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Everything You Know about Indians Is Wrong
In this sweeping work of memoir and commentary, leading cultural critic Paul Chaat Smith illustrates with dry wit and brutal honesty the contradictions of life in “the Indian business.”
Raised in suburban Maryland and Oklahoma, Smith dove head first into the political radicalism of the 1970s, working with the American Indian Movement until it dissolved into dysfunction and infighting. Afterward he lived in New York, the city of choice for political exiles, and eventually arrived in Washington, D.C., at the newly minted National Museum of the American Indian (“a bad idea whose time has come”) as a curator. In his journey from fighting activist to federal employee, Smith tells us he has discovered at least two there is no one true representation of the American Indian experience, and even the best of intentions sometimes ends in catastrophe. Everything You Know about Indians Is Wrong is a highly entertaining and, at times, searing critique of the deeply disputed role of American Indians in the United States. In “A Place Called Irony,” Smith whizzes through his early life, showing us the ironic pop culture signposts that marked this Native American’s coming of age in “We would order Chinese food and slap a favorite video into the machine—the Grammy Awards or a Reagan press conference—and argue about Cyndi Lauper or who should coach the Knicks.” In “Lost in Translation,” Smith explores why American Indians are so often misunderstood and misrepresented in today’s “We’re lousy television.” In “Every Picture Tells a Story,” Smith remembers his Comanche grandfather as he muses on the images of American Indians as “a half-remembered presence, both comforting and dangerous, lurking just below the surface.”
Smith walks this tightrope between comforting and dangerous, offering unrepentant skepticism and, ultimately, empathy. “This book is called Everything You Know about Indians Is Wrong , but it’s a book title, folks, not to be taken literally. Of course I don’t mean everything, just most things. And ‘you’ really means we, as in all of us.”
Raised in suburban Maryland and Oklahoma, Smith dove head first into the political radicalism of the 1970s, working with the American Indian Movement until it dissolved into dysfunction and infighting. Afterward he lived in New York, the city of choice for political exiles, and eventually arrived in Washington, D.C., at the newly minted National Museum of the American Indian (“a bad idea whose time has come”) as a curator. In his journey from fighting activist to federal employee, Smith tells us he has discovered at least two there is no one true representation of the American Indian experience, and even the best of intentions sometimes ends in catastrophe. Everything You Know about Indians Is Wrong is a highly entertaining and, at times, searing critique of the deeply disputed role of American Indians in the United States. In “A Place Called Irony,” Smith whizzes through his early life, showing us the ironic pop culture signposts that marked this Native American’s coming of age in “We would order Chinese food and slap a favorite video into the machine—the Grammy Awards or a Reagan press conference—and argue about Cyndi Lauper or who should coach the Knicks.” In “Lost in Translation,” Smith explores why American Indians are so often misunderstood and misrepresented in today’s “We’re lousy television.” In “Every Picture Tells a Story,” Smith remembers his Comanche grandfather as he muses on the images of American Indians as “a half-remembered presence, both comforting and dangerous, lurking just below the surface.”
Smith walks this tightrope between comforting and dangerous, offering unrepentant skepticism and, ultimately, empathy. “This book is called Everything You Know about Indians Is Wrong , but it’s a book title, folks, not to be taken literally. Of course I don’t mean everything, just most things. And ‘you’ really means we, as in all of us.”
208 pages, Kindle Edition
First published April 1, 2009
57 people are currently reading
1954 people want to read
About the author
Paul Chaat Smith
13 books15 followersPaul Chaat Smith is a Comanche author, essayist, and curator. His books and exhibitions focus on the contemporary landscape of American Indian politics and culture.
Smith joined the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian in 2001, where he currently serves as Associate Curator. His projects include the NMAI’s history gallery, performance artist James Luna’s Emendatio at the 2005 Venice Biennial, Fritz Scholder: Indian/Not Indian (2008), and Brian Jungen: Strange Comfort (2009).
With Robert Warrior, he is the author of Like a Hurricane: the Indian Movement from Alcatraz to Wounded Knee (New Press, 1996), a standard text in Native studies and American history courses. His second book, Everything You Know about Indians Is Wrong, was published in 2009 by the University of Minnesota Press, and is now in its second printing.
Appointed Critic in Residence three times in galleries in the U.S. and Canada, Smith’s exhibitions and essays have explored the work of Richard Ray Whitman, Baco Ohama, Faye HeavyShield, Shelley Niro, Erica Lord, and Kent Monkman. He has lectured at the National Gallery of Art, Center for the Arts in San Francisco, and the Getty Center for the History of Art and the Humanities in Los Angeles. His television appearances include the 1995 Canadian series Markings with Neil Bissondath, and served as creative consultant for the American Experience series We Shall Remain: A Native History of America, broadcast on PBS in April 2009.
Smith lives in Washington, D.C. His middle name is pronounced “chot,” has no hyphen, and rhymes with hot. He has no college or university degrees.
Smith joined the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian in 2001, where he currently serves as Associate Curator. His projects include the NMAI’s history gallery, performance artist James Luna’s Emendatio at the 2005 Venice Biennial, Fritz Scholder: Indian/Not Indian (2008), and Brian Jungen: Strange Comfort (2009).
With Robert Warrior, he is the author of Like a Hurricane: the Indian Movement from Alcatraz to Wounded Knee (New Press, 1996), a standard text in Native studies and American history courses. His second book, Everything You Know about Indians Is Wrong, was published in 2009 by the University of Minnesota Press, and is now in its second printing.
