Elders suffered terribly during the Great Depression. I did not live then, but I am among the last generation schooled by the people who lived it. I know my family’s stories and the statistics, but the rest is speculation....
“The halls of Montezuma,” in the Marine Corps Hymn, refers to the Mexican War, in which the US regularized the border with Texas and acquired by conquest New Mexico,...
All Indigenous Peoples, not just American Indians, have a troubled history with anthropologists. This is because, early on, the study of humans was the study of primitive humans, and we are always considered primitive so as to justify separating us from land and minerals....
The Sue & Chew is the new wave of courthouse snack bars. The food is bad enough to fend off the temptation to hang around longer than you must, but not so bad as to upset your stomach, because you can’t be interrupting trials for too many rest room runs....
I seldom point to the colonial governments as an example for tribal governments, but we could learn a lot from the ongoing comedy in Washington. After all, a negative example is still an example....
Lots of things have followed me into my second retirement. Some, like continuing work with Indian graduate students, are a source of delight. Others less so. I am reminded that I failed to change the world....
Everything is not a matter of opinion and all opinions are not equal. In the U.S., we frame all policy arguments in terms of liberty, and since we don’t teach critical thought, who wins the framing dispute wins the argument....
To say that American Indians, First Nations, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians live in tension with the colonial states of North America is both a truism and an exercise in distance by use of academic jargon. One reason academics use such clinical, bloodless language is that we are not supposed t...