How you get your name?

I should start by saying that many traditional Lakota have two names. There is a "legal name", usually a European first name and a last name that is an English translation of a name that is identified with an ancestor. For example, Oliver Red Cloud is a direct decendant of Red Cloud and is a member of the Red Cloud family. This is the name by which everyone knows him in the community, and the name he uses to sign checks, etc.

However, traditional Lakota will also have an "Indian name" or "Lakota name" given to them in ceremony. This "Indian name" may be the name of an ancestor or may be an original name which is unique to them.

The manner of choosing an Indian name varies depending on the family or community. Some families will take tobacco to an elder member of the family, a spiritual interpreter, or a special person called a Winkte, and request that a name be chosen. If the person accepts the tobacco, they will then pray with it, and ask the spirits what the name should be. If a name is forthcoming, often the family will gift the person for providing that service.

They say that a person's legal name is the way that people identify a person, and a person's Indian name is the way the spirits identify a person. Usually, an Indian name is only used in a ceremonial setting, and usually only said in Lakota, though there are exceptions. For example, the late John Around Him was very open about the fact that his "Lakota name" was waci'nyapi or "Dependable".

I can't speak for other reservations, but in my experience on Pine Ridge and Rosebud, a "naming" ceremony is the modern version of the hunka ceremony. Hunka, or "making of relatives", has been around for quite a long time, going back to the buffalo days. The evolution of this old ceremony is commonly called "a naming", or "tying on a feather", alluding to a part of the ceremony when a feather is tied in the hair by the one who "stands up" for the person being named.

Although there are exceptions, most of the time, a naming ceremony is for children. Exactly when a child is given an "Indian name" may vary, depending on the family, but most times it is sometime after the child can walk, and before the child reaches puberty.

A naming ceremony will usually take about a year to plan and prepare and often a number of children from the same tiwahe will be named during the same ceremony. This will also give the family time to notify those adults who will serve as Ate Hunka or Ina Hunka, being father or mother by choice, for the soon to be named children. This will create a lifetime bond between the adult standing up for them, and the child. The best analogy I can come up with, is the European/American Christian ritual of having "God parents".

I will not go into the particular details of the naming ceremony, other than to say that, like many ceremonies, there is a feast or dinner, and a give-away as two of the major components. In addition, there is also the reciting of the family lineage of the children being named. In this way, they are introduced to the community, and a link is created with the child as to who they are decended from, and therefore who they are related to.

Hope this helps.

Wico'sani