Appointed Critic in Residence three times in galleries in the U.S. and Canada, Smith’s exhibitions and essays have explored the work of Richard Ray Whitman, Baco Ohama, Faye HeavyShield, Shelley Niro, Erica Lord, and Kent Monkman. He has lectured at the National Gallery of Art, Center for the Arts in San Francisco, and the Getty Center for the History of Art and the Humanities in Los Angeles. His television appearances include the 1995 Canadian series Markings with Neil Bissondath, and served as creative consultant for the American Experience series We Shall Remain: A Native History of America, broadcast on PBS in April 2009.
Smith lives in Washington, D.C. His middle name is pronounced “chot,” has no hyphen, and rhymes with hot. He has no college or university degrees.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 62 reviews
June 19, 2009
The reason that everything you know about Indians is wrong, explains Smith, is easily encapsulated in a story about Don Hewitt, the legendary 60 Minutes producer: he refused to do stories about Indians. Not because they were all sullen news and guilt trips, but because the Indian experience was too complex to handle in the allotted amount of time. Smith agrees with him, and goes on to say in an essay called “Americans Without Tears,” that the more a white person is interested in Indians, the dumber he is. Indians and Indian issues are overlooked, misunderstood, and misrepresented because Indian experience is “profoundest event in human history” and central to the history of the world as we know it. Five hundred years ago, “continents and worlds that had been separated for millions of years became just weeks, then days, and now only hours away.” This first contact changed the planet, bringing “[n:]ot just corn and potatoes, but the Atlantic slave trade. Gold and silver, ideas, microbes, animals.” The problem is that Indians “aren’t allowed to be significant in explaining how the world ended up the way it did.”
The problem is also the objectification of Indian culture and history. Indians today can’t be regular Joes, Mom and Pops, or even fully human. Politics has defined every decision made about Indians, from why “Everything We Make Is Art” to the way Indian leaders are called chiefs and not kings, to the use of the English Black Elk instead of the Lakota Heȟáka Sápa, and then the refusal to acknowledge that Black Elk’s friends and co-workers in the Catholic church called him Nick. This is not just culture as commodity or white racism masquerading as romanticism, it’s also the contemporary Indian’s silence about complicated histories.
Smith works as a curator at National Museum of the American Indian, specializing in contemporary art projects. Several of the twenty essays in the collection spanning the years 1992 to the present are introductions to contemporary artists like James Luna, Faye HeavyShield, and Richard Ray Whitman. The last section, called “Jukebox spiritualism” also contains personal essays describing his life as an uncool suburban Indian and a private college dropout – that is, when irony was his best friend. Then several years working for AIM (American Indian Movement) in legal defense, as a movement newsletter editor, and an observer of the PC in NYC – “when irony became obsolete.” But despite his best efforts, he writes, irony lives. And these ironical, loud-mouthed, highly critical and very funny essays about “history, pop music, failed revolution, television, and futures that never quite arrived” do their very best to address the important questions of Who are we? and What happened to us?
The problem is also the objectification of Indian culture and history. Indians today can’t be regular Joes, Mom and Pops, or even fully human. Politics has defined every decision made about Indians, from why “Everything We Make Is Art” to the way Indian leaders are called chiefs and not kings, to the use of the English Black Elk instead of the Lakota Heȟáka Sápa, and then the refusal to acknowledge that Black Elk’s friends and co-workers in the Catholic church called him Nick. This is not just culture as commodity or white racism masquerading as romanticism, it’s also the contemporary Indian’s silence about complicated histories.
Smith works as a curator at National Museum of the American Indian, specializing in contemporary art projects. Several of the twenty essays in the collection spanning the years 1992 to the present are introductions to contemporary artists like James Luna, Faye HeavyShield, and Richard Ray Whitman. The last section, called “Jukebox spiritualism” also contains personal essays describing his life as an uncool suburban Indian and a private college dropout – that is, when irony was his best friend. Then several years working for AIM (American Indian Movement) in legal defense, as a movement newsletter editor, and an observer of the PC in NYC – “when irony became obsolete.” But despite his best efforts, he writes, irony lives. And these ironical, loud-mouthed, highly critical and very funny essays about “history, pop music, failed revolution, television, and futures that never quite arrived” do their very best to address the important questions of Who are we? and What happened to us?
October 21, 2014
Found this weeding the library's collection and its title cried out to be read. Another hidden gem. A collection of disparate essays on being Indian and about their place in the world. I enjoyed the first third of the book more than the remainder which discussed art and Indian artists. Smith is witty, cheeky and is all over issues, debunking stereotypes, endorsing stereotypes. You never quite know what he's thinking or where he stands as his views have evolved over time. We have the Indian as: drunk, noble savage, victim, etc. Great writing and insight from a guy who never graduated from college. A really witty essay on irony. Smith grew up as a suburban Indian, was involved with AIM, and then becomes a curator at the NMAI. Go figure.
November 29, 2022
I appreciated this author’s dry sense of humor, but I don’t know enough about the people and movements he wrote about to understand all that he talked about. That’s on me though for my own ignorance. The author’s main theme seemed to be that Native People shouldn’t only be remembered for their history. They need contemporary culture as well. That’s a good point and one I never would have thought of without this book!
July 26, 2019
An enjoyable, if repetitive, collection of essays in an engaging, jocular tone wrestling with modern Indigenous identity which Chaat Smith critiques as a frozen stereotype stuck in the past not allowed any diversity or interaction with modern culture.
He pleads for an understanding of Indigenous people as people, flawed as everyone, and not as symbols of purity or antiquity or environment or loss. It's powerful plea even if it's not full articulated.
