Powwow

Noun

 * 1) A Native American council or meeting
 * 2) A Native American shaman, or a ritual conducted by such a shaman
 * 3)  A short, private conference

Verb
to powwow


 * 1)  to hold such a meeting

Thesaurus
advise, advise with, audience, bargain, bargaining, bargaining session, call in, collogue, compare notes, conclave, confab, confabulate, confabulation, confer, confer with, conference, confrontation, congress, constitutional convention, consult, consult with, consultation, convention, council, council fire, council of war, counsel, county convention, deliberate, discuss, discuss with, discussion, exchange observations, exchange of views, exchange views, eyeball-to-eyeball encounter, have conversations, high-level talk, hold conference, huddle, interchange of views, interview, meeting, national convention, negotiate, negotiations, news conference, nominating convention, palaver, parley, political convention, pourparler, preliminary convention, press conference, put heads together, quadrennial circus, reason with, refer to, seance, session, sit down together, sit down with, sitting, state convention, summit, summit conference, summitry, take counsel, take up with, talk over, treat

Alternative forms

 * pau wau
 * almost all capitalization, punctuation, and spacing variants are attested, such as pow wow:, Pow-Wow:, and so on.

Etymology
From Algonquian or Massachusett pauwau or Narragansett powwaw or Natick pauwau, practitioner of magic, a shaman, from.