Benjamin A. Railton's Blog, page 283

August 10, 2016: American Fathers: Southern Sons

[August 11thmarks the birthday of AmericanStudier pére, as well as one of the very best digital humanists, scholarly writers,and grandfathers I know, Steve Railton. In his honor, a series on some noteworthy cultural and historical American fathers! Share your paternal responses and reflections for the father of all crowd-sourced posts!]On the complex generational relationship that helps explain the Southern Renaissance.It’s easy enough, and certainly not inaccurate, to characterize the group of Southern intellectuals and writers who formed the vanguard of the 1920s and 30s Southern Renaissance as profoundly conservative, as a community rebelling against radical and future-driven national and international movements and trends such as modernism, urbanization, and (eventually) the New Deal. This was the group, after all, who called themselves first the Fugitives and then the Agrarians, and whose collective writings culminated in the unquestionably conservative (and at times unfortunately racist) manifesto I’ll Take My Stand (1930). No AmericanStudiers worthy of the name could fail to take such historical and cultural contexts into consideration when analyzing why these young men (mostly) and women came together at this moment, and why they wrote and thought the things they did.Yet there are of course other kinds of contexts that also inform any and every writer’s (and person’s) identity, perspective, and works, and I believe a biographical one is particularly important when it comes to analyzing the Southern Renaissance figures. They were born around the turn of the 20thcentury, which meant that their parents had been born, in most cases, just after the end of the Civil War; those parents were thus the children of both Civil War veterans and of the incredibly complex and fraught post-war period, the children of (among other things) both the Lost Cause and the New South. To take the Renaissance’s most enduring literary figure, for example: William Faulkner was born in 1897, to parents born in 1870 and 1871; his father Murry both tried to build the family’s railroad company and to carry on the legacy of his own grandfather, a writer and Civil War hero known as “The Old Colonel.” Is it any wonder, then, that young Quentin Compson is so obsessed with the voice and perspective of his father, Jason Compson, and of the familial and Southern pasts about which he learns from Jason?If we move beyond Faulkner, and into the works of the Fugitive and Agrarian writers who even more overtly self-identified as part of the Renaissance, we likewise find works and characters centered on—obsessed with, even—the legacies of their fathers. Perhaps no work better exemplifies that trend than Allen Tate’s historical and autobiographical novel The Fathers (1938), a text that engages in every tortured word with the legacies of the Civil War and its aftermath and of the familial and cultural issues raised therein. Far more ambiguous and complex, but perhaps even more telling of this father-centered trend, is Robert Penn Warren’s poem “Mortmain” (1960), a five-section elegy for Warren’s father; the first section is entitled “After Night Flight Son Reaches Bedside of Already Unconscious Father, Whose Right Hand Lifts in a Spasmodic Gesture, as Though Trying to Make Contact: 1955,” and while the subsequent four sections range far beyond that man and moment, they do so precisely to ground many other historical and cultural questions in that profoundly autobiographical starting point. As Warren’s life and career illustrate, the Southern Renaissance figures were not circumscribed by such generational relationships—but they were certainly influenced, and in many ways defined, by them.Next father tomorrow,BenPS. What do you think? Fatherly texts or figures you’d highlight?

