06x01 - Dakota Stars

[bunniefuu]

(Ramona)
This is Wahpekute territory,

the land of the Dakota.

(Emily) It feels great
to look at the stars

the same place
my ancestors did.

(Sienna) We're doing
an art project for NASA.

I drew, like, this star forming
and creating life.

[upbeat music]

(Izzie)
Funding for "SciGirls"

is made possible by NASA.

NASA inspires the future
generation of space explorers

and scientists
to engage in the science,

technology, engineering,
and math

that is the foundation
of NASA's mission success.

Additional funding
is provided by...

PPG Foundation aims
to bring color and brightness

to communities
around the world.

♪ ♪

(girls)
♪ S-C-I-G-I-R-L-S ♪

(Izzie)
We need you!

(girls)
♪ S-C-I-G-I-R-L-S ♪

(Izzie)
Come on!

(girls) ♪ When I need help
and I've got a question ♪

♪ There's a place I go
for inspiration ♪

♪ Got to get to the web, check
the girls' investigation ♪

♪ What girls? ♪

♪ SciGirls! ♪

Whoo!

(girls)
♪ S-C-I-G-I-R-L-S ♪

- I need you!

(girls)
♪ S-C-I-G-I-R-L-S ♪

- Come on!

♪ You've got to log on, post ♪

♪ Upload, pitch in ♪
Yeah!

♪ Want to get inside a world
that's fascinating? ♪

♪ The time is right
'cause SciGirls are waiting ♪

(girls)
♪ S-C-I-G-I-R-L-S ♪

(Izzie)
We need you!

(girls)
♪ S-C-I-G-I-R-L-S ♪

(Izzie)
SciGirls!

Hola.

I'm Izzie,
and this is where I live.

This is my room.

I love animals, reading,
cooking,

and spending time
with my family.

[upbeat music]

And my very favorite hobbies
are soccer,

exploring, and building things.

My parents and I hope
I'll become a scientist

or engineer one day.

And look at this--

more girls who like
the same stuff I do.

[computer whirs]

♪ ♪

Science and engineering
is for you.

Come on. I know you can do it.

[laughter]

[upbeat music]

♪ ♪

- Hi. My name is Sienna.

I am Sicangu Lakota
and Wahpekute Dakota.

What I like about being out
in the wilderness

is laying in the grass
sometimes

and just being able to listen
to, like, the sounds in nature.

[gasps, laughs]

♪ ♪

- My name is Emily,
but I like to go by E.V.

I'm Dakota,
and I'm also Ecuadorian.

I define myself like funny,
energetic...

I'm gonna grab an ice chunk.

A lot of other things. [laughs]

That's, like, sad.

- My name is Wicahpi.

I'm Lakota from Cheyenne River
in South Dakota,

and my dad is Ojibwe
from Red Lake.

It's not working.

My full name
is Wicahpi Cikala.

It means "little star."

I have five older siblings,
and my mom knew

that I was gonna be
the last one.

And there are five points
on a star,

And there are five points
on a star,

and I'm in the middle.

[upbeat music]

(Sienna)
In this part of Minnesota,

my people, the Dakota,

were the original
indigenous people.

This land was called
Mni Sota Makoce,

which means the land where
the waters reflect the skies.

The Dakota name evolved
into the state name.

♪ ♪

We're at
the Belwin Conservancy.

This land is used
for restoring it

to its original habitat

the way that the Dakota
used to live.

We are meeting our mentor,
Ramona.

She's gonna teach us more
about the stars

and what our people
believed in

and, like, how it helped us.

Hi.

- Hello.

- Nice to meet you.

- Hello.
- Hi.

- I'm so glad to meet you guys.

So today I wanted
to show you some examples

of a project we're gonna be
working on.

It is a beaded turtle amulet,

and this actually is a way
of us transmitting knowledge

to generations
through our beadwork.

- Where did this design
come from?

- The best way
to get that answer

is to go out and look
at the night sky.

- Okay. Let's go.
- Cool.

