Ceremony in miniature: Kiowa oral storytelling and narrative event.

Abstract

Everytime Kiowas tell stories they invoke a cultural and tribal framework their audience(s) can relate to in a meaningful way. Like any cultural group, Kiowas recontextualize ideas and themes from earlier contexts that symbolically reproduce and reinforce their way of life everytime they tell stories. In this study, I utilize an ethnographic approach of observation and participation and fundamental anthropological linguistic concepts and theories to understand contemporary Kiowa oral storytelling. I apply a loosely structured narrative as a means of revealing the narratives as a whole, but even more so to allow the consultants to speak their minds freely and move about as they might in every day life. In this way, I believe it is easier to enter the world of Kiowa oral storytelling. Furthermore, it clarifies the process by which Kiowas tell stories and enables one to raise other pertinent questions regarding oral storytelling for its appreciation and understanding.