The Ceremonial Transformations

The Native Americans did not have a clear distinction between the spiritual world and the physical world, as there was an intermediate and transitional third world separating them. To some extent, all creatures lived in the three worlds. A person could become a being from any of the other two worlds if he had the power or performed the appropriate rituals.

Transformations used to mimic the events of the “first time”, when the world acquired its identity through cultural heroes and traitors. At ceremonies, someone could take the appearance of one of these figures and think that he was literally transforming into her. A man in sacred black foot really turned into a yellow bear for the gifts.

The supernatural beings that shaped the world in the time of the beginnings used to transform into animals, take human form, or possess people, according to the kwakiutl and haida of the northwest coast. The aforementioned beings were not always just. In some choreographies, two-layer masks, elaborately painted, were used to highlight the alteration. The outer part represented the head of a salmon. During the dance, the dancer pulled out a rope and opened the mask, uncovering the interior that represented sisiutl, a frightening being similar to a dragon. At a certain moment, the mask of an evil being could open and reveal the face of the human being that had been possessed by that being until that moment.

It is very common for men to be transformed into these animals in "animals" ceremonies, such as those of the deer in indigenous peoples. The hunters call the deer in the hills at dawn, and the confused forms of deer men who move as cats astonish at the light of the sun that has just come out whistling cornaments and furrows. The little children, disguised as caterpillars, roam around them while playing and playing in front of the people. The deer dancers are accompanied by a figure known as the mother of hunting.