[upbeat music]

♪ ♪

(Sienna)
The early Dakota people,

we didn't really,
like, you know,

write down certain things.

What we did
is we passed down things

to younger generations
through oral history

and also through amulets.

♪ ♪

- This is Wahpekute territory,

the land of the Dakota.

So can you imagine
our ancestors

for thousands of years

sitting right here
where we are

doing what we're doing,

sharing the knowledge
of the night sky?

- It feels great
to look at the same stars

the same place
my ancestors did.

(Wicahpi)
Looking up at the night sky

felt like a relief because

for a long, long time,
my ancestors were not able

to teach their children
their practices

or even speak their language,

so I think it's a relief
that we can do that now

and learn what they couldn't.

[mellow music]

♪ ♪

- What do you guys notice
about the night sky?

(Sienna) Well, since it's a
lot darker out in the country,

I can see a lot more stars
in the sky.

- There's the North Star.

(Emily)
Oh, yeah. I see it.

It's right there.

(Ramona)
It's like the constant, right?

That one thing
you can always count on.

So if you look
in this direction,

we're starting to see
the Big Dipper.

And in that Big Dipper
where the handle is,

that one star,
we call her Wicahpi Towin,

the Blue Star Woman.

And she gives us
our original instructions

as we make our way
to the Earth

and also greets us
as we make our way back

to the star people.

(Wicahpi) The way
my ancestors taught it,

they knew that we came
from the stars,

they knew that we came
from the stars,

and then scientists nowadays

are finding out that
we have stardust in us.

So it connects
to what they were

already teaching everyone.

- Over here in the eastern sky,

there are those four stars.

Some people call it Pegasus,

but we call it Keya.

In Dakota, that's the Turtle.

- Is that the design
on the turtle amulet?

(Ramona)
Yes. Exactly.

- The symbol
on the turtle amulet

that Ramona was showing us,

that's what the star
constellation looks like.

(Ramona)
That design is to remind us

that we are the star people.

We come from the stars,
and to the stars we return.

(Sienna)
The early Dakota people were

scientific and systematic
with what they did.

They didn't just look at
the stars and be like, oh,

you know,
it's a thing in the sky.

They saw it, and they actually
used it to help them.

(Ramona)
So there's another part,

and that is the Salamander.

And that's also one
of the constellations.

And the design on the back
is what we call "kapemni."

Do you guys know
whatkapemniis?

- Doesn't it mean "symmetry"?

(Ramona)
That's right.

Kapemniis like two triangles
that meet

in their center,

and it means what's above
in this universe

is also below

and that they mirror
each other.

- All of the stories
that they taught

had something to teach,

so I would say they were
teaching and learning science.

- That first turtle design
that I showed you

with the star on the back,

that actually came from
a painting from my friend,

Dr. Annette Lee.

She is an astrophysicist,

and she is Lakota.

I'm so excited for you
to meet her.

- Yeah. Me too.

- Me too.
- Me too.

[upbeat dance music]

♪ ♪

- Today we are meeting
Ramona's friend, Annette.

- Let's get ready
to meet Annette.

(Sienna) Annette is
a Native astrophysicist

and artist.

(girls) Hi.

(Annette)
Greetings.

Mitakuyé Oyasin.

I greet you with a good heart,
all my relations.

My name is Annette Lee.

I am mixed race Lakota.

Our family name is
Wanblí Lúta, Red Eagle.

About years ago,
I started an organization

called Native Skywatchers.

And our vision was
to revitalize

our star knowledge

because so much is lost.

So a lot of people today

think of the so-called
Greek constellations

like that's all there is.

That couldn't be further
from the truth.

All the different cultures
throughout all of humanity

has had this relationship

with the sky and the stars.

And in our indigenous way
of knowing,

it's way more
than just labelling,

but it's a whole relationship

and it's where we come from.

So the purpose
of Native Skywatchers was


So the purpose
of Native Skywatchers was

to bring together
these pieces of knowledge

and these teachings.