August 9, 2016: American Fathers: Fathers of Their Country

[August 11thmarks the birthday of AmericanStudier pére, as well as one of the very best digital humanists, scholarly writers,and grandfathers I know, Steve Railton. In his honor, a series on some noteworthy cultural and historical American fathers! Share your paternal responses and reflections for the father of all crowd-sourced posts!]On the clear and relatively consistent but also complex images of two beloved leaders.By a variety of measures, from the educated opinions of historians and political scientists to broader popular polls and rankings, George Washington and Abraham Lincoln have long been our two most popular presidents. Given the contemporary partisan attitudes and divisions that heavily influence not only current politics but also assessments of every 20th century president, these two much less controversial (in our own era—they engendered plenty of controversies in theirs) historical leaders are likely to remain at the top of the list. Moreover, while of course scholars and historians try to engage with the complex realities of each man and his leadership, our popular narratives and images of both tend to connect to more personal and mythic traits: specific characteristics, such as each man’s famous honesty; and overall symbolic roles, such as Washington’s image as “The Father of Our Country” and Lincoln’s as “Father Abraham.”It’s important to note that those kinds of symbolic and often paternal images aren’t just subsequent additions to the men’s legacies, nor simply the province of children’s books. In a 1799 eulogy to Washington, Richard Henry Lee, one of Washington’s co-framers and one of the era’s most prominent politicians, famously described him as "First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen,” and Parson Weems’ 1800 biography likewise embraced, and indeed helped develop and popularize, all of the mythic narratives and images. With Lincoln, similarly, the phrase “Father Abraham” was apparently coined by Union troops and used frequently in their letters and writings to describe their attitudes toward the president, and Walt Whitman’s 1865 poem “O Captain! My Captain!” illustrates just how fully the mythic images of Lincoln had come to define the man for many Americans by the time of his assassination. Which is to say, whatever communal and psychological reasons we might have to turn these military and political leaders into familial and paternal figures, those reasons (or at least some of them) were present in the men’s own moments, and have only continued and grown in the centuries since.So why have we so consistently paternalized these two presidents? Obviously there are specific circumstances and contexts for each, but I would point to one pretty shared context: that of a nation torn apart internally. The images of the Civil War as pitting brother against brother are well known (and often accurate), and it was Lincoln himself who characterized the moment with the familial phrase “a house divided against itself.” And the Revolutionary era similarly split Americans and families—Ben Franklin, for example, famously split from his beloved son William when the young Franklin remained loyal to England. While of course both Washington and Lincoln chose and led one side in those internal battles (and it’s fair to say that neither the English nor the Confederates bought into the paternal images as a result), it’s nonetheless true that both men came to embody, during and even more so after their respective wars, the possibility of a once-more united nation, of an American family that could move forward rather than dwell on the past divisions and antagonisms. That’s perhaps especially true for Lincoln, since his assassination meant that his images and legacies could exist outside of the continuing bitterness and hostility of Reconstruction. But in both cases, these fatherly images greatly oversimplify and mythologize both the men’s own perspectives and roles and the national community in and after their eras.Next father tomorrow,BenPS. What do you think? Fatherly texts or figures you’d highlight?

August 8, 2016: American Fathers: Mr. Mom

[August 11thmarks the birthday of AmericanStudier pére, as well as one of the very best digital humanists, scholarly writers,and grandfathers I know, Steve Railton. In his honor, a series on some noteworthy cultural and historical American fathers! Share your paternal responses and reflections for the father of all crowd-sourced posts!]On the ways in which we’ve come pretty far in the last few decades—and the ways in which we haven’t.As representative cultural documents go, I’m not sure you can find a more embarrassingly telling one than the Michael Keaton comic film Mr. Mom (1983; written by John Hughes). Fired from his job and forced to stay home while his wife becomes the family’s sole breadwinner (returning to a promising career in advertising she had abandoned once they had children), Keaton’s character proves entirely, comically inept at—as just that hyperlinked minute and a half long trailer illustrates—vacuuming, cooking, cleaning, grocery shopping, child care, and even disposing of diapers in the trash, among other things. Even the film’s title alone makes clear that the very idea of a married man performing “Mom’s” roles is a source of comedy, a nonsensical paradox that can be solved only by Keaton’s manic eyebrow wiggling. While of course the film could be read as part of the decade’s backlash against feminism, or as symbolizing cultural fears about what the presence of more women in the workforce might mean, it also clearly reveals that the simple idea of a dad performing household activities was nothing short of ludicrous to many Americans in the early 1980s.Much has changed in America in the three-plus decades since that film’s 1983 release, of course, and one of the most striking such social changes has been the rise in the number of fathers who are identified as their children’s primary caregiver. Recent statistics for that trend can’t entirely be separated from the 2008 recession, and thus from accidental and temporary situations and employment and role changes not unlike those in the movie. Yet I believe that the trend is also more long-term and intentional than that—my evidence is primarily anecdotal, but I can most definitely say that within the families of many friends and colleagues, and indeed across a high percentage of the families in my own generation with which I’m familiar, fathers are choosing to (at the very least) share evenly in the duties of home and childraising. And indeed in many cases, including my own prior to my divorce, dads are, whether because of circumstance, profession, inclination, or (often) a combination of all those factors, taking on the majority of such duties. Call us Mr. Mom if you want—the title no longer carries the same humorous sting.And yet. In a variety of ways, cultural narratives seem not to have changed nearly so much. To cite one small but telling example, virtually every page of Parents magazine is directed specifically at moms; there will usually be one article per issue by a dad for dads or the like, but otherwise, this ostensibly gender-neutral publication remains overtly and overwhelmingly focused on moms. The same is true for almost every TV commercial featuring products for kids: “Mom, if you’re looking to feed your kids healthier…,” and so on. And while I know that such media and marketing choices are at least partly based on business and basic statistics—if as this 2012 article argues 35% of dads are the primary caregiver, that still means the majority of primary caregivers and thus readers/customers are moms—there are other cultural signs as well. One of the much-hyped (if ultimately unsuccessful) recent TV comedies, for example, was called Guys with Kids , a title and set of marketing images that seem to suggest that the very idea of a man with kids remains a source of comic ridiculousness. But at least the guys are plural, so maybe Mr. Mom is evolving a bit. If so, I’d say it’s time.Next father tomorrow,BenPS. What do you think? Fatherly texts or figures you’d highlight?

