Jingle Dancer by Cynthia Leitich Smith, illustrated by Cornelius Van Wright and Ying-Hwa Hu, 2000.

Jenna is inspired to become one of the jingle dancers at the powwow because her grandmother has been a jingle dancer. She loves the way the little cone-shaped bells on the dancers’ costumes sing!

Her grandmother tells her that there won’t be enough time to get the tin for making the jingles for her costume this time, but next time, she can dance with the Girls group.

Jenna knows how to do the dance because she has watched old videos of her grandmother dancing and has practiced. However, she can’t really do a proper jingle dance without the jingles for her dancing costume.

However, her grandmother isn’t the only person Jenna knows who has been a jingle dancer. Other women in Jenna’s family and among her family’s friends have also been jingle dancers, and not all of them dance anymore. Perhaps, with their help, Jenna can get the jingles she needs in time for this powwow!

The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.

My Reaction

I liked the way the book showed how Jenna’s family and friend supported her and helped her to take part in a tradition that they have all shared. They can’t all be there to see Jenna when she dances, but Jenna dances for all them, her dress covered in borrowed jingles!

A section in the back of the book explains more about Jenna’s tribe and the traditional dance shown in the story. The story is set in Oklahoma, and Jenna is part of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation and has Ojibway (Chippewa/Anishinabe) ancestry. Elements of both tribal cultures appear in the story. The tradition of jingle dancing originated with the Ojibway people, and the book describes details of the costume (called “regalia” in the book) that women and girls wear to perform the dance. The book also contains a glossary of words that appear in the story with some additional details about their significance.

I think this story is a fun way to introduce readers to Native American traditions that may not be familiar to them. I also enjoyed the pictures, which have a lovely, dream-like quality to them.