AIS240 Exam 3

Richard Pratt

"kill the indian, save the man"; opened an Indian school in Pennsylvania to help Indians assimilate Pratt's idea: A school to house and teach native american children hundreds of miles away from home

What the Indian Boarding Schools taught

*from slide* :boys learned useful occupations like carpentry and shoemaking while girls learned domestic service there were 'useful vocations' Girls were taught all of the skills-cooking, sewing, cleaning, laundry-that a housewife or a servant would need to know. The emphasis was on the skills necessary for a mythological family farm, not the reality of commercial agriculture as it existed in the late nineteenth century. Students would spend half of the day in classes where the curriculum emphasized the English language, practical skills, and Christianity. The boys would then spend half a day working on the school farm where they raised most of the food for the school. The girls would work in the laundry where they would not only wash all of the clothes for the school, they would also do all of the mending and other "household" chores. The goal of their education was to train the boys to be farm workers and the girls to become servants.

Relocation Act of 1956

- Definition: a United States law intended to encourage Native Americans in the United States to leave Indian reservations and their traditional lands, and to assimilate into the general population in urban areas. - Placed many Indians from many different tribes in close proximity to each other in an urban setting enabling them to create pressure groups, like the American Indian Movement (AIM) to demand and enact change to Federal Indian policy

Little Big Horn

A particularly violent example of the warfare between whites and Native Americans in the late nineteenth century, also know as "Custer's Last Stand." In two days, June 25 and 26, 1876, the combined forces of over 2,000 Sioux, Cheyenne, and Arapaho Indians defeated and killed more than 250 U.S. soldiers, including Colonel George Custer. The battle came as the U.S. government tried to compel Native Americans to remain on the reservations and Native Americans tried to defend territory from white gold-seekers. This Indian advantage did not last long, however, as the union of these Indian fighters proved tenuous and the United States Army soon exacted retribution.

The Dawes Act 1887

An act that removed Indian land from tribal possesion, redivided it, and distributed it among individual Indian families. Designed to break tribal mentalities and promote individualism. - written by henry dawes - purpose was to break up indian communalism or tribalism - took 7 years to pass - 160 acres to head of household - 80 acres to single person or orphan - 40 acres to all persons under 18 - 25 years of ownership* - Made reservation look like a checkerboard - the government wanted the access land for lumber, mining for minerals, and for immigrant farmers

Assimilated and Traditional Indians

Assimilated: they wanted Indians to leave their tribes and ways of life, and instead adopt American ways of life. Traditional: normal customs, culture, etc

Carlisle Indian Boarding School

Founded in 1879 in an abandoned army post in Pennsylvania, the goal of Carlisle was to strip all vestiges of Indian culture from the Indian students: they were to speak only English, they were to dress in the American style, they were to eat American foods, they were to worship the Christian gods, and they were to live in American-style houses.

Gertrude Bonnin

Gertrude Simmons Bonnin was a writer and Native American activist during the early years of the 20th century. She was born on the Yankton Sioux Reservation in South Dakota and attended a boarding school run by Quakers when she was young. - attended White's Indian Manual Labor Institute - an American Indian activist who was the most outspoken and critical of the government-run boarding school system, and U.S. Federal Indian Policy, and wrote several articles on these subjects that were published in the Atlantic Monthly and Harper's Weekly, during the 1910s and 1920s

Indian Reorganization Act of 1934

In 1934, this act promoted the re-establishment of tribal organization and culture. Today, more than 3 million American Indians, belonging to 500 tribes, live within the United States. The major goal was to reverse the traditional goal of assimilation of Indians into American society and to strengthen, encourage and perpetuate the tribes and their historic traditions and culture. - John Collier wrote and implemented the Act

What was the major problem the Navajo and several other tribes experienced with the Indian Reorganization Act and the Indian WPA?