- How do you bring
your cultural worldview

into your work as a scientist?

- One of the things that, uh,
we always try to uphold

is something calledÂÂ
"etuaptmunk."

Etuaptmunkmeans
"two-eyed seeing,"

and this teaching
was shared with me

by my friend and colleague,
Carola Knockwood,

who is from
the Mi'kmaq nation

over in Cape Breton,
Nova Scotia, Canada,

and her elders, the Marshalls.

It kind of goes like this:

to see with the best
in one eye,

with the indigenous way
of knowing,

and then to see with
the best in the other eye,

with Western science way
of knowing.

But this is the key part:

to see with both eyes
for the benefit of all.

- Two-eyed seeing is similar
to living in two worlds

because one eye sees
the cultural way of learning

and then the other eye sees

the Westernized way
of learning.

And she just put them
both together

for the benefit of everyone.

- Do you have a suggestion
for a science activity

that we could do that helps us
learn more about the stars?

- There's a lot of really great
NASA opportunities.

The ones
I'm really interested in

and especially excited about

have to do with exoplanets
and finding other planets

right here in our own galaxy.

There's one called
Disk Detective

that's really good

where you're working
with actual data

from different missions

or telescopes or science teams.

- Okay. We'll try it out.

- Yeah. It sounds cool.

- Thank you.
- Thank you.

- Bye.
- Bye.

- Keep in touch. Keep in touch.

- Okay. We will.

- [speaking Lakota]

- It was cool to meet
Annette Lee on Zoom.

I wish we could have met her
in person,

but it was okay.

[upbeat music]

- Hi, I'm Emily.

You can call me E.V.
if you want to.

I like the outdoors
because it's just so fun.

I like to see animals
like birds,

like blue jays.

And it's just nice outside.

♪ ♪

This is Piper,
my bearded dragon.

I've had Piper for three years.

I like to hang out
with my family and cousins

and go outside to go on hikes
and ride horses.

Bye.

[upbeat music]

♪ ♪

(Wicahpi)
Annette encouraged us

to continue learning
about stars through science

by giving us resources
that we can do at home.

- This is the NASA
Science website.

It has all these
Citizen Science projects.

Let's do
the Disk Detective one.

(Emily)
Okay.

- Citizen Science
is when anyone can help

to collect and analyze data,

even if they aren't
actual scientists

or have
a scientific background.

Let's do the tutorial.

(Wicahpi)
"Help us find stars

"with hidden disks
of dust around them.

"These stars show us
where to look


"These stars show us
where to look

for new planetary systems."

- We're helping scientists
figure out

if stars are making
new planets.

We look at the matter
around stars,

and that's how
we can detect, like,

planet life.

Okay. Let's start looking
at some of these images.

"The object is extended
beyond the outer circle

in the unWISE images."

- Whoa.

We were looking at images
that were taken

on different types
of telescopes

of the same star

and to see the disks
around it.

"Two or more images
show multiple objects

inside the inner circle."

Does that mean inside
the inner circle only?

- It doesn't say "only."

- Me and my teammates
talked with each other

on the questions
on Disk Detective

and on ways to answer it.

So it moves
off the crosshairs?

(Sienna) Yeah, it moves
off the crosshairs.

So I think it's like,
it's not--

- Not centered?

- Yeah, it's, like,
not centered.

(Wicahpi)
Okay, so this is one.

- It feels nice.

I helped scientists learn about
how new planets are formed.

- It makes me feel like
I can be a scientist one day

and be the ones
that ask people

to help analyze
and collect data.

- It is kind of cool
because it's like

I could actually be helping
an actual scientist.

(Wicahpi) It was round
in some, and in others,

it was, like, a oblong shape.

So yeah or no?

(Sienna) Yeah.

(Emily)
You don't need to worry

about getting it wrong

'cause so many people
look at the images

and combine the results.

- Let's see how many people
are on Disk Detective.

(Emily) Whoa, there's over
, people on there.

(Sienna) That's a lot.

