As we head into the Winter, here are a few thoughts for the future. The road for us has been long, and the winters have been unforgiving. Our elders have passed before us again and again, but we have endured. Do not forget, however, that we will see the spring once again.

Think of our ancestors, and be proud. Think of our children, and be strong.

If the book has been written for us, do not worry. Look into the eyes of the children, the newborns, and remember that the world belongs to them now. Remember that even if everything …

The Good Red Road, a book by my father, has been updated. New in this update is the remaining English text of the book, as well as additional illustrations. Additionally, the text of the Spirit Testament has been added as an appendix, and the layout has been improved slightly. Please note that this is still an early draft, is missing many illustrations, and may contain omissions and other errors. I will post more updates as I progress. To all of you who have been waiting for this release, you will have to wait only a little while longer -- this small …

Since the process of getting the books of my father (Shupshe) online is taking a long time, I have decided to put another piece up for review. This time, the first third of The Good Red Road is now online. Note that many of the gikinoigun and masinaigun are missing from this, but the English text has been entered up to page 33 (of 90) in the original. Like I said, this is an early draft, and there will be some re-organizing and editing before the final release.

Here I present a short work written by my father called Midé Kikind-inin, or Spirit Testament. It was written back in 1986.

Spirit Testament
Author: Shupshewana
Date: 33,102 - 1986

Midé Kikind-inin is my gift to today's generation of my people. My wish is to share the way of life shared with me by my teachers, long ago. I have no wish to add nor take away any part. My only addition, is to say now I have found living by these words, my life has been richly blessed.

It has been said, "you must stand for something, or you …

I have posted a draft Bode'wadmi language font that I'm working on. I need these characters for an upcoming book project, which will be published here (for free.) This font provides only one letter set, and isn't even complete &emdash; it only has characters that match existing Latin letters. All the characters are mapped to UPPERCASE letters, and there are no numbers included. Oh, and did I mention? This isn't even the most common Bode'wadmi character set. Like I said, this is just a draft, and may cause problems. No warranty expressed or implied, all rights reserved (for now), etc. Have …

I am Anishnabek. I live my life by the seasons, by Grandfather Sun and Grandmother Moon. The winters pass by, and still I endure. Even as the sun sets in the west, my fire still burns brightly. We live our lives by the seasons, as all life does here on Anishnabe Aki, on mother Earth. The winter times are the times of trial, of endings, a time to prepare for the new journeys ahead. Those who Gidje'manido calls back to the great dance, to the spirit realms, they go to their resting. Mother Earth covers them with her winter's blanket …

Did anyone notice that the official BIA website has been removed? Well, it seems that the Department of the Interior and the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) has finally been taken to court over their mismanagement of "their" trust fund for Individual Indian Monies. During the investigation, it was found that the computer system set up to manage this trust fund (TAAMS) was horribly insecure -- so much so that court investigators could modify and even create new trust data! As a result, the Department of the Interior was ordered to disconnect from the Internet this system, and any other systems …

I have just recently added a Potawatomi Native Resources page to this site. Right now, it contains a few little gems of information about our traditional language as well as some links. Hopefully, I will have much much more information to add to this site in the future!

Bode'wadmi Language Resources

Currently, I have only a few things to share, two of them from my father, ShupShe (Howard L. La Hurreau). They are here as a gift to all Nishnabe people.

Hopefully someday I will know the native language well enough to create a few lists of my own... The …