August 6-7, 2016: Donna Moody's Guest Post on 21st Century Native American Scholarly Activism

[I first met Donna Moody at the 2011 New England American Studies Association Conference at Plimoth Plantation, and have been fortunate enough to remain connected to her ever since. Her recently defended PhD dissertation promises to significantly expand and enrich the fields of Native American Studies and Anthropology, as well as debates over higher education and our collective understandings of who we’ve been, who we are, and where we’re headed. I’m honored to share her thoughts and work here.]
When Ben invited me to write a guest post for August, he was particularly interested in a piece reflective of 21st century Native American scholarly activism. Questions which I needed to consider and answer were: what exactly is scholarly activism and who decides? Who is considered an activist? Does this include organizations? Much of Indian activism begins, not with academics, but at grassroots levels within communities. As such, the majority of Indian activism remains outside of mainstream scholarly purview.
According to Sara Goldrick-Rab (Higher Education Policy & Sociology at Temple University), scholar activism includes:
·         Direct engagement with practical problems and efforts to improve the world·         Putting new issues on the research agenda as well as the public agenda·         Speaking truth to power and speaking truth directing to the people·         Confronting and making difficult choices·         Acting with accountability to the publics you study, and reciprocating[https://medium.com/synapse/what-is-scholar-activism-1b746ef38b0b#.9gcdjyald]
Given the abysmally low numbers of Native Americans in the U.S. who have achieved a terminal degree in any of the Social Sciences (another entire essay), locating individual American Indians as scholarly activists encompasses a very small field.
In considering individuals who are activists, I think of Dallas Goldtooth of Indigenous Environmental Network (IEN). Dallas is most certainly an activist and has written much about the degradation and exploitation of Indigenous resources, but his writing would not be considered “scholarly.” Neither would much of the writing of Winona LaDuke, although she holds a Master’s Degree.  Narrowing my subject field to those few activists who also are scholars, I wish to honor and illuminate the consummate Indigenous activist, Vine Deloria Jr. (1933-2005) who addressed a number of White/Red conflicts over a more than 40 year career.
I often think about Vine Deloria’s views on the interactions between anthropologists and Indians and the sardonic summaries he wrote, summaries which most often elicited angry responses from those engaged in the field of anthropology. In Custer Died for Your Sins, Deloria wrote,
behind each successful man stands a woman and behind each policy and program with which Indians are plagued, if traced completely back to its origin, stands the anthropologist. [1969:81]
And, perhaps Deloria’s most well-noted and highly contested quote:
into each life, it is said, some rain must fall.  Some people have bad horoscopes, others take tips on the stock market…Churches possess the real world.  But Indians have been cursed above all other people in history.  Indians have anthropologists. [1969:78]
This recurring theme of Deloria’s speaks of the social, political, and economic ways in which anthropological study has contributed to the marginalization of Indigenous peoples.  As the colonizers appropriated land and resources, anthropologists and the discipline have appropriated Indigenous knowledge systems, rewritten those knowledge systems from a colonial Euro-American perspective, and then archived the information in places often inaccessible to the very people who provided the information. 
Deloria also is speaking out against the ways in which field work is financially supported.  Financial resources are allocated through universities, National Science Foundation (NSF) grants, the Ford Foundation, and countless other funding entities.  While these monies support the living expenses including travel, research, and writing time of the anthropologist, rarely does it benefit the communities or individuals being studied. Individuals and communities often recognize that, once again, something is being either freely given to outsiders, or stolen by outsiders.
One segment of my research for my PhD dissertation consisted of personal interviews with tribal elders.  I asked about this issue of funding received by anthropologists for field work and if any of those resources were shared with the tribe or individual informants. I learned of no case or project in New England where those resources were shared. Maybe it’s a Western Indian Reservation thing?
Not everyone in the academic world understood what Deloria was speaking to in Custer. By his own account, in a reply to a book review written by Deward Walker on We Talk, You Listen: New Tribes, New Turf, Deloria wasn’t really writing about Indians; rather in both this book and Custer he was writing “about the forces outside Indian country that intrude consciously or unconsciously into the business of Indian people and thereby become disruptive and often destructive” (1971:321). Certainly, placing Indigenous communities under the anthropological microscope with no visible benefit to the communities qualifies as disruptive and potentially destructive.  Historically, the most severe form of “destructive” occurs when anthropological research results in Indigenous individuals and communities coming under federal or state government scrutiny.
I spent a good number of hours researching book reviews for Custer Died for Your Sins (Deloria 1988 [1969]) and my efforts were rewarded by a mere eight reviews found in professional journals.  Of those eight reviews, one was a negative review written by Joseph Muskrat (1969) and a negative response to Mark Randall (1971) by C. Adrian Heidenreich (1972), positive reviews were submitted by James E. Officer (1970), and Kenneth M. Roemer (1970). I’m left wondering why there was so little response to Custer in the first few years after publication: perhaps anthropologists were so shocked at how Deloria portrayed them in general that they didn’t want to draw attention to the book by responding to it; perhaps they hoped that Deloria would disappear if they ignored him; or perhaps they dismissed the young Vine Deloria because he was an outsider to the tightly knit discipline or because his Indigenous voice simply did not matter to them.
Alfonso Ortiz (1971) wrote a largely positive, but somewhat guarded, review of Custer in American Anthropologist. Ortiz ended his review with
this book does not pretend to be a scholarly work, but this fact only underscores the need for a well-researched and truly balanced national assessment-by an Indian or several-of current Indian thinking, needs, and aspirations. It remains to be written. [1971:955]I believe he may have been saying that while he enjoyed the book (somewhat), it really needed to be written through an anthropological lens. And here we run headlong into the beginning question of this essay, “what exactly is scholarly activism and who decides what constitutes scholarly activism?”
We lost Vine Deloria in 2005. His sardonic wit, intelligence, personal philosophy, and activism will live on in his many writings and I very much doubt anyone today would question his scholarship.
References
 Deloria, Vine, Jr.     1970 We Talk, You Listen: New Tribes, New Turf. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.     1988 [1969] Custer Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.
Heidenreich, C. Adrian     1972 The Sins of Custer Are Not Anthropological Sins: A Reply to Mark E. Randall.  American Anthropologist, New Series, 74(4):1021-1034.                                                                                                                                          Muskrat, Joseph C.     1969 Review of Custer Died for your Sins: An Indian Manifesto. American Bar Association Journal 55(12):1172-1173.
Officer, James E.     1970 Review of Custer Died for your Sins: An Indian Manifesto. Arizona and the West12(3): 292-294.
Ortiz, Alfonso     1971 Review of Custer Died for your Sins: An Indian Manifesto. American Anthropologist73(4): 953-955.
Randall, Mark E.     1971 Review of Custer Died for your Sins: An Indian Manifesto. American Anthropologist, New Series, 73(4):985.
Roemer, Kenneth M.     1970 Review of Custer Died for your Sins: An Indian Manifesto. American Quarterly 22(2): 273.
Walker, Deward E., Jr.       1971 Review of We Talk, You Listen: New Tribes, New Turf.  Human Organization 30(3):321.
[Thanks, Donna! Next series starts Monday,Ben
PS. What do you think?]

