Do you want to do your own research on Indian identity issues?

Consult Books

Daryl Baldwin and Julie Olds. “Miami Indian Language and Cultural Research at Miami University,” in Beyond Red Power, ed. Daniel M. Cobb and Loretta Fowler, 2007. Baldwin and Olds are Oklahoma Miamis. They describe the cooperative research that tribal members and Miami University have been doing to support cultural and language revitalization projects since the mid-1990s. By 1960, there were no native speakers of Miami, but Baldwin and a linguist reconstructed the language in 2005. Funds for this kind of work became more available as a result of the Native American Languages Act of 1990.

David R. M. Beck. The Struggle for Self-Determination, 2005. Beck discusses the termination process and the Menominee’s successful Restoration effort.

Renée Ann Cramer. Cash, Color and Colonialism, 2005. Political scientist Cramer focuses on how the federal recognition process since 1978 has been influenced by public perceptions of Indians, perceptions shaped by biased media accounts that juxtapose federal recognition, Indian casinos, and suspect tribal identity. Public and official bias link “real Indian” identity with poverty and primitivism as well as “Indian” physical features. Cramer argues that the federal acknowledgment process has not been objective and that it is a product of power differentials between majority Americans and the Native minority. The author’s case studies come from Connecticut and Alabama.

Edmund Jefferson Danziger, Jr. The Chippewas of Lake Superior, 1978. The author gives an overview of Ojibwa history from the fur trade to the 1970s. He argues that in the 1970s, reservation life was shaped by earlier experiences, especially ideas and values that were present in the past. He compares reservations in Wisconsin and Minnesota and examines how the Self-Determination legislation in 1975 and afterwards helped improve socioeconomic conditions and strengthened communities.

Eve Darian-Smith. New Capitalists, 2004. Anthropologist Darian-Smith argues that because Indian gaming altered relations of power between non-Natives and Natives the public developed negative attitudes toward tribal recognition. The collective fears of majority Americans were projected onto tribal sovereignty projects. The American stereotype of Indians includes incompetence and lack of materialism, so the introduction of tribally-owned casinos conflicted with the stereotype and branded Indians as inauthentic. The author contrasts a negative view of tribes with casinos with a positive view of non-Native entrepreneurs who own casinos.

Raymond J. DeMallie. “Sioux Until 1850,” in Handbook of North American Indians 13: Plains, vol. 2, ed. Raymond J. DeMallie, 2001. This article provides an historical overview and a detailed discussion of village names of the Dakota and other Sioux divisions.

Eva Marie Garroutte. Real Indians, 2003. Sociologist Garroutte contrasts legal and cultural definitions of American Indian identity and discusses the complications of each. She also examines the problems with using “blood” to define identity. The author’s objective is to illuminate what the issue of Indian identity reveals about the way Americans conceptualize “race.” She argues that indigenous ideas about identity and community should be given more consideration.

Angela Gonzales, “The (Re) Articulation of American Indian Identity,” American Indian Culture and Research Journal, 22, 4, 1998. The author compares concepts of ethnic identity and the criteria used by the federal government to identify American Indians. She also discusses the debates among Indians over cultural “authenticity” and the reasons why identity issues are so important to Indians politically and economically. This issue of the journal is devoted to American Indians and the urban experience, and there are other articles on urban Indians in the Midwest.

M. Annette Jaimes, ed. The State of Native America, 1992. Jaimes discusses how the federal government imposed blood quantum as the standard of Indian identity in order to obtain Indian lands and to reduce costs associated with the government’s trust responsibility.

Alexa Koenig and Jonathan Stein. “Federalism and the State Recognition of Native American Tribes,” Santa Clara Law Review 48, 1, 2008. The authors survey state recognition processes as applied to tribes without federal recognition. State recognized tribes are regarded as bona fide tribes in the state in which they reside. Sixty-two tribes are recognized solely by their respective states. The authors state that in Michigan certain “historic tribes” (not federally recognized) are entitled to receive state services and funding, but Michigan does not offer a legal process for state recognition.

Ruth Landes. The Mystic Lake Sioux, 1968. Anthropologist Landes did field work with the Prairie Island Dakota in 1935. She described life at that time and, drawing on Dakota recollections, related the past and present. Landes examined belief in spirit beings, kinship, community maintenance, sharing customs, and subsistence activity.

Ruth Landes. Ojibwa Religion and the Midewiwin, 1968. Landes described the Red Lake Reservation community in the early 1930s: subsistence activity, religion, sharing customs, World War I ritual, and the Medicine Society.

Herbert S. Lewis. Oneida Lives, 2005. This is a collection of recollections by Oneida elders about past history, customs, school, and other topics.

