Title: The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee Pdf Native America from 1890 to the Present
"Chapter after chapter, it's like one shattered myth after another." - NPR
"An informed, moving and kaleidoscopic portrait... Treuer's powerful book suggests the need for soul-searching about the meanings of American history and the stories we tell ourselves about this nation's past.." - New York Times Book Review, front page
A sweeping history--and counter-narrative--of Native American life from the Wounded Knee massacre to the present.
The received idea of Native American history--as promulgated by books like Dee Brown's mega-bestselling 1970 Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee--has been that American Indian history essentially ended with the 1890 massacre at Wounded Knee. Not only did one hundred fifty Sioux die at the hands of the U. S. Cavalry, the sense was, but Native civilization did as well.
Growing up Ojibwe on a reservation in Minnesota, training as an anthropologist, and researching Native life past and present for his nonfiction and novels, David Treuer has uncovered a different narrative. Because they did not disappear--and not despite but rather because of their intense struggles to preserve their language, their traditions, their families, and their very existence--the story of American Indians since the end of the nineteenth century to the present is one of unprecedented resourcefulness and reinvention.
In The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee, Treuer melds history with reportage and memoir. Tracing the tribes' distinctive cultures from first contact, he explores how the depredations of each era spawned new modes of survival. The devastating seizures of land gave rise to increasingly sophisticated legal and political maneuvering that put the lie to the myth that Indians don't know or care about property. The forced assimilation of their children at government-run boarding schools incubated a unifying Native identity. Conscription in the US military and the pull of urban life brought Indians into the mainstream and modern times, even as it steered the emerging shape of self-rule and spawned a new generation of resistance. The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee is the essential, intimate story of a resilient people in a transformative era.
We all need to read.... Having grown up the rancher's son on stolen native land just miles from Wounded Knee and what now maybe the poorest reservation in America, I greatly appreciate the historic recap and the hope of Treuer's vision. Buy an extra copy and donate it to your local library.... the least we can do in an act of truth and reconciliation.The Most Important Book I Have Ever Read "The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee" is a path-breaking work on the Native American experience. It is actually much more than the title suggests because the first 100 pages explore Indian life before 1890. It is also far more than just a dry history book. Treuer takes us foraging for pine cones and hunting for clams while interviewing colorful family members and acquaintances.Countless books have recounted the tragedies experienced by Native Americans at the hands of Europeans and Americans, but few have told the story like "Heartbeat." For starters, Treuer holds Native Americans responsible for their own share of tragedy inflicted on themselves, whether through inter-tribal wars or self-destructive behavior. Yet even in the darkest times, Tueuer reminds us of Native Americans' resiliency: "We're still here!"After 1890 (Wounded Knee), many of the hardships experienced by Native Americans were based on the good intentions of Christians and the American government. I grew up near Sherman Indian High School (Riverside, CA) without knowing anything about Native American boarding schools. Education and job training were worthy goals, but they came at the cost of strained/broken family ties and cultural genocide. Even the best run schools would punish children who spoke in their native languages. I was shocked that the first Native American would not be admitted to U.C. Berkeley until 1968 (p. 300).One of the key insights I learned from "Heartbeat" is that the turning point for Native Americans came when they embraced the most powerful weapon of all: The rule of law. They slowly learned to read the fine print of the treaties and documents they were asked/forced to sign and began to demand their rights. The first American presidents to get Native American policy right were Lyndon Johnson and (surprisingly) Richard Nixon.Treuer devotes the final 200 pages to how Native Americans have taken advantage of sovereignty and self-determination to lift themselves up and rediscover their cultures. Indeed, Treuer himself represents the first generation to grow up under this system. I now understand "Indian casinos" in a whole new light. "Heartbeat" concludes by presenting a compelling case for adopting an inclusive definition of what it means to be Native American in the 21st century. This definition also strikes at the heart of America's identity.My only complaint is that I wish the book had been longer. The Economist's review suggests that the pre-1890 section of "Heartbeat" is boring, but I found it fascinating. The sections on the tribes in each region of the U.S. could easily become stand-alone chapters. For example, the Cherokee merit more attention. I knew about the Trail of Tears, but I did not know that they use their own alphabet until I visited their ancestral lands in North Carolina. It would also be great if there were maps showing the distribution of tribes in 1700 and today.I the meantime, I can only hope Treuer's insights will be incorporated into all future American school textbooks.Changing the Narrative of Native History Indian history is often taught to young Americans as an unmitigated tragedy. The once proud stewards of the Americas being gradually decimated by disease and conquest. The last stand of the Indian, at Wounded Knee, is symbolic of this history. Women, children and soldiers all cut down by the rapacious white man. Since then Indians have been content to live out such lives as they can on poverty stricken reservations.Except, as native historian David Treuer points out, this simple narrative couldn’t be farther from the truth. Just as Christian Europe once tended to view Jewish history as, for all intents and purposes, one of mere sorrow and wandering after the rejection of Christ, twentieth and twenty-first century Indian history has been mis-told and misrepresented by European Americans.With a certain edginess to it, Treuer recounts it all: from attempts at forced assimilation in schools to the violent uprisings at Alcatraz and other locales in the sixties. What unfolds is a story of, not only survival, but adaption along with a strong desire to preserve traditional ways.And what emerges is a modern people, or peoples, who are not mere victims but proud heirs of a tradition which has endured far longer than the American republic.Treuer does this by weaving history and anecdote. The history, though it does come to some new conclusions such as that the Machiavellian treaty practices of the American government have been too little stressed in the narrative of how Natives lost their land, is written for popular consumption. A fortiori are the anecdotal accounts of modern Natives interwoven throughout the text.So, though written for the general public and not the professional historian, I cannot help but feel that Treuer wants his book to change the way Native history is taught in America. And, even more, how European Americans view their fellow Native American citizens.The Native tradition, or traditions, is not just a tale of many tears. It is a millennia old tale of adaption, transformation and resistance that continues into the present. If the typical reader walks away with a sense that Native Americans are not to be pitied or looked at as our unfortunate victims, I think the author will have achieved his purpose.Written with elegant but non-technical prose, The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee is an excellent introduction to the Native experience. A must read for those, like myself, who are unacquainted with Native American history since their schooldays.
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