I'm listening to Dee browns wonderful book on audio having read it some years ago.
Is there anyone here who can comment on the accuracy of the book, it is after all an 'indian' history. Redressing the balance to some extent I'm sure.
Can anyone point me in the direction of recommended further reading? I find this whole subject/period fascinating.

It is fascinating and quite depressing. It is also one of the most covered up issues in American history. I would bet that at least half of Americans think that we have been right about every war we have partaken in. I would like them to examine our mass slaughter of natives in our quest for dominance. 95% of all Natives died due to the European's arrival. Most of it was due to disease, and I do understand that it was impossible to predict that mass death would occur by microbial organisms carried across the sea. Nevertheless, the whole idea that it was appropriate to usurp the land from the Natives is ridiculous. I know many Americans who still defend what we did to this day. They are mindless patriots.

I know nothing about the accuracy of the book you are reading. I saw a movie based on it on HBO, which was pretty good, though.

It's an interesting one. The main criticism levelled at it is that it does not follow 'modern' academic citations and sources, but naturally, no such system for sourcing and citation existed. I would say that the author did his best to compile information from outside the official documentation, but that obviously and intentionally, he was biased towards presenting the Sioux perspective.

I haven't read it for years, and I doubt I read it particularly neutrally at the time as I'd just done a pipe ceremony with the then leader of the Sioux, Jim Callahan, and was all too sympathetic to the 'noble savage' notion.

I have a chum who teaches post-colonialism (among other things, obviously) and can almost certainly recommend some further reading. I'll ask her and report back.

Look at a author named Eve Ball.

http://www.amazon.com/Indeh-Apache-Odyssey-Eve-Ball/dp/0806121653

This is certainly an epic story, and one that has been overdone from both extremes of attitude over the years.

Wright’s What is America includes a large section on the aboriginal conflict, and will read a lot like Brown.

The Last Stand, by Philbrick, is an interesting read about General Custer and the times he lived in, and is more neutral than Wright.

Disrobing the Aboriginal Industry provides a quite different slant on things, from a modern day perspective. The authors of this book have been labeled racist, but they have some important things to say.



http://www.amazon.com/What-America-Shor ... pd_sim_b_2


http://www.amazon.com/Last-Stand-Custer ... 748&sr=1-1


http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_ ... l+industry

This is what my friend says, Smudge:

'Bury my Heart is still the classic text on the Indian wars. It's pretty solid reading (!) and clearly biased on the Indian side - on the other hand, I think history is best when the bias is easy to spot! As for other texts, the best general one of recent years is called Frontiers and is by Robert V Hine & John Mack Faragher, both very reputable academics. There is an academic version -The American West - a New Interpretive History - which is widely used in universities, but for the general reader Frontiers is the shorter version, high quality and accessible. It's about a tenner ISBN 978 0 300 13620 3.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Frontiers-Short ... 390&sr=1-2

There are of course various specialist histories e.g. of women and of childhoods on the frontier.'

Many thanks everyone!
Some very interesting looking stuff there....

Blip wrote:This is what my friend says, Smudge:

'Bury my Heart is still the classic text on the Indian wars. It's pretty solid reading (!) and clearly biased on the Indian side - on the other hand, I think history is best when the bias is easy to spot!

I find the comment about bias interesting, looking at it from my European perspective, all I see is various groups of European's who invaded and conquered another country, all be it that at the time it was not legally defined as a country. Not having read anything about this subject and therefore from a very simplistic perspective, the 'white man' was not invited and the Indians defended their territory.

Very happy to be corrected if my perception is incorrect.

pilot wrote:

Blip wrote:This is what my friend says, Smudge:

'Bury my Heart is still the classic text on the Indian wars. It's pretty solid reading (!) and clearly biased on the Indian side - on the other hand, I think history is best when the bias is easy to spot!

I find the comment about bias interesting, looking at it from my European perspective, all I see is various groups of European's who invaded and conquered another country, all be it that at the time it was not legally defined as a country. Not having read anything about this subject and therefore from a very simplistic perspective, the 'white man' was not invited and the Indians defended their territory.

Very happy to be corrected if my perception is incorrect.

My friend would agree with you absolutely, pilot: she more than shares your sympathy towards the indigenous population of any colonised country. You should hear her on imperialism! Pointing out that a text is biased doesn't mean she doesn't agree with it

Blip wrote: Pointing out that a text is biased doesn't mean she doesn't agree with it

I never liked the term bias, as it carries an implication of 'untruth' or 'inaccuracy', while I have not read the book (but am intending to if and when I have the chance) it may have been more accurate to have described it as 'from the perspective off the Indians'.

pilot wrote:

Blip wrote: Pointing out that a text is biased doesn't mean she doesn't agree with it

I never liked the term bias, as it carries an implication of 'untruth' or 'inaccuracy', while I have not read the book (but am intending to if and when I have the chance) it may have been more accurate to have described it as 'from the perspective off the Indians'.

Knowing my friend as I do, I'm sure when she used the word 'bias' she had in mind 'a partial perspective', which is pretty much what you're saying, it seems to me She would certainly recommend the text to you highly, as would I.

pilot wrote:

Blip wrote: Pointing out that a text is biased doesn't mean she doesn't agree with it

I never liked the term bias, as it carries an implication of 'untruth' or 'inaccuracy', while I have not read the book (but am intending to if and when I have the chance) it may have been more accurate to have described it as 'from the perspective off the Indians'.

