Best native american & aboriginal biographies according to redditors
We found 213 Reddit comments discussing the best native american & aboriginal biographies. We ranked the 62 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
Yes, but the word "contact" in this context has a different meaning than you are thinking. It's confusing, but when referencing indigenous peoples "uncontacted" really means "without an established relationship with modern society." It also is applied only on an individual level, which causes strange statements, such as saying that half the members of a tribe are "uncontacted" while the other half are "contacted." Many of the people listed in the wikipedia article have been studied thoroughly. Calling the Yanomami "uncontacted" is ludicrous by any conventional sense of the word. Not only have multiple anthropologists lived with them and then published books about them; Yanomami themselves have published books.
There are pretty much no people in the world today that actually are what you think of when you hear "uncontacted."
I''ve always found it funny that historically, Sioux Native Americans called black people "Black Wasichu" because they only ever saw them with white people. Wasichu is their word for "White Person", so Black Wasichu effectively means "Black White Person"
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Edit: Source, for those interested in Native history. (Great read)
For those who enjoy history, I'm currently reading his book
I couldn't recommend it more.
I can't tell you what tribe the declaration of independence was referring to, but Empire of the Summer Moon does a good job of describing the atrocities of the Comanche.
https://www.amazon.com/Empire-Summer-Moon-Comanches-Powerful/dp/1416591060
In addition to the many rape stories as well as the killing of children, there were others like how they would cut your eyelids off and tie you down on your back staring into the summer sun until you baked to death.
Empire of the Summer Moon goes into a little about Comanche shields shrugging off bore from Kentucky rifles. I think a lot of it had to do with the angle of the shields and the speed in which the Comanche struck. They never had to deal with a volley of 100 shots in one direction, often they were circling around their opponents who were in free fire mode and scared out of their wits. But they were effective.
I’ve been reading an amazing book about Polynesian settlement. You should check it out. It’s fascinating and a really good read. The problem is it’s led to a google earth and Wikipedia binge where I’ve learned about islands formed by a god doing goatse to captain cook to the physics of sailing and now I’m ready to leave my family and buy a sailboat.
If you're willing to do some digging, you might want to contact the
Department of American Indian Studies
at University of Washington. If anyone knows of good resources for you, they will. That teach that stuff for a living and they know so much they even offer Masters Degrees in American Indian Studies.
I know there's quite a few books on the Native Americans of Washington state. A simple search of Amazon.com should locate them. University library librarian can locate such books too. Public library not likely to have much but might have a book or two on Pacific Northwest Indians.
Finally, Google search results for "Duwamish Tribe"
History page on Duwamish Tribe website (contact info there too).
Wikipedia page on the Duwamish.
Browsing Amazon turns up these books;
Chief Leschi, War Chief of the Battle of Seattle and the Puget Sound War, 1855–56
Native Seattle: Histories of the Crossing-Over place
Chief Seattle and the Town that Took his Name
The Indians of Puget Sound: The Notebooks of Myron Eels (eyewitness accounts of Indian life from 1874-1907)
The Mythology of Southern Puget Sound: Legends Shared by Tribal Elders
Cynthia Ann Parker was the daughter of White settlers on the Texas frontier in the early 1800s. Her family had built a fort in Central Texas, where the Comanches had massacred them. I think most of the Whites were killed. She was taken hostage as an eleven year old girl in 1836.
When the Comanches took her in, she was treated with about as much respect as a foreign invading hostage could possibly have. She was raised as a daughter by the couple she was given to, and when she grew up she became the wife of Peta Nocona, one of the more powerful war leaders. She pretty much lost all of her original White culture and very much became assimilated as a Comanche. For years, decades, the Texans were trying to find her.
Eventually after Peta's death in the Battle of Pease River she was recaptured (as an adult) by the Texas Rangers, where she was returned to her birth family, her uncle Isaac Parker. She did not adjust well at all and several times tried to flee back to the wilderness. Eventually she went on a hunger strike and died in the 1870s. Her son Quanah Parker became very well known and has a small town in North Texas named after him (Quanah, TX).
Ninja edit: Empire of the Summer Moon, by S.C. Gwynne goes into much detail about her, as well as the general story of Texas and the Comanches during that time period. Great book, I recommend it.
Unfortunately the best histories written about Seattle are getting so old they are becoming a part of history themselves. Here are a couple of more recent additions:
Chief Seattle and the Town That Took His Name
Too High Too Steep: Reshaping Seattle's Topography
This guy's story is really interesting. Parker's Fort, where his mother was captured and the rest of his family slaughtered, is a well kept state park. There was a book written about him, Empire of the Summer Moon, that was a Pulitzer finalist and great read. You can't imagine the violence and turbulence in his world as the Comanche fought the Anglos and Spanish/Mexicans.
Code Talker: The First and Only Memoir By One of the Original Navajo Code Talkers of WWII by Chester Nez et al. http://www.amazon.com/dp/0425247856/ref=cm_sw_r_udp_awd_0gV5tb1RX85FQ
You should check out this book: http://www.amazon.com/Empire-Summer-Moon-Comanches-Powerful/dp/1416591060
I had a customer recommend it to me. I've only gotten a few chapters in, but it's pretty well written and I'm liking it.
