The encounter of the Native American

Indigenous peoples of the Americas

The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of North and South America, their descendants and other ethnic groups who are identified with those peoples. Indigenous peoples are known in Canada as Aboriginal peoples, and in the United States as Native Americans...

 cultures with the European and African civilizations changed drastically their ways of life and thought. Many syncretic and revitalization movements emerged.

The most noticed of those movements were the Handsome Lake

Handsome Lake

Handsome Lake was a Seneca religious leader of the Iroquois people. He was also half-brother to Cornplanter....

 and the Iroquois Longhouse, Dreamers

Smohalla

Smohalla Wanapum nineteenth-century dreamer-prophet associated with the Dreamers movement among Native American people in the Pacific Northwest’s Columbia Plateau region.-Biography:...

 of the Pacific Northwest, the Ghost Dance

Ghost Dance

The Ghost Dance was a new religious movement which was incorporated into numerous Native American belief systems. The traditional ritual used in the Ghost Dance, the circle dance, has been used by many Native Americans since prehistoric times...

 movement, the Indian Shaker Church

Indian Shaker Church

The Indian Shaker Church is a Christian denomination founded in 1881 by Squaxin logger John Slocum in Washington. The Indian Shaker Church is a unique blend of American Indian, Catholic, and Protestant beliefs and practices....

, and the Native American Church

Native American Church

Native American Church, a religious denomination which practices Peyotism or the Peyote religion, originated in the U.S. state of Oklahoma, and is the most widespread indigenous religion among Native Americans in the United States...

.

Also there were many prophets, such Popé

Popé

Popé or Po'pay was a Tewa religious leader from Ohkay Owingeh , who led the Pueblo Revolt against Spanish colonial rule in 1680.-Background:...

, who led the Pueblo revolt in 1675; Neolin

Neolin

Neolin was a prophet of the Lenni Lenape, who was derided by the British as "The Imposter." Beginning in 1762, Neolin believed that the native people needed to reject European goods and abandon dependency on foreign settlers in order to return to a more traditional lifestyle. He made arguments...

; Tenskwatawa

Tenskwatawa

Tenskwatawa, was a Native American religious and political leader of the Shawnee tribe, known as The Prophet or the Shawnee Prophet. He was the brother of Tecumseh, leader of the Shawnee...

; Kenekuk; Smohalla

Smohalla

Smohalla Wanapum nineteenth-century dreamer-prophet associated with the Dreamers movement among Native American people in the Pacific Northwest’s Columbia Plateau region.-Biography:...

; John Slocum

John Slocum

John Slocum was a member of the Squaxin Island Tribe, Coast Salish, and a reputed holy man and prophet who founded the Indian Shaker Church in 1881....

; Wovoka

Wovoka

Wovoka , also known as Jack Wilson, was the Northern Paiute religious leader who founded the Ghost Dance movement. Wovoka means "cutter" or "wood cutter" in the Northern Paiute language.-Biography:...

; Black Elk

Black Elk

Heȟáka Sápa was a famous Wičháša Wakȟáŋ of the Oglala Lakota . He was Heyoka and a second cousin of Crazy Horse.-Life:...

and many others.

Regarded suspiciously by the Whites, those movements suffered repression by government policy, missionary influence and frontier contacts.