestors?
Songs are passed down from generation to generation and taught to kids from a young age for a variety of different reasons.
Description
(Meskwaki tribal members dancing a traditional dance.)
[Stephanie Snow] The songs were basically like everyday social songs
[Abby Brown] Okay.
[Stephanie] Lullabies, love songs that could be done on flute as well, hunting and gathering songs.
[Abby] Also cause for celebration.
[Stephanie] Right.
[Abby] Okay.
[Stephanie] But these songs are meant to sort of. . . Some of them are obviously practical, they have practical use because you're gonna put your baby to sleep.
[Abby] Yes.
[Stephanie] The one I was gonna sing today is telling someone muskrats live over there, that you can find them there, right? because we used to trap muskrats to eat.
[Abby] Interesting. So they are functional.
[Stephanie] Everybody knew a song or two or more, you know, and just did them daily.
[Stephanie] I'm going to do a song today that is telling someone where to find muskrats. The Meskwaki used to trap muskrats and that was one of our foods.
(traditional Meskwaki song.)
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