- Disk Detective and the way
Dakota people studied stars

is similar because they were

looking at the way
the stars were.

The only difference is that
we have the better technology

to look at them closer.

[upbeat music]

Hey, I'm Wicahpi.

Come on in. It's cold outside.

This is my shoe collection.

I only started collecting,
like, two-ish years ago,

so it's not a lot.

Kay, so my favorite shoes
right now...

[inhales sharply]

Now that's where it gets tough.

[clock ticking]

[clock dings]
Both the cool grays.

I like to play lacrosse.

I've been playing
since I was around eight-ish.

I used to use this one,
but then after I made my own,

that's the one I use.

That's why
it's kind of all dirty.

I started off
playing modern lacrosse,

but now I play
traditional lacrosse

more than modern.

I like
traditional lacrosse better

because there's not
as much rules

and you can be more aggressive.

[grunts]

All right,
thanks for stopping by.

See you.

[soft upbeat music]

♪ ♪

We're at
the Women's Resource Center

in South Minneapolis.

♪ ♪


♪ ♪

- We're meeting with Ramona
because we're gonna be doing

a beading project.

(Emily)
The designs of the amulet

are from the stars in the sky,

like the ones
that Ramona showed us

at the Belwin Conservancy.

- Oh, hi.
[speaking Dakota]

Welcome.

- Hello.
Is that a baby's cradle board?

- Yes, it is.

And this is our project today.

This is an amulet that is made

when we're expecting a new baby
to come into the world.

The turtle amulet

represents the women,

and the salamander is

an amulet for boys.

- The turtle represents
the women

because a turtle's heart
is so strong

that it can freeze over,
and then when it thaws out,

it could move on
like nothing even happened.

- The salamander
represents boys--

the way that even when
their tails are cut off,

it grows back,
to show resilience.

(Ramona) And when the baby is
inside the mother's tummy,

it's connected
by the umbilical cord, right?

Once baby's born,
we take that umbilical

and we sew it inside here,

and that is now the connection

of this child
to the star world,

and it's a reminder
to that child

that we are the star people,

and we come from the stars
and to the stars we return.

- It feels nice to get
cultural teachings from Ramona.

(Sienna)
Ramona, she's not just,

you know, talking about it

and showing us the amulets.

We are also making
the amulets ourselves.

It's kind of cool
to, like, be doing

the same thing
that our ancestors did.

- It's just fun to do,
and I just feel more connected.

- We're gonna start
with our design.

As you look at your design,

decide what colors
you'd like to use,

and then color it in.

- So you need to pick out
your colors,

and then you need to put it
on the design,

like, on a piece of paper
so you know where it goes.

(Emily) It just helps you
to know where you're going

so you don't mess up
or do anything bad.

- I love when beadwork,
like, fades

into, like, a different color
and it's, like, super--

it looks like it's almost,
like, painted.

(Sienna) Yeah.

- So these are gonna be,
like, my three colors

all around the whole thing.

- It had to be nine beads

by however long
you wanted to do it.

I chose three different colors
so it'd be easier to make.

- The animal I decided to make
is a turtle.

I'm thinking about
maybe giving it

to my niece, my baby niece.

- I did the salamander design,
and I did the fire colors.

- The amulet I'm making
is a salamander,

and I'm planning to give it
to my sister and her baby

because she had a boy.

Just get one of every color
that we need?

(Ramona) Yep, drop it
in the tray and then cut.

Gently pull them off.
There you go.

Sometimes I just say,
"Just spill the beads,"

because we gotta get it
out of our system.

[laughs]

Get in your box
and find the beeswax,

the thread,
and I have the needles.

Kay, the amount of thread
that we're gonna use


Kay, the amount of thread
that we're gonna use

is two arms' length.

The reason we use the beeswax

is because this thread has
elastic in it,

and if we sew with it,
your beadwork's gonna sag.

So you're gonna press it
into the wax,

and you're gonna pull.

So that double thread,
once it's waxed,

becomes a nice,
tight single thread.

