Shaping the Future
When most people picture Indigenous pottery, their minds often go straight to the Southwest—desert landscapes and bold patterns on iconic clay vessels. Frequently overlooked is the fact that the artform of pottery has deep roots right here in the Upper Midwest.
Ceramics became widespread in what is now known as Minnesota around 2,500 years ago, before European contact. Thanks to the region’s rich deposits of clay, Indigenous people naturally incorporated it into daily life. In fact, clay was so prevalent that Dakota tribes named several places after it, including Bde Mak̇a Ska (White Earth Lake) in Minneapolis, Mde Maya Ṫo (The Blue Bank Lake) in Prior Lake, and Mak̇aṫo (Greenish-Blue Earth), now called Mankato.
Traditionally, clay was most often used to make pots for storing food, cooking food, transporting goods, and holding water. But after contact with Europeans, the use of handmade pottery declined. Metal kettles—effective and durable cooking vessels—gained popularity among northern tribes during the fur trade era. The use of pots also declined as government relocation policies disrupted traditional ways of life.
In the summer of 2025, the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community took a unique approach to maintain this connection to the earth by launching a special pottery program for tribal youth. Led by the tribe’s Cultural Resources Department, four high school students from the SMSC and one college intern took part in a series of hands-on classes over the span of three months, where they learned why pottery was important to the Dakota people and the step-by-step process to make pots using traditional techniques.
Learn more about this program and Dakota pottery in issue 4 of Wiċoṡkaŋ, the magazine of the Shakopee Mdewakanton Sioux Community.
