Dancing for inclusion

8-year-old is the first powwow royalty to represent the two-spirit community at Black Hills Powwow

Eight-year-old Kamiliah Stewart danced onto The Monument floor Friday night, the heartbeat of the Black Hills echoing through the drum beats. As she did so, she simultaneously made history.

Stewart, Oglala Lakota, is the first royalty to represent the two-spirit community at the Black Hills Powwow, one of the Nation’s largest. Stewart was chosen by the two-spirit powwow committee during their inaugural powwow in June.

“This is a powerful, powerful breakthrough for this generation,” Monique “Muffie” Mousseau, a two-spirit elder, said. “The acceptance and understanding and equality is right here.”

This year’s Black Hills Powwow set records with 1,222 dancers registered on Friday night. The powwow was so large competitions ran until the early hours of the morning. During powwows as large as Black Hills Powwow, people from across the nation send royalty to represent their communities.

“Our motto is to come dance with us. And that’s what we want to encourage, you know?” said Stephen Yellow Hawk, president of the Black Hills Powwow Committee. “Dance to that drum and get some of that good medicine. We just want to be inviting to everyone.”

The term “two-spirit” refers to a person who identifies as possessing both a masculine and feminine spirit and is used by some Indigenous people to describe their sexual, gender, and/or spiritual identity. Two-spirit is an umbrella term for what in Western culture may be referred to as the LGBTQIA community.

While Stewart herself does not identify as two-spirit, some of her loved ones do. Her older sibling, Benji Stewart, is a two-spirit individual and activist. Kamiliah ran to be the Uniting Resilience two-spirit royalty after learning about the event from Benji.

“It makes me feel proud,” Kamiliah’s father William Stewart said. “It’s definitely a growing experience for her and it’s also enabled me to get out there and experience new things, meet new people.”

The two-spirit royalty position is non-gendered. Royalty, which are often identified by their elaborate beaded crowns and sashes, are community members who compete to represent either their nation or a specific group.

So far, Stewart has represented the Black Hills two-spirit community at several powwows, including the Oglala Lakota Powwow, Manderson, Denver and Shakopee Wacipi as a fancy shawl dancer.

“I like it because you actually get to have joy and fun while you dance,” Kamiliah said. “My favorite part (of being royalty) is shaking the veterans’ hands because they serve our country.”

Mousseau and her wife Felipa De Leon-Mousseau, Oglala Lakota, lead Uniting Resilience, a nonprofit aimed at uplifting the two-spirit community, as elders. As two-spirit elders, the couple has never seen their Black Hills community openly represented.

“We’re so happy with this journey that’s unfolding in front of us,” Mousseau said. “To have our representation from this beautiful little human, this eight-year-old who had the courage to come and dance and we’re so thankful to her father for supporting as an ally.”

Two-spirit people continue to struggle with discrimination and violence, even at community events. Mousseau said the inaugural two-spirit powwow in June 2023 was met with threats of violence from regional extremist groups.

“This was one of the powwows we wanted her to attend on behalf of Uniting Resilience,” Mousseau said. “I’m overwhelmed with anxiety at opening up a whole new perspective in this generation. It’s amazing to see this growth in an area of harsh racial tension and violence towards the LGBTQ community and two-spirit people.”

In 2015, after waiting decades to be legally married, the Mousseaus found they could not be married on Pine Ridge. This led them to successfully push the Oglala Nation to pass South Dakota’s first comprehensive anti-hate bill and allow for same-sex marriage. That legislation has now also been passed among the Crow Creek and Sisseton-Wahpeton tribes.

Kamiliah will continue to serve as the two-spirit royalty until June 22, 2024, when she’ll pass her crown on to the next representative during the second Black Hills two-spirit powwow.

Dateline:

RAPID CITY, S.D.