The Contributions Of The American Indian To Civilization

This book details the often overlooked role that Native Americans played in shaping modern society. From agriculture to medicine, architecture to philosophy, the American Indian's influence can be seen in every aspect of our daily lives. Alexander Francis Chamberlain's work examines this impact and provides an important reminder of the debt we owe to America's indigenous peoples. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Describes the lives and achievements of American Indians and discusses their contributions to the world.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Discusses Native American commerce, transportation and wars, including land and water transportation, weapons and armor, and traders.

An utterly compelling story of how the cultural, social, and political practices of Native Americans transformed the way life is lived throughout the world, with a new introduction by the author “As entertaining as it is thoughtful . . . Few contemporary writers have Weatherford’s talent for making the deep sweep of history seem vital and immediate.”—The Washington Post After 500 years, the world’s huge debt to the wisdom of the Native Americans has finally been explored in all its vivid drama by anthropologist Jack Weatherford. He traces the crucial contributions made by the Native Americans to our federal system of government, our democratic institutions, modern medicine, agriculture, architecture, and ecology, and in this astonishing, ground-breaking book takes a giant step toward recovering a true American history.

Discusses the many important contributions made by the Indians of North and South America to civilization throughout the world.

For more than a hundred years, outsiders enamored of the perceived strengths of American Indian cultures have appropriated and distorted elements of them for their own purposes—more often than not ignoring the impact of the process on the Indians themselves. This book contains eight original contributions that consider the selling of American Indian culture and how it affects the Native community. It goes beyond studies of “white shamanism” to focus on commercial ventures, challenging readers to reconsider how Indian cultures have been commercialized in the twentieth century. Some selections examine how Indians have been displayed to the public, beginning with a “living exhibit” of Cocopa Indians at the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition and extending to contemporary stagings of Indian culture for tourists at Tillicum Village near Seattle. Other chapters range from the Cherokees to Puebloan peoples to Indians of Chiapas, Mexico, in an examination of the roles of both Indians and non-Indian reformers in marketing Native arts and crafts. These articles show that the commercialization and appropriation of American Indian cultures have been persistent practices of American society over the last century and constitute a form of cultural imperialism that could contribute to the destruction of American Indian culture and identity. They offer a means toward understanding this complex process and provide a new window on Indian-white interactions. CONTENTS Part I: Staging the Indian 1. The “Shy” Cocopa Go to the Fair, Nancy J. Parezo and John W. Troutman 2. Command Performances: Staging Native Americans at Tillicum Village, Katie N. Johnson and Tamara Underiner 3. Savage Desires: The Gendered Construction of the American Indian in Popular Media, S. Elizabeth Bird 4. “Beyond Feathers and Beads”: Interlocking Narratives in the Music and Dance of Tokeya Inajin (Kevin Locke), Pauline Tuttle Part II: Marketing the Indian 5. “The Idea of Help”: White Women Reformers and the Commercialization of Native American Women’s Arts, Erik Trump 6. Saving the Pueblos: Commercialism and Indian Reform in the 1920s, Carter Jones Meyer 7. Marketing Traditions: Cherokee Basketry and Tourist Economies, Sarah H. Hill 8. Crafts, Tourism, and Traditional Life in Chiapas, Mexico: A Tale Related by a Pillowcase, Chris Goertzen