How did the Ghost Dance spread from the Great Basin to the Great Plains?

The second Ghost Dance movement spread from the Great Basin to the Great Plains primarily through the efforts of novitiates—representatives from various tribes—who traveled to visit the Northern Paiute prophet Wovoka in western Nevada.123

After Wovoka experienced his vision in 1889 and began teaching the new dance and its associated millennial message, his reputation as a messiah grew rapidly. Native Americans from many different tribes journeyed to learn directly from him. These individuals then carried the songs, ceremonies, and tenets of the movement back to their own communities across the trans-Mississippi West.234

As the movement reached the Great Plains, particularly among the Oceti Sakowin (Sioux), the message underwent a transformation. While Wovoka’s original teachings emphasized peace and accommodation, the version adopted by many Plains tribes evolved into a more militant belief system that promised the destruction of colonizers and the restoration of traditional ways of life. This rapid spread and the resulting religious fervor eventually contributed to the tensions that culminated in the Wounded Knee Massacre in 1890.3142