Increased dependency on the U.S. government for jobs on the reservation

Indian Police

Indian tribal police are peace officers hired by those Native American tribes which have a constitutional government on reservations, as opposed to hereditary chiefs. 'Semi Sovereign Nations' - Native Americans have had informal 'policing', e.g. Cherokee 'dog soldiers' - Police on Native American Reservations are authorized by Congressional legislation from 1930s on - 'Indian police' have limited jurisdiction over people, territory and crimes - Some Native American tribes have their own police training academies, e.g., the Navajos - Indian police takes many forms, e.g., the Village Public Safety Officer program in Alaska - banishment is a traditional way of handling people without the police, or be executed

Indian Citizenship Act of 1924

Legislation that granted all American Indians the legal protection and voting rights of U.S citizens.

What is Sage used for?

Native Americans and other indigenous peoples have burned sage for centuries as part of a spiritual ritual to cleanse a person or space, and to promote healing and wisdom.

Navajo Code Talkers

Native Americans from the Navajo tribe in the Pacific used their own language to make a code for the U.S. military that the Japanese could not desipher

Greasy Grass

The Battle of the Little Bighorn, also known as Custer's Last Stand and, by the Indians involved, was an armed engagement between combined forces of Lakota, Northern Cheyenne and Arapaho people against the 7th cavalry Regiment of the United States Army

The Ghost Dance

The Ghost Dance was associated with Wovoka's prophecy of an end to white expansion while preaching goals of clean living, an honest life, and cross-cultural cooperation by Indians. Practice of the Ghost Dance movement was believed to have contributed to Lakota resistance to assimilation under the Dawes Act. - originated in the Great Basin - Wovoka was known to do the first ghost dance - the miracle of white people disappearing and buffalo returning was said to happen during the ghost dance - the ghost dance became popular because The Lakota had lost virtually everything and were now a desperate people and had nothing else to turn to to give them hope - The Indian Agent at the Pine Ridge Reservation was very nervous and concerned about the ghost dance

The Arts and Craft Act of 1936

The Indian Arts and Crafts Act is a truth-in-advertising law. It is illegal to offer or display for sale, or sell, any art or craft product in a manner that falsely suggests it is Indian produced, an Indian product, or the product of a particular Indian tribe.

Meriam Report 1928

The Meriam Report of 1928 was the first government study to demonstrate with extensive data that federal Indian policy in the 19th century had resulted in a travesty of social justice to Native Americans. This report - which showed 'paternalism' of the federal government since the passage of the Dawes Act in 1887, to be a national scandal, described the poverty and poor living conditions on the reservations, terrible disease and death rates, grossly inadequate care of the Indian children in the boarding schools, and destructive effects of the erosion of Indian land caused by the Dawes Act.

The reason for opening the first national convention of the Society of American Indian on October 12, 1911 in Columbus Ohio at The Ohio State University

To promote the good citizenship of the Indians of this country, to help in all progressive movements to this end, and to emulate the sturdy characteristics of the North American Indian, especially his honesty and patriotism. - protest over columbus day

Wounded Knee Massacre 1890

US army killed 200 in order to suppress the Ghost Dance movement, a religious movement that was the last effort of Indians to resist US invasion. Ended Native American resistance in the Great Plains

Effects of WWII on Native Americans

WWII marked a major break from the past for Native Americans. ... It marked the first time many Native Americans had left their reservations. It affected their habits, their views, and marked a change in the economic well-being of individuals - Navajo Code Talkers took place in WW2 - they decided to fight because their ancestral and home lands were within the United States and they did not want to lose those lands to the Japanese

Society of American Indians

a group of Native American Indians that worked for social justice and tried to educate americans about their way of life was the first national American Indian rights organization run by and for American Indians. The Society pioneered twentieth century Pan-Indianism, the movement promoting unity among American Indians regardless of tribal affiliation.

Sweat Lodge

a hut, typically dome-shaped and made with natural materials, used by North American Indians for ritual steam baths as a means of purification

Atlantic Monthly

a newspaper written by Henry Demarest Lloyd

Concern of the number of Indians in the Census of 1900, approximately 237,000 Indians only

only 237,00 native americans accounted for in the population of the United States - many people were concerned about the decreasing population + they started movements to 'save the indians' - Mable Dodge of Tao New Mexico was most noted progressive of the time that became involved in the 'save the indian' movement, she preserved pueblo artwork; pottery and watercolor paintings