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Great Plains Indians
2017 Nebraska Book Awards Reference
David J. Wishart’s Great Plains Indians covers thirteen thousand years of fascinating, dynamic, and often tragic history.
From a hunting and gathering lifestyle to first contact with Europeans to land dispossession to claims cases, and much more, Wishart takes a wide-angle look at one of the most significant groups of people in the country. Myriad internal and external forces have profoundly shaped Indian lives on the Great Plains. Those forces—the environment, religion, tradition, guns, disease, government policy—have written their way into this history. Wishart spans the vastness of Indian time on the Great Plains, bringing the reader up to date on reservation conditions and rebounding populations in a sea of rural population decline.
Great Plains Indians is a compelling introduction to Indian life on the Great Plains from thirteen thousand years ago to the present.
David J. Wishart’s Great Plains Indians covers thirteen thousand years of fascinating, dynamic, and often tragic history.
From a hunting and gathering lifestyle to first contact with Europeans to land dispossession to claims cases, and much more, Wishart takes a wide-angle look at one of the most significant groups of people in the country. Myriad internal and external forces have profoundly shaped Indian lives on the Great Plains. Those forces—the environment, religion, tradition, guns, disease, government policy—have written their way into this history. Wishart spans the vastness of Indian time on the Great Plains, bringing the reader up to date on reservation conditions and rebounding populations in a sea of rural population decline.
Great Plains Indians is a compelling introduction to Indian life on the Great Plains from thirteen thousand years ago to the present.
168 pages, Paperback
Published September 1, 2016
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
June 15, 2024
Thank you to Badlands National Park for having this book. It was really nice to read about all the great plains tribes as I drove through the land that used to be theirs. I think what I read in this book should be taught in schools.
June 9, 2020
Short and scholarly introduction to the Great Plains Indians. A must read for anyone and everyone who currently lives on Native lands (which is every American).
August 16, 2016
Indian culture and history is not something I know much about. The idiom that the victors are the ones who write history is true enough, and I don't recall being taught much about the topic in school. Marginalization is real, ya'll, even in the South where you can't throw a rock without hitting someone who claims some kind of Indian heritage several generations back.
This book is relatively short, but to me, a layman, it seemed like a good overview of the Indians of the Great Plains from ancient times to modern day. Because it was so short I did feel like certain sections could have used more fleshing out, but the writing moved at a quick and interesting pace. Most of the time is spent on the 1800's when the majority of the damage to their way of life was perpetrated, and not a lot of time is spent on their ways before colonization or in the modern day.
I've been trying to pick up and find more books on Indian history because I feel like it's a void in our countries history that no one ever wants to talk about. It's pretty unreal to think about how badly they have been treated by the people who came to take over their land. And the most recompense they've received is from the Indian Claims Commission which was a pittance compared to all the hardships that have been visited upon them. This was definitely worth the read if you're interested in this time period, and some of the stories that aren't told very often.
Copy courtesy of University of Nebraska Press/Bison Books, via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
This book is relatively short, but to me, a layman, it seemed like a good overview of the Indians of the Great Plains from ancient times to modern day. Because it was so short I did feel like certain sections could have used more fleshing out, but the writing moved at a quick and interesting pace. Most of the time is spent on the 1800's when the majority of the damage to their way of life was perpetrated, and not a lot of time is spent on their ways before colonization or in the modern day.
I've been trying to pick up and find more books on Indian history because I feel like it's a void in our countries history that no one ever wants to talk about. It's pretty unreal to think about how badly they have been treated by the people who came to take over their land. And the most recompense they've received is from the Indian Claims Commission which was a pittance compared to all the hardships that have been visited upon them. This was definitely worth the read if you're interested in this time period, and some of the stories that aren't told very often.
Copy courtesy of University of Nebraska Press/Bison Books, via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
April 16, 2018
This book is a necessary read for any great plains citizen. While just an intro, Wishart covers miles (get it?!) of history and interaction between the settlers and Native Americans of the Great Plains. So much has changed in even the last 200 + years on the plains that to read of the pre-Lewis and Clark world is utterly fascinating to me. By reading this book, you'll come face to face with once dominant people groups that our society hardly acknowledges in the present day.
February 14, 2019
The book provides a great, straight forward presentation of the factual history of the Great Plains Indians. It covers a broad span of time which goes into great detail, while still emphasizes the greater themes covering the time period. His book is great for historical learning because of its precision and clear presentation of arguments and factual history.
September 18, 2016
Concise history of the various tribes of the Great Plains, from "prehistory" to the challenges faced by those living on reservations today. I found the sections about smallpox fascinating. The author does take the stand that what happened to Native Americans after European contact was cultural, rather than physical, genocide, which some readers may or may not agree with (although he does acknowledge that retrospective use of fairly recent terminology like "genocide" and "ethnic cleansing" is always tricky). A lot of the narrative is presented through (or in conjunction with) the "white man's" lens, probably due to the reliance of academic history on written citations, but native oral and graphic traditions are recognized.
June 25, 2016
There is a problem in Native History.
I mean, there are several problems, but one I have found jarring: it seems not to have existed before the ''colonization''.
All the history books start around 1800s. Some 1700s. Before? Silence.
Since I am interested in history, I was very curious and intrigued when I heard of this book. Finally a history of Native American pre=colonization!
Well, no.
This book suffers from two big problems: one is the aforementioned. There is perhaps 1/4 or 1/5 of the book which actually talks about the 10.000+ years in which the Native where the only humans in America. The rest of the book is about the post-''colonization'' period, which makes the book as a whole A LOT less interesting.
The second is that there are hints that the author is a post-modernist of sort, the kind of people who think that both the creation myths and what science says are just ''different ways of knowing''. Good if it is your cup of tea, but personally I think everybody who believes such idiocy should be given at random real medicine and BS or real computer and computer made with ''other way of knowing'' and see if they change their mind.
Three stars, all in all a disappointment, though not a bad book.
I mean, there are several problems, but one I have found jarring: it seems not to have existed before the ''colonization''.
All the history books start around 1800s. Some 1700s. Before? Silence.
Since I am interested in history, I was very curious and intrigued when I heard of this book. Finally a history of Native American pre=colonization!
Well, no.
This book suffers from two big problems: one is the aforementioned. There is perhaps 1/4 or 1/5 of the book which actually talks about the 10.000+ years in which the Native where the only humans in America. The rest of the book is about the post-''colonization'' period, which makes the book as a whole A LOT less interesting.
The second is that there are hints that the author is a post-modernist of sort, the kind of people who think that both the creation myths and what science says are just ''different ways of knowing''. Good if it is your cup of tea, but personally I think everybody who believes such idiocy should be given at random real medicine and BS or real computer and computer made with ''other way of knowing'' and see if they change their mind.
Three stars, all in all a disappointment, though not a bad book.
December 12, 2016
Will review this work in a scholarly journal. A good kickoff for the Nebraska series of little books on the Great Plains.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews