D'Arcy McNickle - Böcker

This is a reissue of Native American Tribalism with a new Introduction by Peter Iverson. In this book the late D'Arcy McNickle, Professor of Anthropology at the University of Saskatchewan, member of the Flathead Tribe of Montana, and founding member of the National Congress of American Indians reviews the history of almost four hundred years of contact between North American Indians and the dominant - and often domineering - Western civilization. McNickle shows that contrary to the white man's early expectations, the Indians of North America have maintained their cultural identity, social organization, size, locations of their population, and unique position before the law. He points out that even while stigmatized with the generalization of being an inferior race, harsh treatment by the white North American cultures, and severe obstacles such as epidemics of small pox, Indians have managed to remain an ethnic cultural enclave within American and Canadian society from colonial times through the present. McNickle maintains that Indians are eager to adopt knowledge and technology from the white society, but they want to fit these changes into their own culture. He argues that by emphasizing tribal self-determination, the federal government can best help Indians to modernize and achieve independence while maintaining their ancient heritage.Peter Iverson's Introduction discusses McNickle's contribution to Native American studies and provides an overview of recent events and scholarship in the field. He has also updated the appendix describing the geographical distribution of the principle tribes in the United States and Canada.

As this book opens, Archilde Leon has just returned from the big city to his father's ranch on the Flathead Indian Reservation in Montana. The story that unfolds captures the intense and varied conflicts that already characterised reservation life in 1936, when this remarkable novel was first published. Educated at a federal Indian boarding school, Archilde is torn not only between white and Indian cultures but between love for his Spanish father and his Indian mother, who in her old age is rejecting white culture and religion to return to the ways of her people. Archilde's young contemporaries meanwhile are succumbing to the destructive influence of reservation life, growing increasingly uprooted, dissolute, hopeless. Although Archilde plans to leave the reservation after a brief visit, his entanglements delay his departure until he faces destruction by the white man's law.