"Talking Without Words in the Old West" (2009)

Directed by Sally Thompson
Before Euro-American settlement of the West, a sophisticated system of non-verbal communication allowed for intricate relationships between the many tribes of the Great Plains. This illuminating account of the complex communication systems is told by Native Americans from the various tribes who developed and used the languages.

ABOUT THE FILMMAKER
Dr. Thompson has spent over thirty years working with native tribes of the West. She has worked as an archaeologist, ethnographer, and ethnohistorian. As founder of the Regional Learning Project, she oversaw a team of specialists with a focus on regional history, geography and culture, interviewing over 200 elders of 37 tribes and used the results to produce several documentaries and three websites. More recently, she worked with traditionalists from the Kootenai and Blackfeet tribes on a book about their traditional seasonal grounds through the Crown of the Continent, with a focus on Glacier National Park. PEOPLE BEFORE THE PARK is due out in 2014.

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