CUSTER DIED FOR YOUR SINS - VINE DELORIA, JR.

This book is pretty fucking incredible. I’m always on a quest to read more about Native America but I wanted to expand beyond historical concerns to more contemporary theoretical sorts of texts. This book came out in ‘69 so it’s not quite “contemporary” though it’s interesting to think about what’s changed since its publication. Most of the AIM actions happen after this book comes out and they do seem inspired, at least in part, by the ideas that Deloria is laying out here. Deloria is also big on “the YTs are going to kill themselves off” and the subsequent climate change discourse seems pretty in line with that sentiment. The book is a series of essays, all about Native people, policy and culture, which cover an immense amount of ground. Deloria has experience both as a college professor, so he’s deep on theory and history, as well as a politician/lawyer/activist with stints on the board of the Museum of the American Indian and as executive director of the National Congress of the American Indian, so he’s also deep on politics and real-life possibilities. He’s both ultra erudite, he seems to be able to rattle off examples from tribal traditions across the continent at will, and also very direct and purposive as a writer. I found myself marking sections left and right and I’ll end this review with a long list of quotes I really enjoyed. I was particularly taken with the stuff about anthropologists, who Deloria rightfully goes super hard on. He really succinctly pin-points the harm that’s done by the compilation of useless knowledge and the ways in which abstract thoughts can distract from material concerns. There’s great stuff about tribal leadership including talks about how both hippies misunderstood inter-tribal dynamics which doomed their movement and the way that pioneer YTs would just pick some guy they considered manipulatable to declare the “chief” of the tribe as well as how prestige and tribal politics actually worked in the past and how it works today. There’s a whole chapter on Indian humor that performs that rare trick of writing about “humor” without resorting to fantastically unhumorous cringe. There was interesting stuff about an attempt to push for recognition for smaller Eastern tribes which could lead to more communication and coordination between urban and rez Natives. Some of the other most fascinating stuff has to do with Native engagement with the Civil Rights Movement. It’s an incredible critique to read, one typically only gets the Black or YT perspective on the Civil Rights movement so to hear from a party that is intimately involved in this conflict, especially in ‘69 is really invaluable. He both has suggestions and criticism for black leaders and he highlights ways that Indians should emulate and admire the Civil Rights Movement. The BLM and Native Rights movements are both strong here in Seattle and I see the interplay between them at marches pretty regularly (I’ve been able to hear the phrase “Black Lives Matter” in both Lushootseed as well as a Siouxan Language (I’m guessing Lakota since the people speaking were from Standing Rock)) so getting Deloria’s perspective has been very useful to say the least. The book definitely left me with the sensation that I need to know more about contemporary Native issues, I have no idea what the current stance is towards the reservations, despite living near many. Does anyone know who the living Deloria is? I’d like to read their book. 1492 Federally recognized tribes

- “Turning some reservations into an economic resource rather than a homeland”

- “Indians are now equally certain Columbus brought anthropologists on his ship when he came to the New World. How else could he have made so many deductions about where he was?”

- “the anthro is usually devoted to PURE RESEARCH. Pure research is a body of knowledge absolutely devoid of useful application and incapable of meaningful digestion...The fundamental thesis of the anthropologist is that people are objects for observation, people are then considered objects for experimentation, for manipulation, and for eventual extinction. The anthropologist thus furnishes the justification for treating Indian people like so many chessmen available for anyone to play with.”

-”abstract theories create abstract action. Lumping together the variety of tribal problems and seeking the demonic principle at work which is destroying Indian people may be intellectually satisfying. But it does not change the real situation. By concentration on great abstractions, anthropologists have unintentionally removed many young Indians from the world in which problems are solved to the land of makebelieve.”

- “compilation of useless knowledge “for knowledge’s sake” should be utterly rejected by the Indian people. We should not be the objects of observation for those who do nothing to help us.”

- “in a very real sense, then, Christianity replaced living religions with magic.”

-Not wanting to be lumped together, both tribes and Blacks, Indians, “Never did the White man  man systematically exclude Indians from his schools or meeting places. Nor did the white man ever kidnap black children from their homes and take them off to a government boarding school to be educated as Whites. The White man signed no treaties with the black. Nor did he pass any amendments to the Constitution to guarantee the treaties of the Indian...the White man forbade the Black to enter his own social and economic system and at the same time force-fed the Indian what he was denying the Black. Yet the White man demanded that the black conform to white standards and insisted that the Indian don feathers and beads periodically to perform for him.” The White man presented the problem of each group in contradictory ways so that neither Black nor Indian could understand exactly where the problem existed and how to solve it.” 

-”We refused to participate in the Washington March. In our hears and minds we could not believe that Blacks wanted to be the same as Whites. And we knew that even if they did want that, the Whites would never allow it to happen. As far as we could determine, White culture, if it existed, depended primarily upon the exploitation of land, people and life itself.”

- “Culture, as Indian people understood it, was basically a life-style by which people acted.”

- “The Black needs time to develop his roots, to create his sacred places, to understand the mystery of himself and his history, to understand his purpose. These things the Indian has and is able to maintain through his tribal life.”

- “It seemed ridiculous to Indian people that hippies would refuse to incorporate prestige and social status into their tribalizations attempts. Indian society is founded on status and social prestige. This largely reduces competition to interpersonal relationships instead of allowing it to run rampant in economic circles.”