Natives and Academics: Researching and Writing about American Indians

by Devon A. Mihesuah (Editor)

Ten leading Native scholars examine the state of scholarly research and writing on Native Americans. Their distinctive perspectives and telling arguments lend clarity to the heated debate about the purpose and direction of Native American scholarship. All too frequently, Native Americans have little control over how they and their ancestors are researched and depicted in scholarly writings. The relationship between Native peoples and the academic community has become especially rocky in recent years. Both groups are grappling with troubling questions about research ethics, methodology, and theory in the field and in the classroom. In this timely and illuminating anthology, ten leading Native scholars examine the state of scholarly research and writing on Native Americans. They offer distinctive, frequently self-critical perspectives on several important the representativeness of Native informants, the merits of various methods of data collection, the veracity and role of oral histories, the suitability of certain genres of scholarly writing for the study of Native Americans, the marketing of Native culture and history, and debates about cultural essentialism. Some contributors propose alternative forms of scholarship. Special attention is also given to the experiences, responsibilities, and challenges facing Native academics themselves. With lively prose and telling arguments, Natives and Academics lends clarity to the heated debate about the purpose and direction of Native American scholarship.

Genres: Anthropology, Indigenous, Nonfiction, History, Research

213 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1998

Reviews

[Lisa]

Natives and Academics: Researching and Writing about American Indians by Devon Abbott Mihesuah (1998)

[Bernadette · Rating 4 out of 5]

Natives and Academics reprints a 1996 special issue of the journal American Indian Quarterly. Edited by Choctaw educator and historian Devon Mihesuah, it contains an introduction and 12 essays about ethical and methodological concerns in researching and writing about American Indians. In my opinion, it is essential reading for anthropologists, American History/American Studies scholars, creative writers, cultural entrepreneurs, and anyone else who wishes to handle Native material.

To me, the most valuable pieces are the Introduction and "Commonality of Difference" chapters written by Mihesuah herself. In the opening chapter, she places each of the subsequent essays within broader contexts and concerns. For example, she explains that most works in American Indian history are "Indian history interpreted by non-Indians" because they rely solely on written records, and thus do not include Native accounts of events. Even when tribal informants are used, there are questions of whether those persons are culturally aware, or the best source of information for the particular story (pg. 1-2). Mihesuah also points out the very different reception scholarly books have received -- prestigious awards from (white) professional organizations, versus dismissal as "fiction" by the very people that are being written about (pg. 9). She also cites the lack of trained anthropologists, educators, and historians within American Indian communities (pg. 11). Novelists and poets, who are writing the bulk of Native-authored material, sometimes obscure the cultural and historical information that we all receive. Mihesuah's "Commonality of Difference," which addresses particular issues of studying American Indian women, is similarly insightful. Her main point is that researchers must not only think about class, gender, and race, but also about "tribal social systems, factionalism, culture change, physiological appearance, and personal motivations" (pg. 36). These nuances are important because women who are poorer economically might have higher social standing because of their traditional knowledge (pg. 39).

In addition to Mihesuah's chapters, I find that Elizabeth Cook-Lynn's "American Indian Intellectualism and the New Indian Story" and Laurie Anne Whitt's "Cultural Imperialism and the Marketing of Native America" are must-reads. Cook-Lynn's uncompromising stance about the destructive influence of Euro-American literary values on popular novelists and poets such as Louise Erdrich and Sherman Alexie will be difficult for some readers to accept. However, I believe her point that these authors fail to "contribute substantially to intellectual debates in defense of First Nationhood" is valid. Her comments on such writers' "excess of individualism," their focus on reservation pathology, and their disengagement from traditional culture are thought-provoking. I envision that many college instructors could facilitate fruitful (if not heated) conversations with students about whether Cook-Lynn is correct in stating that "a great deal of work done in the mixed-blood literary movement is personal, invented, appropriated, and irrelevant to First Nation status in the United States" (pg. 130). In a similar fashion, Laurie Anne Whitt's essay will likely unsettle self-described friends of Native people. She calls out archaeological excavation, the "public domain" status of traditional music, patenting of tribal medical knowledge, and many other supposedly pro-Native activities for the cultural imperialism that they are.

Some essays, such as Paula Gunn Allen's "Special Problems in Teaching Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony" and Vine Deloria's "Comfortable Fictions and the Struggle for Turf" will be more beneficial to those who have already read the authors that they reference. The lack of sufficient background information in some chapters is why I could not rate this book a "5." That said, Gunn Allen's comments about the printing of tribal religious knowledge are valuable regardless of whether one has read Silko's fiction. And while Deloria's chapter is unfortunately more of a screed against particular colleagues, his point that scholars too often believe that "the modern Indian point of view is wrong because Indians do not have the right to have a point of view when scholars know reality to be different" is a very important one (pg. 70).

Although Natives and Academics was published nearly 20 years ago, it is still relevant, especially to new scholars and writers who are concerned with ethics. Highly recommended.

[Keegan Livermore · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection of essays provides a lot of thoughts on a variety of topics regarding Indian communities, and works to show how complicated writing those thoughts can be. It does its best to show how tribal involvement and frameworks can support academic writing and research, and how the research must contribute to the community as well. I know that I am going to come back to this book often as I continue writing in my future. I am grateful to it.

[Thomas Funke · Rating 5 out of 5]

As a writer pursuing a project about Native American Trails and Portages, I want to be sensitive to the plight of the Native American & reduce as much as possible a European worldview of these ancient trails. From the beginning, I decided I want to interview Native American oral historians about their trails & history.

This book is most definitely going to be one of the top #10 books I will reference on this project, "Michigan's Almost Forgotten Trails".

[Jessica DeWitt · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of essays is a must-read. Written by eleven Indigenous scholars, the essays are focused on critiquing and calling-out problems in Native Studies scholarship. Although published in 1998, the truths written by these scholars and the issues that they bring to the forefront feel contemporary, speaking to the slow movement of change within the academy.