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'Neither Wolf Nor Dog' Tells Story Of Man's Journey To Document Lakota Elder's Life Story

Published: Thursday, June 22, 2017 - 4:12pm
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(Photo via Twitter)
Steven Lewis Simpson

A white man’s experience in Indian Country can be full of guilt-ridden cliches.

But in the new film, "Neither Wolf Nor Dog," which is based on the bestselling novel, the characters push beyond that when they suck a white author into the heart of Lakota country in South Dakota on a journey to document one of their elder’s life stories.

It’s not far from the experience the film’s Scottish director had earlier in his life.

Steven Lewis Simpson spent much of his career on a quest to tell the story of the Oglala Lakota on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in his documentary, "A Thunder-Being Nation."

Except, in this film, the writer who is beckoned to the Lakota Nation is not welcomed with open arms. Instead, that elder, played by Native American actor and Lakota Chief David Bald Eagle — who many of you will remember from "Dances with Wolves" — hands him a shoebox full of notes and tells him to put them into a book.

And I spoke with Simpson more about what happens next.

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