Deerdancer

Here in New Mexico a deer dance is done by Pueblo Indians...celebrates/announces the beginning of each hunting season. The people wear traditional, not at all close-fitted, clothing. Men are the traditional hunters (not women) and they wear antlers, not heads The little men (e.g 4 years old) wear little antlers and the big men wear big antlers. Clowns (koshare) are important players as is an official devil-like guy who sometimes threatens audience discipline with a whip. Photography isn't allowed but public is generally welcome but this isn't a tourist entertainment so "facilities" aren't typically convenient.

If you're interested generally in Native Americans this book is a very good read and it provides insight into issues that are ongoing for some of them.

https://www.amazon.com/Man-Who-Killed-Deer-Pueblo/dp/0804001944

jtk - thanks for the recommendation, it looks interesting. I grew up just outside the White Earth Indian Reservation in northern Minnesota and a lot of my closest friends in school were Native Americans. I never did learn much about their original culture, but I sure got a very intimate look at who they were after that culture had been completely destroyed and even the reservation was stolen from them by the State of Minnesota. There's a great book (later made into a bad tv movie) that is set in, and brilliantly captures, exactly the time I was growing up there.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/194704.Red_Earth_White_Earth

Thanks..I've just ordered Red Earth (used, free shipping!

New Mexico (and perhaps Arizona) Native Americans are fortunate (relatively) to have isolated or otherwise protected reservations..which for some do provide connection to roots. Pueblo Indian villages are mostly culturally secure (they forbid the worst of tourism and forbid photography). Navajo are generally worse off but at least some of the people have, since the Sixties and the American Indian Movement successfully preserved or revitalized their culture...I know more about them and have friends among them, mostly through archery.

Here's an important and very readable book about conflict in New Mexico between Navajo, Mexican/New Mexican, and US Army. It was recommended to me by a 16year old volunteer at an archaeological site.

Blood and Thunder: The Epic Story of Kit Carson and the Conquest of the American West
Hampton Sides

@pbromaghin Bro, thanks for that recommendation. I bought the book for almost nothing online, genuinely enjoyed it.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/194704.Red_Earth_White_Earth

One of the things I got from that book was that different kinds of tribes in different kinds of situations have different kinds of experiences. In NM, native people typically have very little experience with modern agriculture beyond corn (mostly for traditional/religious purposes) and perhaps alfalfa. The 20th century's politics may be very similar (e.g. American Indian Movement).

Glad you liked the book. Things have changed some for them in Minnesota since the new buffalo (casinos) arrived, but this even caused a lot of problems between the different tribes and bands, as those near the larger cities made it big time and those out in the sticks got pretty much nothing.