James M. McClurken. Gah-Baeh-Jhagwah-Buk: The Way It Happened, 1991. The author provides a history of the Little Traverse Bay Odawa’s struggle for federal recognition.

Bruce Granville Miller. Invisible Indigenes, 2003. Anthropologist Miller argues that the recognition process of the Bureau of Acknowledgment Research is a new way that U. S. leaders use to erase the identity of indigenous peoples so that the U. S. maintains its control over them. By limiting the number of Indians in the U. S., the costs of maintaining the trust relationship are reduced. Miller draws on cases from the state of Washington.

Mark Edwin Miller. Forgotten Tribes, 2004. Historian Miller critiques the BAR criteria for recognizing tribes. He argues that the process is biased because it favors communities that were allowed to maintain formal relations with the U. S., discriminates against Native people who adopted some non-Indian customs (often due to coercion), and privileges observable characteristics of identity while ignoring other aspects of identity, such as ideas and values. He explains that many rejected groups had long histories in their homeland, genealogical connections with historic tribes, and distinct communities. Miller’s case studies are from Louisiana, Texas, Arizona, and California.

Joane Nagel. American Indian Ethnic Renewal, 1996. Nagel argues that American Indian culture has always been a dynamic process. She focuses on explaining the emergence of Native American cultural revival and restoration at the local community level since the 1970s and the development of a “supratribal,” that is, “Indian,” identity through which Native people pursued the rights of all American Indians. Much of the impetus for the revival and restoration movement followed the emergence of “Red Power,” or AIM activity.

Larry Nesper. The Walleye War, 2002. Anthropologist Nesper’s work on the fishing rights struggle and sovereignty movement at Lac du Flambeau is also an outstanding account of the process of cultural revival.

Sharon O’Brien. American Indian Tribal Governments, 1989. Anthropologist O’Brien provides a clearly written explanation of the services that the federal government provides to individuals recognized as legally Indian and the services that tribal governments provide to their members.

Lisa Ortiz. “Indian or Not? Ethnic Identity Among Biracial Native Americans,” in Native Chicago, eds. Terry Straus and Grant P. Arndt, 1998. Ortiz uses survey data to argue that mixed-heritage people are accepted by the Chicago Native American community as Indian.

J. Anthony Paredes, ed. Anishinabe, 1980. These essays are based on fieldwork done in the late 1960s among Minnesota Ojibwa in several communities. The editor concludes that modern Ojibwa identity is reinforced by various kinds of activities, including powwows, wakes, and ricing and a complex of symbols of identity that include unique historical experiences. The essay by Michael A. Rynkiewich on powwows makes the point that these rituals reinforce local group identity through customs of social cooperation and the display of identity symbols, including dress, language, songs, distribution of food to visitors, and gift-giving. Peyotism is described by Barbara D. Jackson.

Frank W. Porter III, ed. Nonrecognized American Indian Tribes, Occasional Papers Series 7, Center of the History of the American Indian, The Newberry Library, 1983.
Porter addresses the difficulties that unrecognized tribes have with the recognition process and Charles W. Blackwell and J. Patrick Mehaffey discuss the BAR requirements for recognition and how tribes can meet these requirements through research.

Stewart Rafert. The Miami Indians of Indiana, 1996. The author gives an excellent history of the Miami’s struggle for federal recognition.

Stephen R. Riggs. A Dakota-English Dictionary, 1992 [1890]. Riggs was a missionary, not a professional linguist, so his work differs in particulars from the work of linguists today.

George Roth. “Recognition,” in Indians in Contemporary Society, v. 2 in the Handbook of North American Indians, ed. Garrick A. Bailey, 2008. Roth is an anthropologist at the Office of Federal Acknowledgment (BAR). He provides an overview of the recognition process at the BAR and some discussion of the situation in Michigan. He points out that federally recognized tribes there have not mounted a strong opposition to petitions by unrecognized groups in the region.

Gail K. Sheffield. The Arbitrary Indian, 1997. In discussing the Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990, which tried to prevent fraud in the sale of Indian-made art and craftwork, anthropologist Sheffield argues that the Act confuses nonsimilar ethnic (cultural/social) and legal/political identity and disadvantages individuals who are participants in Indian community life yet not enrolled, as well as persons separated from tribal communities involuntarily. Legislation that was intended to identify “fake art” instead identified “fake Indians” unfairly.

Matthew C. Snipp. American Indians, 1989. Snipp analyzes data from the 1980 U. S. census to discuss patterns of self-identification, as well as other characteristics. He finds three subcategories of American Indians: “American Indians,” usually living on reservations in culturally distinct communities (or in urban areas, possibly temporarily); “American Indians of Multiple Ancestry,” who vary in their social and economic associations; and “Americans of Indian Descent,” who self-identify as White, but recognize an Indian ancestor.

