Ghost Dance

noun

: a group dance of a late 19th century American Indian messianic cult believed to promote the return of the dead and the restoration of traditional ways of life

Examples of Ghost Dance in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

The Bureau of Indian Affairs considered the Ghost Dance a threat and dispatched the military to enforce a ban on the practice. —Nicole Santa Cruz, ProPublica, 20 Oct. 2023

Trumpism is a Ghost Dance for white, male America, an act of faith that the invaders can be banished and the old order restored. —Fintan O’Toole, The New York Review of Books, 26 Aug. 2020

Word History

First Known Use

1876, in the meaning defined above