The Great Lakes

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jill Doerfler ◽  
Erik Redix
Keyword(s):  
Great Lakes ◽  
American Indians ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Urban Life ◽  
Native People ◽  
Treaty Rights ◽  
Military Conflict ◽  
Indian History ◽  
American Indian History ◽  
History Of

The experience of Native people in the Great Lakes region is crucial to understanding the larger history of American Indians. The region was (and remains) a microcosm of the experiences of Native peoples in North America. Most major issues in American Indian history either originated in the Great Lakes or have had a corresponding impact, including removal, military conflict, allotment, termination, challenges of urban life, Indian activism, treaty rights, and economic development via gaming. This chapter reviews those events and topics while exploring the central and critical role that relationships have played in the lives and experiences of Native people in the Great Lakes.

Genocide and American Indian History

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey Ostler
Keyword(s):  
American Indian ◽  
Large Population ◽  
Western Hemisphere ◽  
Native People ◽  
Indian History ◽  
Clear Cut ◽  
American Indian History ◽  
Intentional Actions ◽  
History Of ◽  
Direct Killing

The issue of genocide and American Indian history has been contentious. Many writers see the massive depopulation of the indigenous population of the Americas after 1492 as a clear-cut case of the genocide. Other writers, however, contend that European and U.S. actions toward Indians were deplorable but were rarely if ever genocidal. To a significant extent, disagreements about the pervasiveness of genocide in the history of the post-Columbian Western Hemisphere, in general, and U.S. history, in particular, pivot on definitions of genocide. Conservative definitions emphasize intentional actions and policies of governments that result in very large population losses, usually from direct killing. More liberal definitions call for less stringent criteria for intent, focusing more on outcomes. They do not necessarily require direct sanction by state authorities; rather, they identify societal forces and actors. They also allow for several intersecting forces of destruction, including dispossession and disease. Because debates about genocide easily devolve into quarrels about definitions, an open-ended approach to the question of genocide that explores several phases and events provides the possibility of moving beyond the present stalemate. However one resolves the question of genocide in American Indian history, it is important to recognize that European and U.S. settler colonial projects unleashed massively destructive forces on Native peoples and communities. These include violence resulting directly from settler expansion, intertribal violence (frequently aggravated by colonial intrusions), enslavement, disease, alcohol, loss of land and resources, forced removals, and assaults on tribal religion, culture, and language. The configuration and impact of these forces varied considerably in different times and places according to the goals of particular colonial projects and the capacities of colonial societies and institutions to pursue them. The capacity of Native people and communities to directly resist, blunt, or evade colonial invasions proved equally important.

Gender, Sexuality, and Family History

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brenda Child
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
American Indians ◽  
Settler Colonialism ◽  
Indigenous Communities ◽  
The United States ◽  
Sacred Places ◽  
Her Family ◽  
Indian History ◽  
American Indian History ◽  
History Of

In 1939, an Ojibwe woman named Naynaabeak was involved in a conflict that shows some of the complexities that American Indians experienced throughout the history of settler colonialism in the United States. Her family did not live on a reservation, but they were Ojibwe people and tribal citizens and her home and fishing spot were historically Ojibwe places. The complex legal world defined by borders disrupted Naynaabeak’s ability to make a living, and her conflict was simply part of everyday existence for many Ojibwe women. This chapter considers the hurdles that Naynaabeak’s generation overcame in their determination to make a living, and how their efforts to remain on their lands, fishing grounds, forests, hills, and mountains—and especially their sacred places—enabled their descendants to maintain indigenous communities which still exist. The chapter reviews the literature about gender and labor in American Indian history to illuminate its major themes.

The Absence of Indigenous Histories in Ken Burns's The National Parks: America's Best Idea

2011 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 24-29
Author(s):  
Brenda J. Child
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Great Lakes ◽  
National Parks ◽  
American Indians ◽  
Native People ◽  
Recent History ◽  
Colonial History ◽  
Indigenous Lands ◽  
Native Alaskans ◽  
History Of