Chaat Smith definitely knows what he's against (everything you know about Indians) but less so what he's for. It's more an argument that Indigenous people are simply absorbed in modern culture with a few traditional practices brought along for the ride. It's not much a cri de coeur as a cri de "fuck off".
But he's also the director of an Indigenous museum whose mandate he doesn't seem too able to define, both drawn to and repulsed by traditional depictions and popular culture.
It's interesting to listen to him struggle with identity along with the reader, but it always seems to be the same struggle with only a few facets that he harps on, though very entertainingly. And it is this split personality of Indigenous identity that does seem to drive him and this book.
Maybe could have done with a bit more variety in essays, but still a meditative, super fun read.
He pleads for an understanding of Indigenous people as people, flawed as everyone, and not as symbols of purity or antiquity or environment or loss. It's powerful plea even if it's not full articulated.
Chaat Smith definitely knows what he's against (everything you know about Indians) but less so what he's for. It's more an argument that Indigenous people are simply absorbed in modern culture with a few traditional practices brought along for the ride. It's not much a cri de coeur as a cri de "fuck off".
But he's also the director of an Indigenous museum whose mandate he doesn't seem too able to define, both drawn to and repulsed by traditional depictions and popular culture.
It's interesting to listen to him struggle with identity along with the reader, but it always seems to be the same struggle with only a few facets that he harps on, though very entertainingly. And it is this split personality of Indigenous identity that does seem to drive him and this book.
Maybe could have done with a bit more variety in essays, but still a meditative, super fun read.
Read
January 31, 2025This book collects together essays by Paul Chaat Smith, a Comanche writer, critic, and curator at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian. Most of the essays were written for the catalogues of art exhibits curated by Smith, but cover a broad range of topics, including Smith’s own life story. A recurring topic is the American Indian Movement in the 1960s and 1970s (particularly the protests at Alcatraz, the Bureau of Indian Affairs building, and Wounded Knee). Smith also analyzes the depiction of Indians in popular culture, particularly movies, an art form that has featured Indians prominently since its origin. A recurring theme for Smith is that whether Indians are depicted as “savages” or more positively as spiritual defenders of the earth, the reality is that they are just ordinary people. This is a funny and insightful work, and now I plan to read Smith’s more in-depth historical work Like a Hurricane: The Indian Movement from Alcatraz to Wounded Knee.
Favorite Passages:
Contrary to what most people (Indians and non-Indians alike) now believe, our true history is one of constant change, technological innovation, and intense curiosity about the world. How else do you explain our instantaneous adaptation to horses, rifles, flour, and knives? The camera, however, was more than another tool we could adapt to our own ends. It helped make us what we are today.
The iceberg itself is the problem. And the iceberg is this: the Indian experience, imagined to be largely in the past and in any case at the margins, is in fact central to world history. Contact five centuries ago that for the first time connected the world was the profoundest event in human history, and it changed life everywhere. It was the first truly modern moment: continents and worlds that had been separated for millions of years became just weeks, then days, and now only hours away.
The myth-making machinery that in earlier days made us out to be primitive and simple now says we are spiritually advanced and environmentally perfect. Anything, it seems, but fully human. Over time these cartoon images have never worked to our advantage, and even though much in the new versions is flattering, I can’t see that in the long run such perspectives will help us at all.
For those who want not a piece of the pie but a different pie altogether, the task is both urgent and far more difficult. It requires invention, not rewriting. Instead of a reimagined western, it means a final break with a form that really was never about us in the first place. The stories of the continent must be told. A vacuum is impossible, and humans demand an explanation. So far, the only one that exists is the Big Movie. It says with perfect consistency that we are extinct, were never here anyway, that it was our fault because we couldn’t get with the program. It says we are noble, are savage, and noble savages
My theory argues that no reasonably sentient person of whatever background could seriously dispute the overwhelming evidence that Indians are at the very center of everything that happened in the Western Hemisphere (which, technically speaking, is half the world) over the past five centuries, and so that experience is at the heart of the history of everyone who lives here. That sounds like hyperbole, but actually it understates things. Contact between the two disconnected halves of the world five centuries ago changed the planet and created the world we live in today, so, really, the Indian experience is at the heart of, or pretty damn close to, the history of everybody, period. Not just corn and potatoes, but the Atlantic slave trade. Gold and silver, ideas, microbes, animals. Yet that can’t possibly be true, because everything you learn teaches you that the Indian experience is a joke, a cartoon, a minor sideshow. The overwhelming message from schools, mass media, and conventional wisdom says that Indians might be interesting, even profound, but never important. We are never allowed to be significant in explaining how the world ended up the way it did. In the final analysis, Indians are unimportant, and not a subject for serious people.
The work of affirming a continued Indian existence, of convincing ourselves and others that our culture is alive and dynamic, that history has often lied about us, that we are not all the same: this work is done. It will never be completed, and I fully expect that, in the year 2027, Indians will be answering questions about what Indians eat. But those items can now be safely crossed off our list. Indian people are clear about this: they want to remain Indian.
The country can’t make up its mind. One decade we’re invisible, another we’re dangerous. Obsolete and quaint, a rather boring people suitable for schoolkids and family vacations, then suddenly we’re cool and mysterious. Once considered so primitive that our status as fully human was a subject of scientific debate, some now regard us as keepers of planetary secrets and the only salvation for a world bent on destroying itself. Heck, we’re just plain folks, but no one wants to hear that.
