Cultures in Contact

ANT 326L (30410) Spring, 2008
Samuel M. Wilson

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Ronald Reagan

New Federalism

self-determination

nation-to-nation relations

1988 - Indian self-governance act

Bypassing the BIA

Sovereignty

Sovereignty

Economic recovery?

From 1979 to 1989..

White income grows 12%, African-American by 8%, Native American stays the same

Gap between Indian and white income goes from 37% to 54%

Unemployment at 45%  (BIA 1989)

30% living below poverty line

Why can tribes have casinos?

1987, California v.Cabazon Band of Mission Indians

Supreme Court ruled that the states' interest in regulating games was outweighed by the tribes' interest in promoting tribal gaming for the economic good of the tribe.

Indian Gaming Regulatory Act

Prohibited states from taxing profits

Gaming figures

Indian Tribes: 562

Tribes in gaming: 224

Revenue: $19.4 billion (‘04)

(exceeds the combined revenues of Las Vegas and Atlantic City)

Downsides

corruption - organized crime

exploitation of tribes

gambling addictions and alcohol

Recent situation...

Are present policies working?

Native Americans die at 2.3 times National average from diabetes

6 times n.a. from Tuberculosis

7 times n.a. from alcoholism

75% in substandard housing

 The 21st-Century dilemma:

in a society that purports to believe in individual equality, doesn't holding Native Americans to another set of law and practice deny them civil rights and keep them in a subjugated state at the mercy of Congress?

or, is it unfair to oppress a people for centuries, force them from traditional lands onto reservations where economic self sufficiency is impossible, then end Federal involvement?

The continuing "contact period"...

Looking back or looking forward?

Overview - European Background

What in European history prompted its 15th-20th Century colonizing push?

Long history of dealing with non-Europeans

Byzantine Empire

Islamic World

Mongols

Historical forces after 1000 A.D. that promoted exploration

Population growth

Growth of wealth

Trading classes, growing elite

American Background

New World diversity in politics, economics, interaction

Over 2000 distinct languages

Huge and complex empires to hunter-gatherers

Cycles of complex society

The Conquest

Columbus & Co.

Impact of disease

Differences and similarities in the ways that the conquest proceeded

Colonial Strategies

Spanish

Portuguese

English

French

Dutch, Swedish, German, etc.

African Diaspora in the New World

Slavery to Freedom

Competition, cooperation, synthesis

African - Indian alliances

Emerging Native American policy in the U.S.

Colonization of the eastern seaboard

Revolutionary War

Strategy of “Removal”

Strategy of forced assimilation

Native American Policy in the 20th C.

Native American low point

The Indian New Deal

The “termination” policy

Present state of affairs

Major themes of the course

importance of chance and the decisions of individuals

Cultural identity as an extremely powerful component of political and social discourse

Land Issues

What rights did Indians have to lands?

1908 Act (35 U.S. 312) removing restrictions on "alienation" of property

Loss of tax exempt status for 8M acres

Oklahoma land issues under Okla. law, not Federal Law