Dakota people Dakota people The Dakota people are a Native American tribe and First Nations band government in North America. They compose two of the three main subcultures of the Sioux people, and are typically divided into the Eastern Dakota and the Western Dakota. The Eastern Dakota are the Santee ("Isáŋyathi" or "Isáŋ-athi"; "knife" + "encampment", ″dwells at the place of knife flint″), who reside in the eastern Dakotas, central Minnesota and northern Iowa. They have federally recognized tribes established in several places. The Western Dakota are the Yankton, and the Yanktonai ("Iháŋktȟuŋwaŋ" and "Iháŋktȟuŋwaŋna"; "Village-at-the-end" and "Little village-at-the-end"), who reside in
Native American recognition in the United States Native American recognition in the United States American Indian tribal recognition in the United States most often refers to the process of a tribe being recognized by the United States federal government, or to a person being granted membership to a federally recognized tribe. There are 573 federally recognized tribal governments in the United States. Non-Acknowledged Tribes are tribes which have no federal designation as sovereign entities. This is not to be confused with recognition of Native Americans in the US which are defined by the BIA as any descendant of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas which is a