At CSULB, Pow Wow brings traditional songs, new voices and lasting bonds together

As it has for more than half a century, the CSULB Pow Wow at Puvungna gathered people together in song, music and camaraderie to celebrate Native American culture.

"It's very special," Shannon O'Loughlin '97 said. "This is a very sacred place, literally, and what it gave me, it gave me a beautiful place to go to school. It gave me a beautiful community of people that I call my deepest friendships today."

O'Loughlin, a citizen of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, graduated with a special major in American Indian Studies and invited Native drummers to her class's Commencement. As covered by the Daily 49er at the time, her plan was for drummers to accompany a song honoring American Indian Studies faculty.

She later completed law school at the University of Arizona and is now chief executive of the nonprofit Association on American Indian Affairs. O'Loughlin returned to The Beach on Saturday to celebrate the annual CSULB Pow Wow at Puvungna.

"There's something about coming on the land and feeling the drum," O'Laughlin said.

Cal State Long Beach hosted Pow Wow, honoring Indigenous cultures of North America, on Saturday and Sunday. Puvungna is the historic name for CSULB's location. People of the Gabrielino/Tongva/Kizh and Acjachemen/Juaneño Tribes lived at Puvungna, traditionally upheld as a sacred place.

The Beach, in 1968, was the first California State University campus to establish an American Indian Studies program. Pow Wow has welcomed multiple generations of people to dance and create friendships since its 1969 founding.

"The people who are now at our Pow Wow, they are people whose grandparents started this thing, or whose great grandparents started this thing," said Craig Stone, professor emeritus of American Indian Studies and art.

To attend Pow Wow is to be enveloped by music. Resonant drumming and sonorous vocals fill the air during dance exhibitions. Dancers wearing traditional regalia, often dyed in jewel tones like ruby red, sapphire blue or emerald green, sometimes also wear bells that chime along to their movements.

"We stand today; we stand with our traditions," emcee Arlie Neskahi said to the audience during the Grand Entry. "As we stand, we stand with one another."

Neskahi, a member of the Diné Nation, has emceed CSULB's Pow Wow since 2018. The role enables him to fulfill his longtime love of oratory. He and others attending Pow Wow also emphasized its importance as a time for friendship, as well as its spiritual aspect.

"We are the protectors of this land," said Thomas Parrilla, who has O'Odham and Chiricahua Apache ancestry. "We're out here thanking Mother Earth and the Spirit for everything that is given us."

Parilla said he has attended Pow Wow for some 40 years. Another longtime participant, Pamela James, has about 30 years' history with the event. She served as the Head Woman Dancer in 2023 and said she looks forward to Pow Wow as a marker on the transition from winter to spring, and its drumming being evocative of the basic rhythms of life.

"The drum, when we're in our mother's womb, the first thing we hear is our mama's heartbeat," said James, who has Chickasaw, Santee Sioux and Menominee heritage.

Pow Wow is an intertribal gathering and this year's event included a special time set aside to share Indigenous songs from California. As afternoon moved into evening on Saturday, audiences listened to exhibitions of traditional and new songs in Chumash, Coast Miwok and Acjachemen languages.

The gathering also provides an opportunity for current students and recent alumni to celebrate American Indian culture. Alec Gonzales, a fourth-year computer science student, contributed to the event in part by providing water to drummers and singers.

Gonzalez has Tohono O'odham ancestry through his grandmother, who took American Indian Studies classes during the 1980s. He added the discipline as a minor, adding a new dimension to his studies.

"It's nice to get a different part of my brain working," Gonzales said.

The event also provided occasions to celebrate recent alumni. They included Shamia Sanders '25, who wore gold regalia adorned with blue-and-red stars while her family joined her for a walk around the arena.

"I grew up in the powwow community," Sanders said. "My grandmother, she wanted to honor me and my late grandfather."

Sanders' grandmother, a member of the Oglala Lakota tribe, also participated in the walk. Sanders earned her degree in human development and is now working as a case manager.

"It was a good feeling to be embraced by my community," she said.