August 5, 2016: Native American Leaders: 21st Century Leaders

[August 1stmarks the 150th anniversary of Cherokee Chief John Ross’s death. So this week I’ll AmericanStudy Ross and other native leaders, leading up to a weekend Guest Post from one of our most talented and significant Native Studies scholars.]Three leaders who illustrate just how fully our own moment’s examples extend those of the past.1)      Greg Graycloud: I wrote in that post about Graycloud’s inspiring chanting in the Senate chamber after the defeat of the Keystone pipeline, a ceremonial and communal moment that reflected and extended the impressive work done by numerous native activists to oppose the pipeline. Misuse, theft, and potential destruction of native lands are of course nothing new in our history, but neither is activist leadership to resist those attacks—from John Ross and the Cherokee Memorials to Sarah Winnemucca and her efforts in Malheur, some of the most vocal and vital Native American leaders have performed such acts of resistance. Graycloud and his peers are continuing those efforts, and deserve our full attention and support.2)      Santana Jayde Young Man Afraid of His Horses: As I noted in that post, Santana isn’t exactly an elected leader, at least not in the traditional sense; she’s the reigning Miss Oglala Lakota Nation, winner of the tribe’s annual pageant. Yet that pageant emphasizes service and leadership far more than beauty or poise (or other such conventional pageant priorities), and as I wrote in the post Santana’s year in the role (like her life and evolving career) has entirely reflected those emphases. Her work to strengthen both the lives and the perspectives and knowledge of young Native Americans, and to celebrate tribal community, language, history, and identity, continue the best of both the American Indian Movement’s activisms and Wilma Mankiller’s leadership efforts. That she’s doing so as a pageant winner, and through social media as much as on-the-ground service, simply reflects how such native leadership has evolved as well as endured into our own moment.3)      Melissa Tantaquidgeon Zobel: My week’s subjects share more than just their inspiring leadership efforts, of course, and one of the most significant shared elements is their use of writing to extend their voices and activisms to broader audiences and communities. Thanks in large part to my friend and colleague Siobhan Senier, I’ve had the chance to get to know a number of wonderful 21st century Native American writers, many of them scholars (like this weekend’s Guest Poster Donna Moody) or tribal historians and medicine women/men (like Linda Coombs and Steve Stonearrow). But of course creative literature and art performs just as vital a role in bringing voices and communities into conversation with broad audiences, and I know of no 21st century author (Native American or otherwise) doing that work with more talent and success than Zobel. I can think of few better or more enjoyable ways to support 21st century Native American leaders and communities than by buying and reading her books!Special Guest Post this weekend,BenPS. What do you think? Native American leaders or figures you’d highlight?

