Provides a culturally relevant and rich introduction to contemporary issues facing Native Americans.

Most Americans know very little about Native America. For many, most of their knowledge comes from an amalgam of three sources—a barely remembered required history class in elementary school, Hollywood movies, and debates in the news media over casinos or sports mascots. This two-volume set deals with these issues as well as with more important topics of concern to the future of Native Americans, including their health, their environment, their cultural heritage, their rights, and their economic sustainability. This two-volume set is one of few guides to Native American revival in our time. It includes detailed descriptions of efforts throughout North America regarding recovery of languages, trust funds, economic base, legal infrastructure, and agricultural systems. The set also includes personal profiles of individuals who have sparked renewal, from Sheila Watt-Cloutier, a leader among the Inuit whose people deal with toxic chemicals and global warming, to Ernest Benedict and Ray Fadden, who brought pride to Mohawk children long before the idea was popular. Also included are descriptions of struggles over Indian mascots, establishment of multicultural urban centers, and ravages of uranium mining among the Navajo. The set ends with a detailed development of contemporary themes in Native humor as a coping mechanism. Delving occasionally into historical context, this set includes valuable background information on present-day controversies that are often neglected by the news media. For example, the current struggles to recover Native American trust funds and languages both emerged from a cradle-to-grave control system developed by the U.S. and Canadian governments. These efforts are part of a much broader Native American effort to recover from pervasive poverty and reassert Native American economic independence. Is gambling an answer to poverty, the new buffalo, as some Native Americans have called it? The largest Native American casino to date has been the Pequots' Foxwoods, near Ledyard, Connecticut. In other places, such as the New York Oneidas' lands in Upstate New York, gambling has provided an enriched upper class the means to hire police to force anti-gambling traditionalists from their homes. Among the Mohawks at Akwesasne, people have died over the issue. This two-volume set brings together all of these struggles with the attention to detail they have always deserved and rarely received.

Provides a culturally relevant and rich introduction to contemporary issues facing Native Americans.

Explore the vibrant Native American experience with this comprehensive and affordable historical overview of Indigenous communities and Native American life! The impact of early encounters, past policies, treaties, wars, and prejudices toward America’s Indigenous peoples is a legacy that continues to mark America. The history of the United States and Native Americans are intertwined. Agriculture, place names, and language have all been influenced by Native American culture. The stories and history of pre- and post-colonial Tribal Nations and peoples continue to resonate and informs the geographical boundaries, laws, language and modern life. From ancient rock drawings to today’s urban living, the Native American Almanac: More than 50,000 Years of the Cultures and Histories of Indigenous Peoples traces the rich heritage of indigenous people. It is a fascinating mix of biography, pre-contact and post-contact history, current events, Tribal Nations’ histories, enlightening insights on environmental and land issues, arts, treaties, languages, education, movements, and more. Ten regional chapters, including urban living, cover the narrative history, the communities, land, environment, important figures, and backgrounds of each area’s Tribal Nations and peoples. The stories of 345 Tribal Nations, biographies of 400 influential figures in all walks of life, Native American firsts, awards, and statistics are covered. 150 photographs and illustrations bring the text to life. The most complete and affordable single-volume reference work about Native American culture available today, the Native American Almanac is a unique and valuable resource devoted to illustrating, demystifying, and celebrating the moving, sometimes difficult, and often lost history of the indigenous people of America. Capturing the stories and voices of the American Indian of yesterday and today, it provides a range of information on Native American history, society, and culture. A must have for anyone interested in our America’s rich history!

An outstanding resource for contemporary American Indians as well as students and scholars interested in community and ethnicity, this book dispels the myth that all American Indians live on reservations and are plagued with problems, and serves to illustrate a unique, dynamic model of community formation. City-dwelling American Indians are part of both the ongoing ethnic history of American cities in the 20th and 21st centuries and the ancient history of American Indians. Today, more than three-quarters of American Indians live in cities, having migrated to urban areas in the 1950s because of influences such as the Termination and Relocation policy of the federal government, which was designed to end the legal status of tribes, and because of the draw of employment, housing, and educational opportunities. This book documents how North America was home to many ancient urban Indian civilizations and progresses to describing contemporary urban American Indian communities, lifestyles, and organizations. The book concentrates on contemporary urban American Indian communities and the modern-day experiences of the individuals who live within them. The authors outline urban Indian identity, relationships, and communities, drawing connections between ancient urban Indian civilizations hundreds of years ago to the activism of contemporary urban Indians. As a result, readers will gain an in-depth understanding of both ancient and contemporary urban Indian communities; comprehend the differences, similarities, and overlap between reservation and urban American Indian communities; and gain insight into the key role of urban environments in creating ethnic community identities.

This wide-ranging survey of the environmental damage to Native American lands and peoples in North America—in recent times as well as previous decades—documents the continuing impact on the health, wellness, land, and communities of indigenous peoples. Beginning in the early 1950s, Native peoples were recruited to mine "yellow dust"—uranium—and then, over decades, died in large numbers of torturous cancers. Uranium-induced cancers have become the deadliest plague unleashed upon Native peoples of North America—one with grave consequences impacting generations of American Indian families. Today, resource-driven projects such as the Keystone XL pipeline continue to put the health and safety of American Indians at risk. Authored by an expert with 40 years of experience in the subject, this book documents the environmental provocations afflicting Native American peoples in the United States: from the toll of uranium mining on the Navajos to the devastation wrought by dioxin, PCBs, and other pollutants on the agricultural economy of the Akwesasne Mohawk reservation in northernmost New York. The detailed personal stories of human suffering will enable readers to grasp the seriousness of the injustices levied against Native peoples as a result of corporations' and governments' greed for natural resources.

This book documents the lesser-known varieties of English which have been overlooked and understudied within the canon of English linguistics.