Innaihtsiiyi (Peace) History Conference

[Rrlapier at AOL.COM]

News Release August 2006

Piegan Institute
Browning, Montana

Innaihtsiiyi (Peace) History Conference

In a time when war in the Middle East is profoundly affecting American 
society, it seems relevant to ask how peace and warfare have affected earlier 
societies. Innaihtsiiyi (Peace) History Conference will explore the effects of 
warfare on Blackfeet society in the 18th and 19th centuries. Historians have long 
described Blackfeet society as especially "war-like." What does is mean? What 
is true or not true about the description? What role did peace play within 
Blackfeet society? The Piegan Institute will hold a one-day history conference 
Innaihtsiiyi (Peace) which will examine differing concepts of peace (and war), 
Blackfeet relationships with their neighbors, the role of peace negotiators, and 
the dynamics of history on the Northern Great Plains.  The conference is free 
and open to the public and will be held on Friday, August 18, 2006 at the 
Nizipuhwahsin School  from 10am to 4pm. Presenters will include:

Dr. Theodore Binnema, Professor of History, University of Northern British 
Colombia, and author of Common and Contested Ground: A Human and Environmental 
History of the Northwest Plains, will examine  the significance of peace and 
warfare in Blackfeet history in the 18th and early 19th century and the role of 
warfare on Blackfeet society.

Narcisse Blood, Kainai Studies Department at Red Crow College, Alberta and 
Dr. Cynthia Chambers will screen a 30 minute video which attempts to capture 
Blackfoot stories, especially those about the land, and those that originate from 
the land, have not adequately conveyed the perspective of Blackfeet elders.

Dr. Hugh Dempsey, Chief Curator Emeritus, Glenbow Museum, Calgary, Alberta, 
and author of The Amazing Death of Calf Shirt and other Blackfoot Stories: 
Three Hundred Years of Blackfoot History, will examine the motivations for 
treaties made between the Blackfoot and other tribes, such as the Cree and Kootenai, 
and why some treaties succeeded and others failed, and their implications.

Dr. James Dempsey, Professor of Native Studies, University of Alberta, and 
author of Warriors of the King, will examine images of peace and war in 
Blackfoot pictographs. His visual presentation will examine these pictorial 
representations of history and the unique concepts of war and peace found within them.  

Nicholas Vrooman, Adjunct Instructor of Native American Studies at the 
University of Montana will examine the life of Maski Pitonew or Broken Arm, a Cree 
Indian. Broken Arm's traditional role as a peace negotiator coincided when 
Native ideas of peace struggled to accommodate external and internal conflict.  

Piegan Institute is a private not-for-profit organization with programs 
dedicated to researching, promoting and preserving Blackfeet history and language. 
This conference is co-sponsored by the O'Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain 
West and the Native American Studies Department at the University of Montana. 

For more information on the conference or directions to Nizipuhwahsin please 
call Rosalyn LaPier at 406-338-7740 or rrlapier at pieganinstitute.org.
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