August 4, 2016: Native American Leaders: Wilma Mankiller

[August 1stmarks the 150th anniversary of Cherokee Chief John Ross’s death. So this week I’ll AmericanStudy Ross and other native leaders, leading up to a weekend Guest Post from one of our most talented and significant Native Studies scholars.]On how a trailblazing leader reflects the best and worst of contemporary native communities.Wilma Mankiller (1945-2010) is sometimes erroneously referred to as the first female Principal Chief of a Native American tribe (that hyperlinked New York Times obituary refers to her as such); both Alice Brown Davis of the Seminoles and Mildred Cleghorn of the Apaches led their tribes in the 20th century, and many other women led tribes in earlier eras. Yet Mankiller, who served as the Cherokee’s Principal Chief from 1985 to 1995, was indeed that tribe’s first female chief, as well as a groundbreaking late 20th century American leader and activist in every sense. She published the bestselling autobiography Mankiller: A Chief and Her People (1999), received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Bill Clinton in 1998, was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame, and garnered numerous other accolades and successes. She was more than deserving of consideration as one of the nominated “Women on 20s,” before Harriet Tubman received that honor earlier this year.If we step back from those unquestionable, individual successes and accomplishments to consider Mankiller’s tenure as Principal Chief through a communal lens, she likewise accomplished a great deal that embodies the best of late 20th and early 21st century Native American communities. From the outset of her service (which began in 1985 when she was deputy chief and principal chief Ross Swimmer moved to a position with the Bureau of Indian Affairs; Mankiller was subsequently re-elected in both 1987 and 1991), Mankiller emphasized community development on a number of levels. She created the Cherokee Nation Community Development Department, which helped initiate local infrastructure and economic projects such as building a hydroelectric facililty and establishing tribally owned businesses (and continues its workto this day). She also revived the tribal high school, advocated for more sovereignty in the tribe’s relationship to the US government, and made increasing the tribe’s population a priority, with a resulting tripling of Cherokee citizenship over the course of her tenure. In all these ways, Mankiller helped push back on both the continuing vanishing of Native Americans from our collective narratives and the very real conditions on reservations and in tribal communities, making the Cherokee a highly visible and vibrant community through her efforts.As with any leader, Mankiller’s service was not without its controversies, and the most prominent embodies a much less attractive side of contemporary native communities. One of her first efforts as tribal leader was to establish a law that excluded (disinrolled) the Cherokee Freedmen from tribal citizenship; the Freedmen are descendents of the African Americans who were held as slaves by the tribe prior to the Civil War and became both free and Cherokee citizens after the war (thanks in part to the 1866 Reconstruction Treaty about which I wrote in Monday’s John Ross post). The aftermath of this law has continued to unfold for both the freedmen and the tribe, including a 2006 Cherokee Supreme Court decision that reinrolled the freedmen and a 2007 amendment of the tribal constitution that disinrolled them once more, among other controversial moments. While of course every tribe has the right and responsibility to decide who qualifies for membership—and while the stakes are certainly real and high for such decisions—it’s hard for me to see the disrollment of the Cherokee Freedmen as anything other than a continuation of the oppression that first brought the slaves into the tribe. And more broadly, such decisions emphasize present community at the explicit expense of history—and at their best, Mankiller and her efforts wedded the present to the past, as all great leaders do. Last leaders tomorrow,BenPS. What do you think? Native American leaders or figures you’d highlight?

