Powwow
The English name for Pennsylvania German folk healing, borrowed from a Native American word and unrelated to the Native gatherings known as pow wows.
Also: pow-wow, pow wow, powwowing
In Pennsylvania and nearby states, to powwow meant to heal or protect with prayers and charms, as in the Pennsylvania German tradition of braucherei. English-speaking settlers borrowed the word from Algonquian languages, where pauwau referred to a ritual leader, and applied it to their German neighbours' practice, and it stuck. Contemporary Native American pow wows are intertribal gatherings of dance, song and community, a modern form distinct from the healing practice, and the two share only a word. The practitioner is a powwower or braucher. Some practitioners today avoid the word because of this confusion, and because the tradition has no Indigenous connection. Where the English term appears, it generally means the German-descended healing custom.