skip to content
Neither wolf nor dog : American Indians, environment, and agrarian change Preview this item
ClosePreview this item
  • Preview this Item (Questia)

Neither wolf nor dog : American Indians, environment, and agrarian change

Author: David Rich Lewis
Publisher: New York : Oxford University Press, 1994.
Edition/Format:   Book : EnglishView all editions and formats
Summary:
During the nineteenth century, Americans looked to the eventual civilization and assimilation of Native Americans through a process of removal, reservation, and directed culture change. Underlying American Indian policy was a belief in a developmental stage theory of human societies in which agriculture marked the passage between barbarism and civilization. Solving the "Indian Problem" appeared as simple as teaching  Read more...
Rating:

(not yet rated) 0 with reviews - Be the first.

 

Find a copy in the library

Retrieving... Finding libraries that hold this item...

Details

Document Type: Book
All Authors / Contributors: David Rich Lewis
ISBN: 0195062973 9780195062977
OCLC Number: 29255850
Description: x, 240 p. : ill., maps ; 25 cm.
Contents: 1. Agriculture, Civilization, and American Indian Policy --
2. Nuciu, the Northern Ute People --
3. Agriculture and the Northern Utes --
4. Hupa, the People of Natinook --
5. Farming and the Changing Harvest Economy in Hoopa Valley --
6. Tohono O'odham, the Desert People --
7. The Tohono O'odham and Agricultural Change.
Responsibility: David Rich Lewis.
More information:

Abstract:

During the nineteenth century, Americans looked to the eventual civilization and assimilation of Native Americans through a process of removal, reservation, and directed culture change. Underlying American Indian policy was a belief in a developmental stage theory of human societies in which agriculture marked the passage between barbarism and civilization. Solving the "Indian Problem" appeared as simple as teaching Indians to settle down and farm and then disappear into mainstream American society. Such policies for directed subsistence change and incorporation had far-reaching social and environmental consequences for native peoples and native lands. This study explores the experiences of three groups - Northern Utes, Hupas, and Tohono O'odhams - with settled reservation and allotted agriculture in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Each group inhabited a different environment, and their cultural traditions reflected distinct subsistence adaptations to life in the western United States. Each experienced the full weight of federal agrarian policy yet responded differently, in culturally consistent ways, to subsistence change and the resulting social and environmental consequences. Attempts to establish successful agricultural economies ultimately failed as each group reproduced its own cultural values in a diminished and rapidly changing environment. In the end, such policies and agrarian experiences left Indian farmers economically dependent and on the periphery of American society.

Reviews

User-contributed reviews
Retrieving weRead reviews...
Retrieving GoodReads reviews...
Retrieving Amazon reviews...

Tags

Be the first.
Confirm this request

You may have already requested this item. Please select Ok if you would like to proceed with this request anyway.

Close Window

Please sign in to WorldCat 

Don't have an account? You can easily create a free account.