August 3, 2016: Native American Leaders: Remembering the American Indian Movement

[August 1stmarks the 150th anniversary of Cherokee Chief John Ross’s death. So this week I’ll AmericanStudy Ross and other native leaders, leading up to a weekend Guest Post from one of our most talented and significant Native Studies scholars.]On why and how we should better remember the 1960s activist leaders.
Of the many social movements that originated in and out of the 1960s, I’m not sure that any has been as completely disappeared from our national narratives about and collective memories of that decade as the American Indian Movement (AIM). There are certainly historical reasons for that absence: the movement represented a far more specific community than, say, feminism; it wasn’t responding as overtly to controversial contemporary events like the anti-war and hippie movements. There are also, and just as certainly, symbolic reasons for AIM’s absence from our memories, factors rooted in our centuries of mythmaking about Vanishing Americans and our concurrent inability to engage in any consistent or in-depth way with the continuing national presence of Native Americans. Yet the simple truth is that you can’t tell the story of either the 1960s or Native Americans in the 20th century without better remembering the American Indian Movement.
It’s also important to note, however, that among AIM’s tactics was a kind of militancy that often directly and provocatively challenged national power structures (as in the 19-month occupation of Alcatraz between 1969 and 1971 or the much briefer takeover of the Bureau of Indian Affairs in 1972), and that could turn into violence with relative ease. No event seemed to highlight that potential for violence more than the June 1975 murder of two FBI agents, Jack Coler and Ronald Williams, on the Pine Ridge Oglala Sioux Reservation, a shooting for which AIM activist Leonard Peltier has been imprisoned since shortly thereafter. Yet like so much of our history, and most especially the history of Native American communities and their relationship to the US government, the story is a lot more complicated than that. As usual, I can’t begin to get into all the details here, but whatever happened to Coler and Williams and whoever was responsible, it is certainly significant to note that a large number of AIM activists had themselves been killed on the Reservation in the years prior to 1975, and that a heavily armed, pro-government gang of tribal enforcers had established a kind of martial law in, it seems, at least implicit association with the FBI over those years.
As with so many of our darkest historical events, it seems clear that we’ll never know what really happened at Pine Ridge. But what we can and must do is to try to tell and remember these stories, and to do so by engaging as broadly and deeply as possible with both the multiple communities and perspectives to which they connect and the many national narratives and identities they implicate. And when it comes to Pine Ridge, it is, interestingly, a British filmmaker, Michael Apted, who has perhaps done so with the most complexity and success, in a pair of complementary 1992 films: the documentary Incident at Oglala and the feature film Thunderheart. Each is, I believe, a masterpiece of its genre, and each likewise blurs the lines between document and story, fact and fiction, in ways that do justice to the nuances of the event and our history and force us to think and engage ourselves with what is being portrayed, to engage with these narratives long after the film has ended. At its heart, such historical and cultural engagement is precisely what the American Indian Movement has been advocating for since its inception.
Next leader tomorrow,BenPS. What do you think? Native American leaders or figures you’d highlight?

August 2, 2016: Native American Leaders: Sarah Winnemucca and Authenticity

[August 1stmarks the 150th anniversary of Cherokee Chief John Ross’s death. So this week I’ll AmericanStudy Ross and other native leaders, leading up to a weekend Guest Post from one of our most talented and significant Native Studies scholars.]On “authentic” voices and the late 19thcentury book and leader that embody the concept.
William Styron’s Confessions of Nat Turner (1967) is probably one of the most controversial, and definitely in many quarters one of the most reviled, novels of the last fifty years. The most obvious and certainly one of the most central reasons for the attacks which the book has received from African American writers and historians and scholars (among other critics) is that Styron focuses the psychology and passion of his fictionalized Nat Turner on a teenage white girl, ignoring potential (if ambiguous and uncertain) evidence for a slave wife of Turner’s and greatly extrapolating this relationship with the white girl from a few minor pieces of evidence in the historical record. Yet having read at length the critiques on Styron, including those captured in a book entitled Ten Black Writers Respond , I have to say that an equally central underlying reason for the impassioned attacks on the book is the simple fact that Styron, a white novelist (and a Southerner to boot), had written a novel in the first-person narrative voice of this complex and prominent African American historical figure.
The issue there is partly one of authenticity, of who does and does not have the ability to speak for a particular community and culture. Yet while there may well be specific reasons to critique Styron’s choices and efforts in this novel, on that broader issue I believe that one of the central goals of all fiction should be to help readers connect to and engage with identities and experiences and communities and worlds outside of their own; seen in that light, Styron’s novel is, at least in its goals, hugely ambitious and impressive. But it pales (no pun intended) in comparison with a similar, entirely forgotten novel from nearly a century prior: William Justin Harsha’s Ploughed Under: The Story of an Indian Chief, Told by Himself (1881). Harsha, the son of a prominent preacher and pro-Indian activist and himself an impassioned advocate of Native American rights, published this novel anonymously, and since it is narrated (as the subtitle suggests) in the first-person voice of a Native American chief, his project represents an even more striking attempt to speak from and for an identity and culture distinct from the author’s own. The novel is long and far from a masterpiece—it features in a prominent role one of the least compelling love triangles I’ve ever encountered—but in this most foundational stylistic and formal (and thematic and political) choice of Harsha’s, it is to my mind one of American literature’s most unique and amazing efforts.
And yet was it necessary? Just a few years later, Paiute chief and leader Sarah Winnemucca Hopkins would publish her Life Among The Piutes: Their Wrongs and Claims (1886), a work of autoethnography and history and political polemic that, like all of Winnemucca’s life and work, makes clear just how fully Native American authors and activists and leaders could and did speak for themselves in this period (as they had for centuries, but with far greater opportunities to publish and disseminate broadly those voices than at any earlier point). Winnemucca, like the Ponca chief Standing Bear whose lecture tour inspired Helen Hunt Jackson’s conversion to activism and like numerous other Native American leaders (including Inshta Theamba, also known as “Bright Eyes,” who wrote the introduction to Harsha’s novel), spoke and worked tirelessly for her tribe and for Native American rights more generally, and her book illustrates just how eloquent and impressive her voice was in service of those causes. Although her individual and cultural identities became, in both her life and the text, quite complicated as a result of her experiences as a translator and mediator between her tribe and the US army and government—complexities that are the focus of the Winnemucca chapter in my second book—such complications are, if anything, a further argument for the value of hearing and reading her own voice, rather than trying to access it through intermediaries or fictional representations.Everyone should, indeed, read Winnemucca’s book, and if we had to choose one Native American-focused text from the decade to cement in our national narratives, I’d go with hers without hesitation. But we don’t, and we don’t even necessarily have to decide whether her voice is more authentic than Harsha’s narrator’s, or Jackson’s Ramona’s and Alessandro’s, or Theamba’s. There may be some value in that question, but to me the far greater value is in reading and hearing as many voices as we can, from this period and on these issues and in every other period and frame, to give us the most authentic understanding of both Native American experiences and the whole complex mosaic of American identity. Next leader tomorrow,BenPS. What do you think? Native American leaders or figures you’d highlight?

August 1, 2016: Native American Leaders: John Ross

[August 1stmarks the 150th anniversary of Cherokee Chief John Ross’s death. So this week I’ll AmericanStudy Ross and other native leaders, leading up to a weekend Guest Post from one of our most talented and significant Native Studies scholars.]Three American histories that look far different when viewed through the lens of the Cherokee Nation’s longest-serving Principal Chief.1)      The Trail of Tears: As I wrote in this post, Jackson’s Indian Removal policy and the Trail of Tears that it produced are perhaps the best remembered Native American histories, yet our collective memories of them tend to position the Cherokee and their native brethren solely as tragic victims. The Cherokee Memorials to Congress, of which Ross was likely the central author, offer one potent and powerful way to revise that narrative, highlighting the communal voices and histories through which the nation engaged with America and its own evolving histories and community. Yet Ross’s life and perspective also connect to the complex debate within the Cherokee nation over the removal policy and the most effective way to respond to it, with Ross representing a more active resistance and his fellow chief Major Ridge standing for the more moderate “Treaty Party.” History, of course, bore Ross and his position out very fully—but an accurate history of the era would feature far more of the Cherokee nation’s diverse perspectives as well as their multiple resistances to removal, and Ross offers a starting point for engaging with all those histories and factors.2)      Early Republic Wars: Long before he was elected Principal Chief (in 1828), Ross emerged onto the national scene as an officers’ assistant in a Cherokee regiment fighting (ironically enough) under General Andrew Jackson during the War of 1812. As I wrote in this post, the U.S. army during that war’s culminating (if literally inconsequential) Battle of New Orleans exemplified the national community in multicultural miniature, from French pirates and Filipino fisherman to the city’s African American community and multiple Native American regiments. Yet by the time of that January 1815 battle, Ross and his Cherokee regiment had already also fought under Jackson in the so-called Creek War of 1813-14, a far more complex conflict that interconnected with the War of 1812 yet pitted the U.S. army against multiple Southeastern Native American tribes. As had been the case during both the French and Indian and Revolutionary Wars, the Native American military during this Early Republic era was thus complicatedly both part of and opposed to America’s martial efforts, and Ross came of age within that divided world.3)      The Civil War: The final years of Ross’s life took place against the backdrop of an even more divided wartime moment, not only for the nation but also for the Cherokee tribe and Ross’s own family and personal perspective. At the Civil War’s outset the Cherokee, now living in the Indian Territory that would later become Oklahoma (once the tribe was once again forcibly removed), were once again divided, with a majority supporting the Confederacy but a sizeable contingent favoring the Union. Ross, still in his role as Principal Chief, initially advocated neutrality, and traveled to Washington early in the war to meet President Lincoln; three of his sons volunteered for the Union Army, while his nephew-in-law John Drew organized the Confederate Army’s first Cherokee regiment. Later in the war the divisions only deepened, with pro-Confederate sympathizers led by Stand Watie raiding Ross’s home and killing his son-in-law while Ross’s now overtly pro-Union faction had moved to Fort Leavenworth. At the time of his August 1, 1866 death Ross (along with Watie and many other leaders) was in the midst of the negotiations with the Johnson administration that would culminate in the Cherokee Reconstruction Treaty, one final step in the tribe’s and Ross’s complex relationship to the Civil War and its histories. Next leader tomorrow,BenPS. What do you think? Native American leaders or figures you’d highlight?