Veronica E. Tiller. Tiller’s Guide to Indian Country, 2005. Tiller provides a brief sketch of each tribe, including land area, population, history, and economic profile.

View Videos

The Gibagadinamaagoom Project
http://gibagadinamaagoom.info/
In the Ojibwa language, “Gibagadinamaagoom” means “to bring life, to sanction, and to give permission.” This educational website features an “Ask the Elders” section, where various elders respond to questions on topics ranging from the use of sacred objects, the Ojibwa language, and treaty rights. The site also features a “Virtual Museum” and a multimedia presentation of Ojibwa cosmology (see the “7 Directions”).

Waasa Inaabidaa: “We Look in All Directions”
www.ojibwe.org
This is a companion website for the six-hour PBS documentary history series about the history and culture of Ojibwa Indians in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. The site offers video clips as well as photo galleries, historical timelines, and instruction guides for teachers.

Use Online Sources

Acknowledgment Decision Compilation (ADC), Office of Federal Acknowledgment
http://www.bia.gov/WhoWeAre/AS-IA/OFA/ADCList/ActivePetitions/index.htm
http://www.bia.gov/WhoWeAre/AS-IA/OFA/ADCList/PetitionsResolved/index.htm
This database lists tribes that have submitted Letters of Intent to Petition and that have received a Notice of Proposed Finding or a Final Determination. By clicking on a tribe’s name, users can view the tribes’ Letters of Intent to Petition, the Proposed Finding documentation provided by the BIA, and the notice submitted to the Federal Register. Midwest tribes included on this database are: Burt Lake Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians (Not Acknowledged), Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa, MI (Acknowledged), Nottawaseppi Huron Band of Potawatomi, MI (Acknowledged), Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians of Michigan (Acknowledged), Miami Indians of Indiana (Not Acknowledged), and the Brotherton Indian Nation, WI (Pending).

American Indian Studies Research Institute, Indiana University. Institute Publications Projects. Language Documentation.
http://www.indiana.edu/~aisri/projects/research.shtml
On this site is a Dakota dictionary, as well as other dictionaries and linguistic research.

Certificate Degree of Indian Blood (CDIB) application, Bureau of Indian Affairs
http://www.bia.gov/DocumentLibrary/index.htm
http://www.bia.gov/idc/groups/public/documents/text/idc-001805.pdf
The Bureau of Indian Affairs offers a document library. Among the documents in the library is a Certificate Degree of Indian Blood application. Individuals of Indian descent who are not members of a federally recognized tribe can use this form to apply to be legally recognized as Indians by the federal government. The first link above leads to the Bureau of Indian Affairs Document Library and the second link leads to the CDIB application.

Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission
http://www.glifwc.org/
Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission. GLIFWC is an agency of eleven Ojibwa nations in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Michigan, with off-reservation treaty rights to hunt, fish, and gather in treaty-ceded lands. GLIFWC assists its member bands in the implementation of off-reservation treaty seasons and in the protection of treaty rights and the natural resources. The site has maps, lists of publications, and reports of management activity. The following links offer educational materials and activities for children:
http://www.glifwc.org/publications/pdf/TreatyRights06.pdf
http://www.glifwc.org/publications/pdf/OTRUI2006.pdf
http://www.glifwc.org/publications/pdf/GrowingUpOjibwe_Supplement.pdf
http://www.glifwc.org/publications/pdf/Iskigamizigan_Supplement.pdf

Native American Constitution and Law Digitization Project
The University of Oklahoma Law Center has collaborated with the National Indian Law Library (NILL) to create a searchable database for tribal constitutions and codes.
http://thorpe.ou.edu

Office of Federal Acknowledgment (OFA), Bureau of Indian Affairs
http://www.bia.gov/WhoWeAre/AS-IA/OFA/index.htm
http://www.bia.gov/idc/groups/public/documents/text/idc-001215.pdf
The Office of Federal Acknowledgment website offers several informational documents, including a list of unrecognized tribes that have sent a Letter of Intent to Petition for federal acknowledgment. The first link listed above leads to the OFA website and the second link leads to a list of unrecognized tribes by state.

Tribal Constitutions
National Indian Law Library (NILL)/Native American Rights Fund (NARF)
http://www.narf.org/nill/index.htm
http://www.narf.org/nill/triballaw/az_constitutions.htm
NARF is a non-profit organization that provides legal representation and technical assistance to Indian tribes. NARF also offers an informational website that hosts the National Indian Law Library . The first link above leads to the NILL site, which offers a number of useful documents and a library catalog, and the second link leads to a comprehensive list of tribal constitutions.

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