You did it.
- There we go.

(Ramona) That was easy.

Okay, are we ready
to start beading?

(Sienna and Wicahpi) Yeah.
(Emily) Mm-hmm.

(Ramona) All right,
take out your amulets.

So this is
hand-tanned elk hide.

For the Dakota, we use

every single part
of that animal

because we never want
to just disrespect

any part of this hide.

- The most fun part is
learning new ways

that you can bead,

because I started
my bead project

off the way I knew best,

and then Ramona taught me
a different way to do it,

and it was so much easier
for the project we were doing.

- You can just go, girl.

She's got this.

She gonna teach the class next.

- [chuckles]

[upbeat music]

(Sienna) My favorite part
was probably

sewing the beads onto it

because it's like,
when you're doing it,

it's kind of like
you're a bit nervous about it,

but when you finish
and you pull it back,

it's like you can see
the design coming together.

♪ ♪

(Ramona) No black.
Do you see black there?

On your map? [laughs]
(Emily) No.

Dang it.

(Ramona) That's okay,
'cause you know what?

When you make mistakes,
it helps you to learn

how to fix 'em.

♪ ♪

- Just looking at what you did
is fun,

but getting poked
by the needle's not fun at all.

But once you get
the hang of it,

it's not--it's not hard
at all.

(Ramona) How are you doing?

(Emily) I'm doing good.

- Wow.

It looks beautiful.
You did such a great job.

(Sienna) I finished this part.
- [Ramona gasps]

That's beautiful. Wow.

You're almost done.
It's beautiful, my girl.

[bright music]

- Hi, my name is Sienna,
and welcome to my house.

Come in.

I'm working on a project
for my drawing class,

and what I really like
about it is that

it's kind of, like,
more independent and stuff

and, like, I get to, like,
choose what I want to draw

and, like, what certain
elements I have to put into it.

Like, I can choose if I wanna
do pattern or value.

My favorite book right now
is "Poet X,"

and it's by Elizabeth Acevedo.

It's like a journal,
but in the form of poetry.

This is my dog Coco.

We've had her for, like,
four or five years

or something like that.

She's, um, Yorkie
and then a Maltese.

I'm cooking with my siblings
right now.

We do this especially, like,
on the weekends

'cause then I have more time.

This is Sophie.
She's ten years old.

- I'm turning next month.

(Sienna) And this is Demian.
He's five years old.

- Okay, I think that's good,
right?

- Yeah, that's good.

Bye. Thank you for visiting.

[upbeat music]

♪ ♪

- We're in Minneapolis
at the American Indian Center.

- We're in Minneapolis
at the American Indian Center.

- And today, we are
finishing up our amulets.

- So the next thing
we're gonna do is,

we're gonna add
some beautiful adornments,

because in the Dakota language,
there is no word for art,

but we make things beautiful

to reflect the way
the Creator made the world.

- It's all part of our culture
and the way we make things.

So we don't think it's art.
It's just the way we make it.

- We are going to add

some of the things
that make sound, right?

So we're gonna use
either the brass beads

or the glass beads

and then
these really nice brass cones.

- We filled it
with buffalo hair and sage.

- And the--some scraps
of the elk hide

that we could not use
on the outside of it.

- So this is an awl,

and this is the bone
of a buffalo.

This is a tool
that Dakota women used always

and actually had a place for it
on their belt

because it served
so many great purposes.

- We use an awl
to help the string go through.

It actually really worked.
[laughs]

♪ ♪

- It was, like,
really nice to see

'cause, like,
when you shake it,

like, it jingles
and stuff like that,

and also just, like, getting
to see all the beads together

and, like, how it looks
is just really nice.

- This is exactly what
our ancestors wanted us to do.

So now you learned
how to make them,

and so your responsibility
will be to pass that on

to someone else.

- When you're making
the amulet,

you wanna pass on the story
that comes with it.

So you're teaching your babies
and your kids

that you're connected
to the stars.