Favorite Passages:
Contrary to what most people (Indians and non-Indians alike) now believe, our true history is one of constant change, technological innovation, and intense curiosity about the world. How else do you explain our instantaneous adaptation to horses, rifles, flour, and knives? The camera, however, was more than another tool we could adapt to our own ends. It helped make us what we are today.
The iceberg itself is the problem. And the iceberg is this: the Indian experience, imagined to be largely in the past and in any case at the margins, is in fact central to world history. Contact five centuries ago that for the first time connected the world was the profoundest event in human history, and it changed life everywhere. It was the first truly modern moment: continents and worlds that had been separated for millions of years became just weeks, then days, and now only hours away.
The myth-making machinery that in earlier days made us out to be primitive and simple now says we are spiritually advanced and environmentally perfect. Anything, it seems, but fully human. Over time these cartoon images have never worked to our advantage, and even though much in the new versions is flattering, I can’t see that in the long run such perspectives will help us at all.
For those who want not a piece of the pie but a different pie altogether, the task is both urgent and far more difficult. It requires invention, not rewriting. Instead of a reimagined western, it means a final break with a form that really was never about us in the first place. The stories of the continent must be told. A vacuum is impossible, and humans demand an explanation. So far, the only one that exists is the Big Movie. It says with perfect consistency that we are extinct, were never here anyway, that it was our fault because we couldn’t get with the program. It says we are noble, are savage, and noble savages
My theory argues that no reasonably sentient person of whatever background could seriously dispute the overwhelming evidence that Indians are at the very center of everything that happened in the Western Hemisphere (which, technically speaking, is half the world) over the past five centuries, and so that experience is at the heart of the history of everyone who lives here. That sounds like hyperbole, but actually it understates things. Contact between the two disconnected halves of the world five centuries ago changed the planet and created the world we live in today, so, really, the Indian experience is at the heart of, or pretty damn close to, the history of everybody, period. Not just corn and potatoes, but the Atlantic slave trade. Gold and silver, ideas, microbes, animals. Yet that can’t possibly be true, because everything you learn teaches you that the Indian experience is a joke, a cartoon, a minor sideshow. The overwhelming message from schools, mass media, and conventional wisdom says that Indians might be interesting, even profound, but never important. We are never allowed to be significant in explaining how the world ended up the way it did. In the final analysis, Indians are unimportant, and not a subject for serious people.
The work of affirming a continued Indian existence, of convincing ourselves and others that our culture is alive and dynamic, that history has often lied about us, that we are not all the same: this work is done. It will never be completed, and I fully expect that, in the year 2027, Indians will be answering questions about what Indians eat. But those items can now be safely crossed off our list. Indian people are clear about this: they want to remain Indian.
The country can’t make up its mind. One decade we’re invisible, another we’re dangerous. Obsolete and quaint, a rather boring people suitable for schoolkids and family vacations, then suddenly we’re cool and mysterious. Once considered so primitive that our status as fully human was a subject of scientific debate, some now regard us as keepers of planetary secrets and the only salvation for a world bent on destroying itself. Heck, we’re just plain folks, but no one wants to hear that.
June 7, 2022
Some essays are better than others, but overall they were thought-provoking. I don't know a whole lot about the modern art community, so it was new for me to see the ubiquitous problems of racism and tokenism towards Native Americans through the angle of an art curator.
PCS's style is fabulous. His writing is full of mirth, and the more I read, the more I detected the throw-up-your-hands-and-scream frustration bubbling under the surface. His ideas are often couched (in caveats, humor, or both) but they're bold and logical.
When he says what we know is wrong, he means the way we think of Native Americans as some combination of wise environmentalists, deep spiritualists, drunks, and museum exhibits.
In one essay he lays out his theory of history:
"My theory believes that humans start out as pretty much the same, that it's culture that shapes our ideas about buildings and food and contemporary German art and the history of the United States. My theory argues that no reasonably sentient person of whatever background could seriously dispute the overwhelming evidence that Indians are at the very center of everything that happened in the Western Hemisphere (which, technically speaking, is half the world) over the past five centuries, and so that experience is at the heart of the history of everyone who lives here. That sounds like hyperbole, but actually it understates things. Contact between the two disconnected halves of the world five centuries ago changed the planet and created the world we live in today, so, really, the Indian experience is at the heart of, or pretty damn close to, the history of everybody, period. Not just corn and potatoes, but the Atlantic slave trade. Gold and silver, ideas, microbes, animals.
Yet that can't possibly be true, because everything you learn teaches you that the Indian experience is a joke, a cartoon, a minor sideshow. The overwhelming message from schools, mass media, and conventional wisdom says that Indians might be interesting, even profound, but never important."
Later, PCS writes:
"Because of the centrality of the Indian experience, and because of the particular place of privilege white people inhabit in relationship to that experience, many whites have only a few choices. They can become "interested in Indians" and completely ignore that centrality; they can recognize the centrality but shy away from engaging the issue because it's all too complicated (the smarter ones), or, if they're both smart and brave, they can honestly engage in a dialogue."
PCS's style is fabulous. His writing is full of mirth, and the more I read, the more I detected the throw-up-your-hands-and-scream frustration bubbling under the surface. His ideas are often couched (in caveats, humor, or both) but they're bold and logical.
When he says what we know is wrong, he means the way we think of Native Americans as some combination of wise environmentalists, deep spiritualists, drunks, and museum exhibits.
