Ojibway Ceremonies

The Ojibway Indians were first encountered by the French early in the
seventeenth century along the northern shores of Lakes Huron and
Superior. By the time Henry Wadsworth Longfellow immortalized them in
The Song of Hiawatha, they had dispersed over large areas of Canada and
the United States, becoming known as the Chippewas in the latter. A rare
and fascinating glimpse of Ojibway culture before its disruption by the
Europeans is provided in Ojibway Ceremonies by Basil Johnston, himself
an Ojibway who was born on the Parry Island Indian Reserve. Johnston
focuses on a young member of the tribe and his development through
participation in the many rituals so important to the Ojibway way of
life, from the Naming Ceremony and the Vision Quest to the War Path, and
from the Marriage Ceremony to the Ritual of the Dead. In the style of a
tribal storyteller, Johnston preserves the attitudes and beliefs of
forest dwellers and hunters whose lives were vitalized by a sense of the
supernatural and of mystery.