Overview

Spirit Wars is an exploration of the ways in which the destruction of spiritual practices and beliefs of native peoples in North America has led to conditions of collective suffering--a process sometimes referred to as cultural genocide. Ronald Niezen approaches this topic through wide-ranging case studies involving different colonial powers and state governments: the seventeenth-century Spanish occupation of the Southwest, the colonization of the Northeast by the French and British, nineteenth-century westward expansion and nationalism in the swelling United States and Canada, and twentieth-century struggles for native people's spiritual integrity and freedom. Each chapter deals with a specific dimension of the relationship between native peoples and non-native institutions, and together these topics yield a new understanding of the forces directed against the underpinnings of native cultures.

Full Product Details

Author:   Ronald Niezen ,  Kim Burgess ,  Manley Begay ,  Phyllis Fast
Publisher:   University of California Press
Imprint:   University of California Press
Dimensions:   Width: 15.20cm , Height: 1.80cm , Length: 22.90cm
Weight:   0.408kg
ISBN:  

9780520219878

ISBN 10:   0520219872
Pages:   274
Publication Date:   28 August 2000
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Out of stock  
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Table of Contents

List of Figures Preface I. Introduction 2. The Conquest of Souls The Pueblo Revolt of 1680 Epidemics and the Black Robes of New France Puritans and Praying Indians in New England Prelude to Nation Building The Pequots' Conversion to Christianity, by Kim Burgess 3. Learning to Forget Enlightenment and Evolutionism The Origins of the Indian Residential School Residential Education in Canada The Hidden Catastrophe The Way of the Dine Still Sustains Us, by Manley Begay Jr. 4* Medical Evangelism Contrasting Styles of Healing Mission Programs, Federal Intervention, and Regional Autonomy Sorrow and Forgetting Hearing Voices: Gwich'in Athabaskan Perceptions of Spirit Invasion and Recovery, by Phyllis Fast 5. The Politics of Repression The Ghost Dance Religion and the Suppression of Prophecy The Potlatch Laws The Peyote Religion and Its Enemies Transgressions of Sacred Space Native Spiritual Traditions and the Tribal State: The Oklahoma Choctaws in the Late Twentieth Century, by Valerie Long Lambert 6. The Collectors Ethnological Collecting Desecration and the Growth of Museums Bones and Spirits Repatriation Dialogue or Diatribe? Indians and Archaeologists in the Post-NAGPRA Era, by Michael Wilcox 7. Apostles of the New Age Wild Men of Ideas The Oral and the Written Invention and Authenticity Suffering and Redemption Medicine Wheelers and Dealers, by Bernard C. Perley 8. Conclusions References Cited Index

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Author Information

Ronald Niezen is Research Scholar in the History Department, University of Winnipeg, and is currently engaged in field research with the Pimicikamak Cree Nation. He has worked with a number of native communities in northern Canada and has served as a delegate to the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations.

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