The book is sub headed An Indian History of the American West so it clearly states it's point of view.

I think we could tie ourselves in knots discussing 'bias'. For example; are fundamentalist Christians bias, liars or just expressing a point of view? What about the scribes that wrote the oldest versions of what became the Old Testament? When is an 'untruth' a lie and when just a viewpoint? Let's not go there here....

History is so often told by those that win. It is important to hear the views of the losers, the beaten and abused. That does not stop me having an interest in truth and balance.

Anyway. It's a wonderful book!

smudge wrote:
Anyway. It's a wonderful book!

With such good reviews.......I had no choice but to log on ebay......I bid....I won....I wait for the postman.

I read the book years ago and I must say I found it a bloody good read.

In hindsight, it is easy to look back and see the white/aboriginal relationship as one long war of conquest for the Europeans. The conflicts took place over a period of three hundred years, a very long time. In that space, European colonists had varying views of aboriginals, and indeed of themselves. At times, natives were seen as indispensable allies in the colonial wars fought between the European powers. They were also seen, at times, as important economic partners in the fur trade, certainly in Canada at least. In the earliest days, some were simply not all that interested in native affairs, unless there was some economic advantage for being so.

Times changed when land became more important after large-scale immigration, and native nations were pushed westward. The industrial revolution was significant, because for one thing it gave Europeans the idea of progress, change of society through invention and innovation. As they could not see indigenous change coming from native societies, this fueled racist theories, conflict, and eventually an onerous form of paternalism, leading to the reservations and white administration of native groups. Whites read a lot into the idea that they were evolving, but many aboriginal groups were not, as they saw it. This theory was also convenient for those seeking new land for colonial expansion.

What happened to the Native Americans is one of the most disgraceful episodes in the history of humanity. The culture of the Plains Indians in particular is what interests me, and so much of it has been lost. Unfortunately though, these things happen and will carry on happening. Many people forget that the same thing happened when the Anglo-Saxons invaded the British Isles. The British Celtic people and culture were almost completely destroyed.... some of them survived for a time in Cornwall, Wales, Scotland and Ireland but it is the same kind of thing as what happened to the Native Americans, just not in as quick a time.

It is quite amazing really how a country that often considers itself the inventor of modern democracy and freedom is one that in just a few decades brought down an entire civilisation. I'm not singling out America, though... as I said, genocide isn't specific to a single nation.

"It is in your nature to destroy yourselves." Terminator 2: Judgement Day.

I think your analogy between the Anglo-Saxon invasion of England, and the squelching of North American Indian culture is a good one. They took place over a roughly similar time period, and my guess is that attitudes between the two people also varied quite a bit, depending on time and place. Certainly after the fall of the Roman Empire, residents of England would not have been all that up to speed about world events, and would likely have been focused on local matters. The Anglo-Saxon migrations took place over a very long time. Probably some were met on the beaches, by locals ready for combat. In other cases, some would have only been aware that others had taken up farming at a distant point, and they were not local people.

Sometimes, one cannot see the forest for the trees. Today, we can look back and see a long, long trail of brutality across a continent. But no doubt many during these times were caught up in either a cycle of violence, where personal loss outweighed anthropological thought, or an acceptance of crude and simplistic racial theories- all that was available at the time. Many whites during the nineteenth century saw a process of change and progress within their own culture, but only tribalism and conflict in aboriginal culture. This is a narrow view of course, but it was the one available to them.

Attitudes varied a lot between individuals too. Some Europeans saw natives as a noble race, living in a balance with their environment. Some aboriginals actually had no interest in the environment, and wanted the products of the industrial revolution. In the 1830’s, the Hudson’s Bay Company had to argue strenuously for less hunting of fur-bearing animals by natives, because they thought some species would be driven to extinction. Many natives were actually quite enthusiastic about industrialism, and the European style economy.

Matt H wrote:What happened to the Native Americans is one of the most disgraceful episodes in the history of humanity. The culture of the Plains Indians in particular is what interests me, and so much of it has been lost. Unfortunately though, these things happen and will carry on happening. Many people forget that the same thing happened when the Anglo-Saxons invaded the British Isles. The British Celtic people and culture were almost completely destroyed.... some of them survived for a time in Cornwall, Wales, Scotland and Ireland but it is the same kind of thing as what happened to the Native Americans, just not in as quick a time.

It is quite amazing really how a country that often considers itself the inventor of modern democracy and freedom is one that in just a few decades brought down an entire civilisation. I'm not singling out America, though... as I said, genocide isn't specific to a single nation.

"It is in your nature to destroy yourselves." Terminator 2: Judgement Day.

An interesting idea.
Not sure how accurate it is or if the analogy is very close.
Seems to me that having already suffered at the hands of other invasions the 'culture' on the British Isles would have been quite a hotch-potch already. Certainly inhabitants would have been aware of 'outside' cultures and the potential for invasion, assimilation and change. The sheer scale of the America's, the variety and breadth of American Indian culture(s) destroyed, seem to put it in a class of it's own. Though I'd certainly agree, similar events are not uncommon and remain equally tragic.

It is some measure of 'bias' when the Wounded Knee incident is referred to as the Battle at Wounded Knee where the Little Big Horn is referred to as the Massacre at Little Big Horn in early reports when in fact the terms battle and massacre should be changed over.