In one essay he lays out his theory of history:
"My theory believes that humans start out as pretty much the same, that it's culture that shapes our ideas about buildings and food and contemporary German art and the history of the United States. My theory argues that no reasonably sentient person of whatever background could seriously dispute the overwhelming evidence that Indians are at the very center of everything that happened in the Western Hemisphere (which, technically speaking, is half the world) over the past five centuries, and so that experience is at the heart of the history of everyone who lives here. That sounds like hyperbole, but actually it understates things. Contact between the two disconnected halves of the world five centuries ago changed the planet and created the world we live in today, so, really, the Indian experience is at the heart of, or pretty damn close to, the history of everybody, period. Not just corn and potatoes, but the Atlantic slave trade. Gold and silver, ideas, microbes, animals.
Yet that can't possibly be true, because everything you learn teaches you that the Indian experience is a joke, a cartoon, a minor sideshow. The overwhelming message from schools, mass media, and conventional wisdom says that Indians might be interesting, even profound, but never important."
Later, PCS writes:
"Because of the centrality of the Indian experience, and because of the particular place of privilege white people inhabit in relationship to that experience, many whites have only a few choices. They can become "interested in Indians" and completely ignore that centrality; they can recognize the centrality but shy away from engaging the issue because it's all too complicated (the smarter ones), or, if they're both smart and brave, they can honestly engage in a dialogue."
June 30, 2023
I'm glad Smith wrote this book, although it made me realize how much I didn't know about Indians, despite a degree in anthropology a zillion years ago. I like recognizing errors in my thinking, believe it or not.
August 25, 2017
It was a good book to read and I enjoyed it. That being said, I have been reading other books touching on the same subjects that I found provided just a bit... more. If there weren't books out there leaving me amazed from page one through to the end I'd give this a higher rating but, fortunately, I've been blessed with great book recommendations. It's a good day when one can say that this book only gets 3/5 stars.
September 11, 2010
Unfortunately, this book turned out to be a series of essays and lectures from the curator of the Smithsonian's National Museum of American Indians. Although parts of it were indeed about the incorrect portrayal of American Indians in history books and movies, much of it was about current Indian artists. I was hoping to be educated about real American Indians but was not.
July 30, 2025
Back in 2012, the world was allegedly ending. I was spiraling through ancient prophecies, cosmic alignments, and apocalypse clickbait, when I stumbled across Paul Chaat Smith’s Everything You Know about Indians Is Wrong. A title like that? Impossible to resist.
I picked it up expecting rage, maybe some fiery manifestos. What I got instead was... irony. Precision. A laser-sharp dismantling of every Hollywood-glazed misconception I'd ever unconsciously inhaled about “Indians.”
This isn't a history book, and it's not a manifesto either. It's something harder to pull off—a collection of witty, personal, genre-defying essays that refuse to let you settle into comfortable truths. Smith, a Comanche thinker and Smithsonian curator, doesn’t offer the “authentic Indian voice” we might be conditioned to expect. He actively disrupts that expectation. He plays with it. Mocks it. Explodes it from the inside.
His essays—written across the 90s and early 2000s—read like dispatches from someone caught in the strange limbo between cultural insider and skeptical commentator. In “A Place Called Irony,” Smith talks about growing up in 60s/70s suburbia, his part-Comanche identity marinating in TV reruns and Warhol, not in tribal chants or feathers. And that’s kind of the point: Native identity today doesn’t look like the movies. It looks like complexity. Ambiguity. Hybridity. Sometimes it looks like bad cable TV and bureaucratic jargon. And it definitely looks like Paul Chaat Smith, shaking his head at people trying to “find their spirit animal.”
He comes down hard on the usual suspects: the noble savage myth, the environmental spiritual guru archetype, the stoic tragic survivor trope. And yet, the tone is rarely bitter—it’s biting, yes, and sarcastic when it needs to be, but there’s always an undercurrent of weary affection. This is critique from someone who cares—someone exhausted by lazy storytelling and desperate for truth that isn’t dressed up in feathers and flute music.
The chapter on media and photography floored me back then. Smith’s observation that Americans often “learned about Indians from movies, not from Indians” hit with eerie precision. He pulls the curtain back on how visual culture—photographs staged for white audiences, ethnographic exhibits, costume dramas—have shaped the very way we imagine Native peoples. It's both revelatory and infuriating.
But he doesn’t leave it there. His discussions of contemporary Native art, especially artists like James Luna, are generous, challenging, and beautifully curated. You get the sense that Smith is trying to document a moving target—what it means to be Indian in a world that keeps freezing you in time.
Reading it during my Mayan-calendar crisis made it hit even harder. While the world was obsessed with Indigenous cultures as ancient or doomed, Smith was saying: We’re still here. We’re messy. And we’re not here to teach you spiritual lessons or die symbolically in your narratives.
Twelve years later, I still think about it. It’s not a book that gives answers. It’s one that reprograms your questions.
And trust me, you’ll never look at the phrase “authentic Native experience” the same way again.
I picked it up expecting rage, maybe some fiery manifestos. What I got instead was... irony. Precision. A laser-sharp dismantling of every Hollywood-glazed misconception I'd ever unconsciously inhaled about “Indians.”
This isn't a history book, and it's not a manifesto either. It's something harder to pull off—a collection of witty, personal, genre-defying essays that refuse to let you settle into comfortable truths. Smith, a Comanche thinker and Smithsonian curator, doesn’t offer the “authentic Indian voice” we might be conditioned to expect. He actively disrupts that expectation. He plays with it. Mocks it. Explodes it from the inside.
