Course Description
Cultural diversity of contemporary Native American tribes of the continental United States and Alaska, including lifestyles, politics, literature, music, art, and socioeconomic conditions.
Athena Title
Contemporary Native America H
Equivalent Courses
Not open to students with credit in ANTH 3410, NAMS 3410, ANTH 3410E, NAMS 3410E
Non-Traditional Format
When course is taken as part of a summer field school, all lectures and demonstrations will total the equivalent amount of time as the traditional three hours lecture per week during a semester. The emphasis is on direct experiential contact with Native America -- landscape, ceremony, and culture.
Prerequisite
(ANTH 1102 or ANTH 2120H) and permission of Honors
Semester Course Offered
Not offered on a regular basis.
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Course Objectives
Most students have little real knowledge of 20th century Indians beyond stereotypes and media "sound-bites." This course attempts to remove the banality and falsity of idealized Indians ("White Man's Indians") presenting instead the strength and diversity of contemporary Native America.
Topical Outline
1. Introduction and review of military and judicial defeats of the U.S. tribes -- Southeast tribes; the Iroquois; the Plains and West. 2. Removal and Reservations. Challenge of self government. Decertification and assimilation policies - allotment and blood quantum. The Lumbees of North Carolina. 3. Grassroots and the American Indian Movement. 4. Alcatraz to Wounded Knee. 5. Indian Education and Medicine. Status of Native American health -- traditional and contemporary healing; herbs and pharmaceuticals; mental health. 6. Spirituality and Religion. Hopi. Survival of ritual. White "Shamans." Religious freedom and sacred places. 7. Archaeology and the Indian -- NAGPRA. 8. Arts in Native America. a) The Pow-Wow Culture. Contemporary dance and music - reinventing the flute and drum. b) Ceramics, baskets and textiles. Painting and sculpture. c) Contemporary literature and poetry. d) Toli. 9. Traditional Environmental Knowledge - T.E.K. Ecology and the Indian. The environmental movement co-op of the Indian. "New Age." 10. Indians and the End of the 20th Century. The Choctaws- poverty to "Las Vegas." 11. Latin America - the Indian's "South Africa." Peasant revolts, genocide and the conscience of America. 12. Beyond 2000 -- American Indians and the Future. The end of Indian "Nations?"