July 30-31, 2016: July 2016 Recap

[A Recap of the month that was in AmericanStudying.]July 4: Modeling Critical Patriotism: Frederick Douglass’ July 4th Speech: A series on models of critical patriotism starts with the speech that challenges us as much today as it did 150 years ago.July 5: Modeling Critical Patriotism: William Apess’ “Eulogy on King Philip”: The series continues with a speech that offers two complementary models of critical patriotism.July 6: Modeling Critical Patriotism: Suffrage Activists at the Centennial Exposition: Critical patriotism at America’s 100th birthday celebration, as the series rolls on.July 7: Modeling Critical Patriotism: Carlos Bulosan’s America is in the Heart: The author and book that critically but optimistically redefine American identity.July 8: Modeling Critical Patriotism: Jeremiah Wright and Barack Obama: The series concludes with a controversial sermon and a follow-up speech that offer competing visions of critical patriotism.July 9-10: Crowd-sourced Critical Patriotisms: Fellow AmericanStudiers offer their nominees for models of critical patriotism—share yours in comments, please!July 11: 20th Century Women Writers: Mary Antin and Anzia Yezierska: A series inspired by my current grad class kicks off with the distinctions and similarities between two Jewish American writers.July 12: 20th Century Women Writers: Nella Larsen: The series continues with the brief but potent career of a Harlem Renaissance writer.July 13: 20th Century Women Writers: Sylvia Plath: The talented poet who reminds us not to settle for accepted narratives, as the series rolls on.July 14: 20th Century Women Writers: Leslie Marmon Silko: Two texts that complicate and enrich our vision of Silko beyond her stunning debut novel.July 15: 20th Century Women Writers: Toni Morrison’s “Recitatif”: The series concludes with a few reasons to read the only short story by one of our greatest writers.July 16-17: Hybrid Grad Course on 20th Century Women Writers: A special weekend post on a few of the many reasons I’m excited for this grad course.July 18: VikingStudying: Elementary Explorers: An Iceland-inspired series starts with a striking change in elementary school social studies.July 19: VikingStudying: Leif Erikson: The series continues with three telling details about the Iceland-born world explorer.July 20: VikingStudying: The Sagas: Two AmericanStudies contexts for the Viking literary epics, as the series rolls on.July 21: VikingStudying: Historic Sites: Lessons from the two discovered Viking sites in the New World, and what might be next.July 22: VikingStudying: Vikings on the Screen: The series concludes with a key difference between 1960s and 21st century depictions of Vikings, and what has endured.July 23-24: IcelandStudying: A special weekend post on three things I learned about America while traveling in Iceland.July 25: American Camping: The Wendigo: A camping series starts with the scary story that also offers cultural and cross-cultural commentaries.July 26: American Camping: The Gunnery Camp: The series continues with two vital lessons we can learn from the father of American camping.July 27: American Camping: Into the Wilds: The distinct but equally American cultural traditions for two recent wilderness stories, as the series rolls on.July 28: American Camping: Appalachian Trailblazers: Three men who helped blaze one of the nation’s (and world’s) premiere hiking trails.July 29: American Camping: Camping and Race: The series concludes with two historical and cultural contexts for a complex American divide.Next series starts Monday,BenPS. Topics you’d like to see covered in this space? Guest Posts you’d like to write? Lemme know!