(Emily) The responsibility is,
you have to pass it on

and keep telling people
so they can pass it on

for generations.

- They came out so beautifully.

Your designs, your colors.

For us, this is
transmitting knowledge.

This is cultural lifeways.

But we never really
connected it to science,

but it is.

And so it would be
really exciting

if we were able to put this

into an art competition
with NASA.

Would you like to do that?

(all) Yeah.

(Wicahpi) We finished working
on the amulets

that we were doing
with Ramona,

and we're doing an art project
for NASA.

- "What do you think
we'll discover

"when we #UnfoldTheUniverse?

"Show us what you believe
the Webb telescope will reveal

by creating art."

You really just have to create,
like, a piece of art,

whether it be, like, a picture,
a video, or like, a dance.

(Emily) So first,
for the art project,

we all sketched out our ideas.

♪ ♪

- We started, uh, sharing
our ideas

and trying
to combine them all together

to have one idea.

(Wicahpi) I just wanted to see
if they could find

planets
with more vibrant colors.

- I drew, like, this star,
I guess, kind of, like, forming

and creating life.

- I'm gonna take a picture
of my amulet

and then put it on our poster.


and then put it on our poster.

For the art project,

we each had one good idea
we liked,

and then we put it together
for our art project.

- Do you want to do a picture
of your turtle?

- Yeah, I'd be fine with that.

We could take my idea
of the star

creating, like, other planes.

- And so I just thought
that we should take my planet

with the stardust coming down
forming their amulets.

(Emily) You guys want it to be
this big or smaller?

(Sienna) You could clean up
the sides a little bit.

(Emily) Okay.

♪ ♪

(Wicahpi) I think
it turned out pretty nice.

(Emily) Yeah, I like
that you guys outlined it.

- I'm gonna go
take the picture.

[shutter clicks]

(Wicahpi)
Our art challenge poster

starts off my planet,

and then the stardust
going into making new life,

and it incorporated
what we learned.

(Ramona) I am so excited
to show this to you.

Look at this social media post
about you guys.

(Sienna) "This is awesome.
Congrats to you young ladies

for sharing your talents
and knowledge."

- Oh, look at this one.
They're from NASA.

"This is really wonderful.

"Thank you so much for sharing
what you have learned

and your visions
for what we might find."

- Oh, my gosh, my mom replied.

(Ramona) How are you feeling?

(girls) Good.

- It felt good to work
with everybody on the project.

- I hope that the Native youth
that see this know

that we have always been here

and that they know
that we have also

always been scientists too.

[dinging]

[percussive Dakota music]

♪ ♪

(Wicahpi)
Science has reinforced

my connection to the stars
by showing

that stars are constantly
creating new life.

(Emily)
Now, when I look at the stars,

I'll think
about the Blue Star Woman

and the salamander
and the turtle

and how they made us.

(Sienna) What I'll think about

when I look up
at the stars now

is my people and how we're all
connected in the universe

and also about how life
is all connected

and how we need
to take care of it.

♪ ♪

(girls) ♪ S-C-I-G-I-R-L-S ♪

(Emily) It feels great
to look at the stars

same place my ancestors did.


same place my ancestors did.

- Welcome to our star party.

(person) Say hi to the sky.
(person) Hi!

- Cut out a circle
with your arms.

And that's your circle
of observation.

(person) We're gonna focus
on isolation.

(person) I like how cozy
our design is.

- [speaking Spanish]

(all) Uno, dos, tres.
[all cheering]

- Would you girls call that
a success?

(all) Yeah.

(person)
We're like NASA girls.

(all) We're NAScigirls.

[upbeat music]

(Izzie)
Funding for "SciGirls"

is made possible by NASA.

NASA inspires the future
generation of space explorers

and scientists
to engage in the science,

technology, engineering,
and math

that is the foundation
of NASA's mission success.

Additional funding
is provided by...

PPG Foundation aims
to bring color and brightness

to communities
around the world.

♪ ♪

(girls) ♪ S-C-I-G-I-R-L-S ♪