Native Americans

1. By Gail D. MacLeith Native Americans

2. Noble savage Extinction “Other men in another time” Tragic victims Misinformation about Native Americans:

3. Contact: Indian-white contact Economy: their attitude toward a capitalist marketplace Identity: requirement to reinvent their identity Revitalization: population growth, political activism and cultural revival In recent Native American Studies 4 themes are of great concern:

4. Siberian migrants-Bering Strait-7 million Indians in 1500 and 2000 languages. Thousands of deaths-European diseases-no direct contact Contact:

5. 1960s: a history of white oppression and racism • 1970s and 1980s: Paying attention to how Indians forged strategies in order to resist • 1990s: cross-cultural relations • Co-existing through negotiation and compromise Indian-white contact in the 20th century:

6. Creation of both opportunity and distress by market relations Resistance toward capitalist forces Both consumers and producers Economy:

7. The gift-giving complex was practiced and created a social debt between parties. They tried to follow the same strategy by encouraging unions between native women and European men. Pre-contact North America economy:

8. “Unbrotherlike” behavior of the traders • Unhealthy overreliance on alcohol • The US government ended the practice of “gifting” and replaced it with “loans” to make sure they would be entrapped in cycles of debt and to make way for agrarian capitalism. • Huge debt made them give up their lands in order to pay back loans. This led to removal of the tribes to the west of Mississippi.

9. The Trail of Tears in 1838

10. Private property led to class stratification within Indian nations. In the 2nd half of the 19th century, reservation life did not disconnect Indians from the larger market economy. The late-19th and early 20th centuries, were the time of large-scale impoverishment and dispossession.

11. The Allotment Act in 1887: Communal held lands were given to male heads of households and the rest were offered for public sale. The Burke Act in 1906: They were allowed to sell their lands if they were considered “competent” enough to manage their affairs.

12. The term “Indian” has been multilayered but the formation of new tribal identities was inevitable. Fluid and contingent identity rather than a rigid one exists. The creation of new tribal entities after European arrival is known as ethnogenesis. Identity:

13. To face removal in the 1830s: • Some tried to emphasize their cultural similarity with whites. • Some denied their Indian identity. • The Indian Removal Act vs. The Allotment Act

14. Recent publications (since the 1990s): “resurgence”, “renewal” or “revival” Engaging in new forms of political protest to generate tribal wealth. Formation of new organizations like “Red Progressives” to improve reservation conditions. Revitalization:

15. The Trail of Broken Treaties

16. In 1972 a number of Native American groups organized a protest, known as the Trail of Broken Treaties, which travelled from San Francisco, California, to Washington, D.C., to bring attention to their concerns. Once in Washington, about 500 Native Americans went to the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) to present a 20-point program of demands. The protesters took over the BIA building and renamed it the Native American Embassy. The occupation ended after government officials agreed to appoint a committee to study the demands and not to arrest the protesters.

17. By 1978, $800 million was awarded in compensation for tribal trades over treaty violations. • President Jimmy Carter in 1980 paid $81.5 million compensation to 2 tribes in Maine for treaty violations. • 237,196 Indians in 1900 vs. 2.5 million in 2000.

18. Why do individuals would like to be identified as Indians? Because of economic benefits such as educational scholarships, subsidized healthcare and exemption from state and federal taxes.

19. The American Indian Religious Freedom Act in 1978: “believe, express and exercise” The Language Act in 1990 Pow-wows were made illegal in the early decades of the 19th century, but by the 1990s an average of 2,000 were being held annually in the USA. They still have a hard battle to fight: protests against the movies Dance with Wolves and the Walt Disney’s Pocahontas (1995).

20. Indians are allowed to establish casinos on their reservations from which they achieve enormous prosperity. Economic revival, however, is not universal. In 1990, almost 50% of all reservation Indian families had incomes that placed them below the poverty level.

21. Indians are dynamic ever-changing and diverse people and they have a capacity for resistance and creative adaptation. And finally?