His essays—written across the 90s and early 2000s—read like dispatches from someone caught in the strange limbo between cultural insider and skeptical commentator. In “A Place Called Irony,” Smith talks about growing up in 60s/70s suburbia, his part-Comanche identity marinating in TV reruns and Warhol, not in tribal chants or feathers. And that’s kind of the point: Native identity today doesn’t look like the movies. It looks like complexity. Ambiguity. Hybridity. Sometimes it looks like bad cable TV and bureaucratic jargon. And it definitely looks like Paul Chaat Smith, shaking his head at people trying to “find their spirit animal.”
He comes down hard on the usual suspects: the noble savage myth, the environmental spiritual guru archetype, the stoic tragic survivor trope. And yet, the tone is rarely bitter—it’s biting, yes, and sarcastic when it needs to be, but there’s always an undercurrent of weary affection. This is critique from someone who cares—someone exhausted by lazy storytelling and desperate for truth that isn’t dressed up in feathers and flute music.
The chapter on media and photography floored me back then. Smith’s observation that Americans often “learned about Indians from movies, not from Indians” hit with eerie precision. He pulls the curtain back on how visual culture—photographs staged for white audiences, ethnographic exhibits, costume dramas—have shaped the very way we imagine Native peoples. It's both revelatory and infuriating.
But he doesn’t leave it there. His discussions of contemporary Native art, especially artists like James Luna, are generous, challenging, and beautifully curated. You get the sense that Smith is trying to document a moving target—what it means to be Indian in a world that keeps freezing you in time.
Reading it during my Mayan-calendar crisis made it hit even harder. While the world was obsessed with Indigenous cultures as ancient or doomed, Smith was saying: We’re still here. We’re messy. And we’re not here to teach you spiritual lessons or die symbolically in your narratives.
Twelve years later, I still think about it. It’s not a book that gives answers. It’s one that reprograms your questions.
And trust me, you’ll never look at the phrase “authentic Native experience” the same way again.
July 9, 2022
I think I mostly agree with Paul Chaat Smith–Comanche, art curator, cultural critic, former AIM member, current sell out, cynic, and contrarian–even if I disagree with some of his approaches. He likes being combative with certain leftist movements, like multiculturalism and its desire to cordon off and highlight indigenous cultural traits, and he calls white people who are interested in or curious about native life and history (like me) stupid.
But, as far as I can tell, his arguments basically boil down to this: natives are not any one thing, certainly not the romanticized image most people have in mind. They do not all hunt buffalo and live in tipis, they are not all amateur ecologists or wise medicine men, they have not remained static throughout history (before or after Columbus), and they are not–or shouldn’t be–relegated to the role of minor nuisance in the great American drama. Their lifestyles and commentary and art, with all its flaws, are just as American as anything else. And they are very much still alive. It is in this way that Smith’s goal seems to be in line with Ralph Ellison and his invisible man. People see the Indian they want to see–different for everyone, but born of the same mold–and ignore the individual underneath.
Considering how Smith works at the National Museum of the American Indian, his vision of contemporary culture is primarily conveyed through his experiences in the art world. For instance, he spends one section describing James Luna, a devout performance artist. Not only does Luna go all out for his art, he manages to avoid the trajectory of most native pieces by not allowing his work to become mere kitsch. In one of his most famous exhibitions, The Artifact Piece, Luna posed almost naked in a display case for many hours a day with various labels marking his possessions (all atypical for a commonplace Indian) and body parts, all in an effort to suggest natives are not a thing of the past but still adapting to the present.
I guess where I get confused is where Smith’s musings leave modern day indigenous people. He encourages them to downplay any native influences so they can meld into mainstream American culture, but he also doesn’t want them to be forgotten or overshadowed. His remedy cuts it close to previous attempts at cultural assimilation.
Oh, well. This book is a series of essays that spans fifteen years or so, and, at times, Smith seems to be arguing with himself more than the reader. Plus, according to him, one of the defining features of an intellectual is the willingness to emend old thoughts and contradict former views. So maybe neither one of us has a good answer.
But, as far as I can tell, his arguments basically boil down to this: natives are not any one thing, certainly not the romanticized image most people have in mind. They do not all hunt buffalo and live in tipis, they are not all amateur ecologists or wise medicine men, they have not remained static throughout history (before or after Columbus), and they are not–or shouldn’t be–relegated to the role of minor nuisance in the great American drama. Their lifestyles and commentary and art, with all its flaws, are just as American as anything else. And they are very much still alive. It is in this way that Smith’s goal seems to be in line with Ralph Ellison and his invisible man. People see the Indian they want to see–different for everyone, but born of the same mold–and ignore the individual underneath.
Considering how Smith works at the National Museum of the American Indian, his vision of contemporary culture is primarily conveyed through his experiences in the art world. For instance, he spends one section describing James Luna, a devout performance artist. Not only does Luna go all out for his art, he manages to avoid the trajectory of most native pieces by not allowing his work to become mere kitsch. In one of his most famous exhibitions, The Artifact Piece, Luna posed almost naked in a display case for many hours a day with various labels marking his possessions (all atypical for a commonplace Indian) and body parts, all in an effort to suggest natives are not a thing of the past but still adapting to the present.
I guess where I get confused is where Smith’s musings leave modern day indigenous people. He encourages them to downplay any native influences so they can meld into mainstream American culture, but he also doesn’t want them to be forgotten or overshadowed. His remedy cuts it close to previous attempts at cultural assimilation.
Oh, well. This book is a series of essays that spans fifteen years or so, and, at times, Smith seems to be arguing with himself more than the reader. Plus, according to him, one of the defining features of an intellectual is the willingness to emend old thoughts and contradict former views. So maybe neither one of us has a good answer.
