{"id":344131,"date":"2026-09-11T17:02:52","date_gmt":"2026-09-11T17:02:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/344131\/"},"modified":"2026-09-11T17:02:52","modified_gmt":"2026-09-11T17:02:52","slug":"lenape-pow-wow-returns-to-prospect-park-for-3rd-year-bringing-indigenous-culture-to-brookyn-brooklyn-paper","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/344131\/","title":{"rendered":"Lenape Pow Wow returns to Prospect Park for 3rd year, bringing Indigenous culture to Brookyn \u2022 Brooklyn Paper"},"content":{"rendered":"

A celebration honoring Brooklyn\u2019s Indigenous roots is returning to Prospect Park this fall as the Third United Lenape\/Lun\u00e0apeew Nations Pow Wow<\/a> brings dancers, drummers, artists and food makers to the borough for a free two-day event.<\/p>\n

The Pow Wow<\/a> will take place Oct. 3 and 4 at the LeFrak Center at Lakeside. The event runs from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Saturday and to 4 p.m. Sunday and is presented by Prospect Park Alliance, the \u00c9enda-L\u016dnaapeew\u00e1hkiing Collective and American Indian Community House.<\/p>\n

Lenape\/Lun\u00e1apeew is the name of the Indigenous peoples whose ancestral homelands encompassed what is now Brooklyn and the surrounding region. The term means human beings, or more specifically, \u201cthe ones who came from thought,\u201d according to event organizers.<\/p>\n

Pow Wows are gatherings where Lenape\/Lun\u00e1apeew and neighboring Indigenous nations come together to socialize and celebrate life. Prospect Park previously hosted intertribal Pow Wows from 1916 to 1972, making the return of the tradition part of a much longer history in Brooklyn. <\/p>\n

\u201cReviving the Pow Wow tradition in Prospect Park provides the Lenape\/Lun\u00e1apeew who were forced to relocate across the continent back to their ancestral homelands to reunite and celebrate, and offers Brooklynites of all backgrounds the chance to immerse themselves in the cultures of the original stewards of this land,\u201d said Morgan Monaco, president of Prospect Park Alliance. \u201cThis historic event is a crucial step in healing deep-seated wounds from our nation\u2019s past and ensuring that all in our community see themselves in our programming.\u201d<\/p>\n

EL Collective founder George Stonefish revived the modern Pow Wow tradition by organizing the first United Lenape\/Lun\u00e1apeew Nations Pow Wow at the Park Avenue Armory in 2018. Prospect Park Alliance held a culture fair with EL Collective<\/a> and American Indian Community House in 2024, then hosted a full Pow Wow at the LeFrak Center in 2025. <\/p>\n

\"lenapeThe event will feature drummers, dancers, and art.Photo courtesy of Bob Levine\/Prospect Park Alliance<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re proud to welcome the United Lenape\/Lun\u00e1apeew Nations Pow Wow back to Prospect Park for a day of conversation, celebration, and culture, NYC Parks Commissioner Tricia Shimamura said in a statement. \u201cEvents like this demonstrate how critical our public parks are as welcoming spaces that foster connection and bring people together.\u201d <\/p>\n

For Stonefish, the gathering is also an opportunity for Lenape communities dispersed across North America to reconnect.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are thrilled to join our partners at Prospect Park Alliance, American Indian Community House and the City in our work to bring together our Lenape communities from across Turtle Island,\u201d said George Stonefish, founder of EL Collective. \u201cThis Pow Wow serves as an educational message to the broader community, and a social and cultural message for us, the Lenape people. We want all to leave the Pow Wow with a deeper understanding about why we as contemporary Native Americans still follow our culture, practice our dances and share our songs today.\u201d<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s event will put a particular emphasis on younger generations. The Pow Wow will feature a Youth Spotlight highlighting performers aged six to 17, while two young adults \u2014 Emma Hannah K. Stonefish and Javid Ridgeway \u2014 have been brought on as Pow Wow coordinators. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis third annual Pow Wow will focus on Lun\u00e1apeew\/Lenape youth from across the continent,\u201d Brent Stonefish, co-founder of EL Collective, said. \u201cTwo young Lun\u00e1apeew\/Lenape young adults have been hired as coordinators of this event, while being mentored by their older relatives to help develop their leadership skills ensuring that our future generations continue to thrive and carry our rich culture into the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Pow Wow is part of Prospect Park Alliance\u2019s ReImagine Lefferts initiative, which is reworking Lefferts Historic House to explore the lives, resistance and resilience of the Indigenous people of Lenapehoking, as well as the Africans enslaved by the Lefferts family.<\/p>\n

A related exhibit, \u201cEelunaap\u00e9ewi Ehaptoon\u00e1akanal: Voices of Lun\u00e1apeew\/Lenape,\u201d will be on view at Lefferts with the Pow Wow. The exhibition features video interviews with Lun\u00e1apeew\/Lenape knowledge-keepers and culture bearers discussing their relationships with their ancestral homelands.<\/p>\n

\u201cNew Yorkers are deeply interested in the original peoples of this land and their heritage, culture and art,\u201d Dylan Yeats, Ph.D., Prospect Park Alliance\u2019s Lefferts Historic House museum director, said in a statement. \u201cThis Pow Wow will be very special since Lenape\/Lun\u00e1apeew from across the continent will be reconnecting with their lands and each other. It is a real privilege and honor for Brooklynites to be able to host and participate in this historic event, which will also be incredibly fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Pow Wow is free and open to the public, though organizers are asking attendees to RSVP<\/a> through Prospect Park Alliance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A celebration honoring Brooklyn\u2019s Indigenous roots is returning to Prospect Park this fall as the Third United Lenape\/Lun\u00e0apeew…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":344132,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[108213,98,6456,3462,10454,128976,100,6766,99,128977,2099,128978,128979,128980,111700,20903,128981,128982,128983,9,24,370,63,12682,128984,15739,15740],"class_list":["post-344131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-american-indian-community-house","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-community","tag-brooklyn-culture","tag-brooklyn-events","tag-brooklyn-events-october-2026","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-history","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-el-collective","tag-family-friendly-events","tag-indigenous-artists","tag-indigenous-culture","tag-indigenous-history","tag-lefrak-center","tag-lenape","tag-lunu00e1apeew","tag-native-american-culture","tag-native-american-heritage","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-newsletter","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-events","tag-pow-wow","tag-prospect-park","tag-prospect-park-alliance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=344131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/344132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=344131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=344131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=344131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}