Talking stick

What it is

A talking stick is a staff that gives one person the floor. Many Indigenous communities, above all on the Pacific Northwest coast of North America, use it so that people speak one after another instead of all at once. Some sticks travel from hand to hand around a circle. Others stay with a leader as a sign of the authority to address a crowd. A stick may carry a single crest at the top, or be carved all over with the heraldic crests of a chief or of a hereditary spokesman for the group. Shell inlay is sometimes worked into the wood. Because the carvings follow the same forms as totem poles, a talking stick can look like a small pole held in the hand.

How it is used

At a gathering, a chief or a speaker chosen for the purpose holds the stick and makes the announcements. The stick is thumped against the ground to give weight to a point. When that person finishes, the stick moves on, and the next voice begins. This is how a large meeting stays orderly: one stick, one speaker. The practice belongs especially to potlatches, the great ceremonial gatherings of the Northwest Coast, where families and clans come together. A feather has sometimes stood in for the stick when none was at hand. The staff is still used ceremonially today.

Origins and history

Talking sticks are a long-standing part of Northwest Coast ceremony, though the sources do not date their beginning. The Akan chiefs of West Africa keep a parallel tradition. Their speaker's staffs are capped with gold-leafed finials, a form that emerged in the 19th century and marked the holder's power. On the Northwest Coast the staff carries a different kind of record. It shows the crests of a chief or of the hereditary spokesman for a clan, carved so that anyone who knows the system can read on whose behalf the voice is raised.

Carving and public life

Making a talking stick is a living Northwest Coast art. The Tsimshian carver David A. Boxley was asked to sculpt the crown of one for the 1990 Goodwill Games, working in symbols of the United States and Russia. Athletes carried that staff from Spokane, Washington, through Oregon, and on to Seattle, Washington. Talking sticks also appear inside totem poles. In 1988 the Kwakwaka'wakw carver Richard Hunt made a pole described as the world's largest, showing a Cedar Man who holds a talking stick 4.3 metres tall. Chiefs are shown on poles carrying talking sticks and coppers.

How Talking stick is kept

A chief, or a speaker appointed in their place, takes up the talking stick at a gathering. Holding it, that person makes the announcements. The stick is struck on the ground to stress a point. Then it passes to the next speaker, so that the meeting hears one voice at a time. Among the nations of the Pacific Northwest coast this happens above all at potlatches, the large ceremonial gatherings where families and clans come together. A feather can take the stick's place where none is available.

When and where

There is no fixed date. A talking stick comes out when people gather, above all at a potlatch, the ceremonial gathering of a Northwest Coast community. It is also carried at public events, as when athletes ran with one in 1990 between Spokane and Seattle.

It belongs above all to the Indigenous nations of the Pacific Northwest coast of North America, including the Tsimshian and the Kwakwaka'wakw. Akan chiefs in West Africa keep a related tradition of speaker's staffs with gold-leafed tops. Talking sticks have also travelled into wider public events, such as the 1990 Goodwill Games.

What Talking stick means

The stick is a way of holding the floor. Whoever carries it has the right to be heard, and the group agrees to listen. The carved crests tie that right to a family or a chief, so the stick says not only who is speaking but on whose behalf. Talking sticks are described as an instrument of Indigenous democracy, and as a living art form they carry the history of the nations that make them.

Questions people ask about Talking stick

See also

MaracatuA set of Afro-Brazilian performance traditions from Pernambuco and Ceará featuring drumming, dance, and royal pageantry.Saint David's DayThe national feast day of Wales, marked with parades, poetry contests and daffodilsDamba festivalA Ghanaian celebration of royal authority, ancestral memory, music and danceMakahikiA four-month Hawaiian new year season of peace, harvest gifts, feasts and games

Good reading and sources

• Talking stick on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• More photos on Wikimedia CommonsPhotos and video
• Wikidata recordOpen data

It may contain mistakes. Traditions differ from one family, village and community to the next, and the people who keep them know them best. If something is wrong, tell us. Last refreshed 2026-10-05.