Dream-catchers catch on in North America

The dream-catcher is one of the universal symbols of Native American art and culture. The dream-catcher shows that Native Americans value compassion and believe that dreams have a powerful impact on peoples' lives.

According to legend, a wise old woman saved the life of a spider. As a thank you, he granted her a gift: the dream-catcher. He told the grandmother that the web would prevent bad dreams without obstructing good ones. Good dreams have easy access to the mind of the sleeper, through the feathers on the dream-catcher, and the bad dreams are tangled in the web, never to reach the mind of the dreamer. The first rays of sun destroy these bad dreams, and the dreamer is forever protected from them. The legend of the dream-catcher comes from the Ojibway Chippewa tribe; the members make dream-catchers by bending wood into circular shapes and webbing fine strands of string across the middle to create a web.

Each decoration on a dream-catcher has a meaning. A common design involves three feathers and a small bead in the middle. The bead in the middle represents the spider who gave the dream-catcher to the old woman and the feathers represent the "breath of air," or wind, that guided the dreams to the dream catcher. There are also several other ways to decorate a dream-catcher. Some have a multitude of beads on them, instead of just one, which represent all the good dreams dreamt during the night. There are even some decorated with precious stones or feathers. The feathers come from many different birds, including hawks and eagles, and each type of feather has a different meaning: the eagle symbolizes strength, and the hawk agility, for example. Each dream-catcher is unique and brings something different to the owner according to the symbols used to decorate it.

Dream-catchers are universal within the Native American community as well as in the American culture. Although they originated in the Ojibway tribe, they quickly spread to others, who embraced and adapted them to fit their tribes' needs. Dream-catchers are still very popular today, as many Americans appreciate their beauty and the comfort of their supposed mythical powers. The high demand has led their production to be widely commercialized. Commercialization has detracted from the original purpose of calmness and rest that is supposed to come from the dream-catcher, because they are often used solely for decoration by people who don't know their history, but that does not take away from the appreciation Americans have for their beauty.

The dream-catcher is an example of how tradition can bring a group of people together, whether or not they have Native American blood running through them.