November 20, 2019
Everything You Know about Indians Is Wrong is a collection of twenty essays by Paul Chaat Smith. I bought a copy of his book after reading an interview with him by Mark Leviton in the August, 2019, issue of The Sun Magazine.* Smith is a Comanche author and the Associate Curator at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian.
I learned several things from this series of essays. There were hundreds of native nations in the Americas before the arrival of the Europeans. They had built the most extensive systems of irrigation canals in the whole world. They had cities larger than many in Europe. They were just as different from each other as Germans were different from Italians or Greeks or Egyptians or Swedes. The subjugation of a large number of people is simplified if they are dehumanized and conglomerated into a single identity. The notion of Plains Indians living in tipis and chasing buffalos is largely historically inaccurate; especially when one considers that the horses were a late addition to their lives. Coerced acculturation cannot help but create images and concepts that are confusing for the enforcers as well as the targets of their racist cruelty. The movies forever crystalized these stereotypes into a distorted and inalterable notion of who Indians are.
Actually, the book is not what I assumed it would be. I did not know about Smith’s expertise in the world of art. I had figured the book would be political, and actually it was, but it was political from the point of view of Native artists. He made reference to dozens of artists, none with whom I was familiar. I suppose that is one of the points Smith was trying to make. Native art is a narrow, neglected niche. Further it is obscured behind a curtain of stereotyped assumptions on behalf of natives and non-natives alike.
Smith made several references to the importance of the historical work of Dee Brown. So now I have a copy of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee waiting in the queue of books to be read.
*https://www.thesunmagazine.org/issues....
I learned several things from this series of essays. There were hundreds of native nations in the Americas before the arrival of the Europeans. They had built the most extensive systems of irrigation canals in the whole world. They had cities larger than many in Europe. They were just as different from each other as Germans were different from Italians or Greeks or Egyptians or Swedes. The subjugation of a large number of people is simplified if they are dehumanized and conglomerated into a single identity. The notion of Plains Indians living in tipis and chasing buffalos is largely historically inaccurate; especially when one considers that the horses were a late addition to their lives. Coerced acculturation cannot help but create images and concepts that are confusing for the enforcers as well as the targets of their racist cruelty. The movies forever crystalized these stereotypes into a distorted and inalterable notion of who Indians are.
Actually, the book is not what I assumed it would be. I did not know about Smith’s expertise in the world of art. I had figured the book would be political, and actually it was, but it was political from the point of view of Native artists. He made reference to dozens of artists, none with whom I was familiar. I suppose that is one of the points Smith was trying to make. Native art is a narrow, neglected niche. Further it is obscured behind a curtain of stereotyped assumptions on behalf of natives and non-natives alike.
Smith made several references to the importance of the historical work of Dee Brown. So now I have a copy of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee waiting in the queue of books to be read.
*https://www.thesunmagazine.org/issues....
December 3, 2023
This was my read while eating book, so it took some time to get through. But it was a good style for that as it's a series of essays that the author has written over the past 20 years. Even spread out, some of them felt a little repetitive, but there were some excellent stories, lines and messages throughout the book.
I was recommended this book by a fictional character in a Louise Erdrich novel, but I did enjoy it in reality. There just so many memories and conceptions and ideas that can come from indigenous communities that this felt like just scratching the surface. Smith is an engaging writer, with lots of pop culture references alongside histories and first story accounts of his journey.
I was recommended this book by a fictional character in a Louise Erdrich novel, but I did enjoy it in reality. There just so many memories and conceptions and ideas that can come from indigenous communities that this felt like just scratching the surface. Smith is an engaging writer, with lots of pop culture references alongside histories and first story accounts of his journey.
April 29, 2023
3.5 stars, rounded up.
because I'm nearly 20 years late to this book, i did struggle to follow along with some of the references to pop culture and events, especially the many artists. it's a bit dated due to that, and often you can tell that an essay was originally a speech he gave where you're expected to be seeing a particular piece or show shortly after. but i really enjoyed the insights i was able to take away, both in the history of Native organizing, and the more personal politics of identity. one of the final essays in particular, about the struggle that comes with being "half" something (for him, Comanche; for me, it's Mexican) will stay with me for a long, long time
because I'm nearly 20 years late to this book, i did struggle to follow along with some of the references to pop culture and events, especially the many artists. it's a bit dated due to that, and often you can tell that an essay was originally a speech he gave where you're expected to be seeing a particular piece or show shortly after. but i really enjoyed the insights i was able to take away, both in the history of Native organizing, and the more personal politics of identity. one of the final essays in particular, about the struggle that comes with being "half" something (for him, Comanche; for me, it's Mexican) will stay with me for a long, long time
June 22, 2023
I really enjoyed the first few essays, with some laugh out loud moments around his writing style. As I continued and realized that I was reading a slapped together collection of addresses, my interest flagged. The book became less about what I was thinking it was about, and more about some other stuff. When it came time for the group to discuss the book, we had a lively discussion about what we humans want, no matter what ethnicity we identify with, and how we choose to represent our heritage. For some reason, out of all the jumble of ideas, I got a very strong message that reparations are almost always going to be misdirected and futile.
October 30, 2018
Based on the title, I was expecting a focus on Native Americans as a whole (both past and present), but instead the focus is primarily on Native American artists and intellectuals. Although I learned some stuff about this narrow sliver of the Native American population, I felt like the book could have been a lot more enlightening. The book consists of a series of the author's essays and speeches from the last several decades. There is the occasional witty remark or insightful observation, but the book doesn't really deliver what the title seems to promise.