Abstract The National Parks begins in 1851 and ends with Alaska in the 1970s, yet almost entirely erases Indigenous history from the landscape, allowing Native Alaskans, Indigenous Hawaiians, and American Indians no foothold or voice in the modern story of the parks. This is remarkable, considering that all of the parks were established on Indigenous homelands and that Native people and politics continue to be intertwined with the recent history of the parks. The experiences of Ojibwe people in the Great Lakes suggest that the creation of national parks in their homeland was part of a broader colonial history of appropriating Indigenous lands and resources, and extended the damaging policies of the Indian assimilation and allotment era farther into the twentieth century.

scholarly journals Depictions of American Indians in George Armstrong Custer’s My Life on the Plains

Humanities ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 56
Author(s):  
Danielle Johannesen
Keyword(s):  
American Indians ◽  
American West ◽  
Literary Text ◽  
Indian Culture ◽  
Historical Scholarship ◽  
Military Conflict ◽  
Arts And Culture ◽  
History Of ◽  
Popular Representations

General George Armstrong Custer remains one of the most iconic and mythologized figures in the history of the American West. His infamous defeat at the 1876 Battle of the Little Bighorn largely defines his legacy; historical scholarship and popular representations of Custer consistently focus on his “Last Stand.” However, Custer was also a writer with a keen appreciation for arts and culture. This article analyzes Custer’s descriptions of American Indians in his memoir My Life on the Plains (1874). I trace how Custer’s descriptions of Indians and Indian culture clearly reveal a colonial mindset; yet, Custer regularly reflects on Indians and Indian culture with interest, curiosity, and even respect. I analyze these moments of potential commiseration and question whether these moments depart from a colonial mindset. Additionally, I analyze how Custer constructs Indians as the “enemy” and show how these constructions are problematic, yet critical for Custer’s aestheticizing of military conflict. Ultimately, I argue that Custer’s memoir is deserving of increased attention as a literary text and show how to reveal complexities and contradictions with literary and historical implications.

American Indian Activism after 1945

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bradley Shreve
Keyword(s):  
Native American ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
American Indian ◽  
American Indians ◽  
Energy Resource ◽  
Well Being ◽  
The United States ◽  
Native People ◽  
Treaty Rights ◽  
1960S And 1970S

American Indian activism after 1945 was as much a part of the larger, global decolonization movement rooted in centuries of imperialism as it was a direct response to the ethos of civic nationalism and integration that had gained momentum in the United States following World War II. This ethos manifested itself in the disastrous federal policies of termination and relocation, which sought to end federal services to recognized Indian tribes and encourage Native people to leave reservations for cities. In response, tribal leaders from throughout Indian Country formed the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) in 1944 to litigate and lobby for the collective well-being of Native peoples. The NCAI was the first intertribal organization to embrace the concepts of sovereignty, treaty rights, and cultural preservation—principles that continue to guide Native activists today. As American Indian activism grew increasingly militant in the late 1960s and 1970s, civil disobedience, demonstrations, and takeovers became the preferred tactics of “Red Power” organizations such as the National Indian Youth Council (NIYC), the Indians of All Tribes, and the American Indian Movement (AIM). At the same time, others established more focused efforts that employed less confrontational methods. For example, the Native American Rights Fund (NARF) served as a legal apparatus that represented Native nations, using the courts to protect treaty rights and expand sovereignty; the Council of Energy Resource Tribes (CERT) sought to secure greater returns on the mineral wealth found on tribal lands; and the American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC) brought Native educators together to work for greater self-determination and culturally rooted curricula in Indian schools. While the more militant of these organizations and efforts have withered, those that have exploited established channels have grown and flourished. Such efforts will no doubt continue into the unforeseeable future so long as the state of Native nations remains uncertain.

American Indians in World History

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Witgen
Keyword(s):  
American Indians ◽  
New World ◽  
World History ◽  
Radical Change ◽  
Social Worlds ◽  
Indian History ◽  
American Indian History ◽  
Narrative Constructions ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter explains the role of American Indians in world history by exploring the concept of a mutual encounter in the Americas in the first centuries following the Columbus voyages. The chapter quickly shifts to an examination of narrative constructions of North American history, in particular focusing on the relationship between American Indians, Atlantic World empires, and their settler colonies. This examination centers on an analysis of American Indian history and world history in the context of evolving social worlds that formed after contact. That context delineates an Atlantic New World of empires, colonies, trade, and alliance, and an indigenous New World in the interior of the continent, where autonomous Native peoples and homelands experience radical change as they incorporate new peoples, things, and ideas into their lives.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document