October 12, 2019
I haven't been tempted to give up reading a book in a long time, but I struggled to finish this one which I found disjointed and poorly organized.
I was never sure exactly where the author was going. After reading it, I came back to read a few of the reviews here and am really surprised that someone could give this book a four- or five-star rating. I wanted to learn more about the subject but in the end didn't know much more about Indians than when I began the book.
I hate being critical, but maybe I can save someone else from slogging through what is mostly a boring read.
I was never sure exactly where the author was going. After reading it, I came back to read a few of the reviews here and am really surprised that someone could give this book a four- or five-star rating. I wanted to learn more about the subject but in the end didn't know much more about Indians than when I began the book.
I hate being critical, but maybe I can save someone else from slogging through what is mostly a boring read.
November 10, 2021
read this for my intro to native american studies class
i really enjoyed this book! as a non-Indian person, i found it very informative--not so much on the nitty-gritty politics surrounding Indians and their history, but more on the little social/cultural nuances and challenges surrounding the ways in which Indians have to navigate modern western society, which has often relegated them/their people to the past.
Smith writes with a very sardonic/humorous tone which was always a welcome respite from the very straightforward academic readings i've had to do
i really enjoyed this book! as a non-Indian person, i found it very informative--not so much on the nitty-gritty politics surrounding Indians and their history, but more on the little social/cultural nuances and challenges surrounding the ways in which Indians have to navigate modern western society, which has often relegated them/their people to the past.
Smith writes with a very sardonic/humorous tone which was always a welcome respite from the very straightforward academic readings i've had to do
January 18, 2024
This book was great and good and pointing out ways in which white people romanticise and create false narratives for and of Indigenous people and in doing so commit cultural genocide and homogenise American Indian experience. I really enjoyed the book, and wonder if having to read it for a class drained some excitement from it. 😂 I also think that Smith is both sobering with the details of Indigenous displacement, but also remarkably graceful and human in dealing with non-Indigenous folk addressing some of the aftermath and trauma which followed.
November 15, 2021
Take this three stars with a massive pinch of salt, as most of the essays are pretty good (or at least have good bits.) My favorites were “A Place Called Irony” and “Every Picture Tells a Story.” Unfortunately our author’s style doesn’t work for me as a whole because A) I don’t think he’s as funny as he seems to think he is and B) I don’t understand most of his many, many, many music/film/pop culture references that are littered throughout.
January 15, 2022
Though the premise of the book seemed promising, the book was not all that engaging. The stories he uses to illustrate his theme that Indians are stereotyped as noble savages with a deep connection to nature, a view that was never completely true and is less true today, were by and large boring. Still, his premise that Indians cannot be stereotyped and should be viewed as human beings first and Indians second and can do quite well within modernity is important.
January 29, 2024
Love it for its messy grappling with issues around history, culture, belonging, dominant narratives, and how people change their minds (or not) over time. It’s repetitive at times, but then there is the glorious call for Indian intellectuals and Indian contemporary artists that defy the pressure to be guardians of the environment or spiritual caretakers, and I feel I get it. Nobody is timeless. (It does show its age, however.)
March 22, 2017
a fabulous collection of essays from paul chaat smith - activist, historian, comanche bad ass - on many themes of native america, it's various histories, the art world, and how colonialist powers have distorted our north american history to whitewash natives into a very small box, where labels like spiritual, environmental, and stoic are used to subvert and sum up a rich, indescribable culture. chaat smith writes with a great sense of humor and speaks truth while never taking himself too seriously.
February 16, 2018
Clear minded, straightforward, challenging and damn funny: Paul casts “cultural criticism” in a brand new light. It’s the questions—who are we? Where do we come from? Where are we going?—that he’s most interested in: he’s asking them about the history, role, 70s activism, and contemporary art practices of American Indians. A must read, particularly the first half of essays.
September 16, 2022
Interesting read, the first of a couple I wanted to read after it was mentioned in The Sentence.
Repetitive at points but thats what you get from a collection of essays written over a long time.
Was what I thought I knew about indians wrong? For some, not for others, inapplicable mostly? After all Paul Chaat Smith proposes that Indian people are...people
Repetitive at points but thats what you get from a collection of essays written over a long time.
Was what I thought I knew about indians wrong? For some, not for others, inapplicable mostly? After all Paul Chaat Smith proposes that Indian people are...people
February 3, 2023
Half personal memoir, half collection of introductions to art exhibits by Native artists. 100% compelling. Though at times repetitious, since the essays were all written for separate purposes, so they re-visit some of the same ground. I wish there were more pointers to see (at least online) some of the art being referenced.
February 5, 2018
Like many essay collections, it's a mixed bag. Also, the author comes off as a bit of a douche. However, the best essays are extremely well-written and thoughtful and- true to the book's provocative title- succeeded in flipping my mental script on the subject.
November 23, 2022
Essays, singular voice, expanded my outlook for sure.
Some repetition as essays span almost 15 years, great insights into indigenous art philosophy, practice and the politics of establishing the National Museum of the American Indian.
Loved the authorial voice, and writing style!
Some repetition as essays span almost 15 years, great insights into indigenous art philosophy, practice and the politics of establishing the National Museum of the American Indian.
Loved the authorial voice, and writing style!
March 17, 2019
Truly incredible writing. I found myself stopping after certain paragraphs and just letting the words sink into my brain.
If I had to sum up in a single word: incisive. And: necessary.
If I had to sum up in a single word: incisive. And: necessary.
November 29, 2021
Enlightening, a different way of viewing First Americans in past, present and future.
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