According to the book Empire of the Summer Moon, during the American Civil War the Western Frontier was actually pushed back quite a bit because the soldiers that had been guarding it were called back East to fight the civil war and the Plains Indians seized the opportunity to take back some of their land. So yes, going West at the time likely would have sent you into a different line of fire.
While the exact same scenario is for obvious reasons unlikely in a hypothetical American Civil War 2, it isn't hard to imagine various warlords and militant groups arising to fill the power vacuum in remote areas. The Taliban and ISIS both pretty much started out that way.
"Empire of the Summer Moon" is a great read about her and her son, the last tribal leader of the Comanche
Edit: here's the link, I'm on mobile and can't figure out the high-speed way to rename links... https://www.amazon.com/dp/1416591060/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_Mr50xbSRZVZCR
Check this book out. Camanches were gnarly
Some suggestions:
Oral History/Stories
Historical/Educational material
Native Authors
Non-Native Authors
Region Specific
And just for fun, a Movie
Feel free to point out any mistakes, I'll add more should I think of them.
These are just suggestions.
It's been a long time since I read Black Elk Speaks. It's not fiction, but I still remember it as a great book. It's short and well worth the time. http://www.amazon.com/Black-Elk-Speaks-Oglala-Premier/dp/1438425406/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1292062391&sr=8-1.
The Tony Hillerman series already mentioned is a good book (at least the first one) and a a light read in the mystery and detective vein.
Both of these are books that were in the syllabus of a Native American Literature class I took and the only two I can remember off the top of my head.
Most but not all. There are some really interesting stories about the encroachment of settlers on Comancheria in this book which tells of the last great Indian tribe that went up against the white settlers.
Afaik the Ohlone didn't raise any domesticated animals. Source: The Ohlone Way https://www.amazon.com/Ohlone-Way-Indian-Life-Francisco-Monterey/dp/0930588010
I'm in law school-
All in all, it's a long and arduous journey, so best of luck to you.
Actually... the Northeast tribes were fairly peaceful compared to the west. Now once we go out west and you get to the Sioux. They would fuck your shit up and torture and flay you to death thinking that the way you died was the way you spent the rest of your life in 'Happy Hunting Grounds'.
So in turn the westerners all fully freaked out would lash out against all tribes peaceful or not. Its what would happen to palestine and israel if the international community looked away for a decade. The animosity was so horrific that frontiersman would cut out indian womens lady parts to make tobacco pouches. That is how much hatred they had for the Sioux! I am NOT claiming that Native Americans were hippy tree huggers. That crap is realm of popular myth. What colonists and later US government did in turn to the native tribes was far worse than anything they did to us.
EDIT: spelling, etc.
Source; http://www.amazon.com/Heart-Everything-That-Untold-American/dp/1451654685/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1462407668&sr=8-1&keywords=red+cloud
EDIT: If you will Indulge me I just wanted to say that the book on Red Cloud was amazing and I really enjoyed it. I am incredibly impressed at the ability of Red Cloud to choose to bend later in life than sacrifice his people. The PBS series We Shall Remain is excellent as well, but the book on Red Cloud held nothing back.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Heart-Everything-That-Is/dp/1451654669
Oglala Sioux were very tough on their enemies.
I've just finished an incredible book of a man I knew nothing of but found fascinating. It was Quanah Parker and focused on his people (the Comanches) who were among the biggest and most violent tribes of all. They constantly fought with almost any other tribe and were among the first to truly master the horse.
https://www.amazon.ca/Empire-Summer-Moon-Comanches-Powerful/dp/1416591060
A great read and exactly what you're asking about, is covered in this book.
>Native Americans in California's Bay Area only had to hunt / gather a few hours a week given the abundance of the environment, and spent the rest of the time doing stuff you and I would do if we didn't have to work so hard.
You wouldn't happen to own a copy of The Ohlone Way, by any chance?
Allan W Eckert has a lot of great books. Some historical fiction, but very accurate from what I've heard. Not only about Native Americans themselves, but also of the frontiersmen who interacted with them. Being from SW Ohio, the subjects about which he writes are very close close to where I live, which adds another layer of interest.
A few of my favorites are:
Blue Jacket: War Chief of the Shawnee https://www.amazon.com/dp/1931672202/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_VRCDCb25ES80X
A Sorrow in Our Heart: The Life of Tecumseh https://www.amazon.com/dp/055356174X/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_WSCDCb0REGDMA
The Frontiersmen: A Narrative https://www.amazon.com/dp/0945084919/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_OTCDCbV1AJ3VN
My favorite non-fiction book of all time is Empire of the Summer Moon. Early Texas history and Native American history at its finest.
Empire of the Summer Moon
Great book about this sort of thing.
LG Bible and the corresponding Workbook. Really focus on learning how to break them down, not on the time, because if you don't understand the problems there's no way you're going to finish them quickly.
Once you feel more confident about it, use the released exams as practice, especially the most recent ones. You can buy them in bundles on Amazon, or get them individually from LSAC. Don't just extrapolate your grade, actually try to figure it out.
I REALLY wish this was the highest comment, because everyone in this thread would love Empire of the Summer Moon. It reads a lot like science fiction. When the colt revolver emerges it feels like something Tony Stark invented.
It. Is. A. Must. Read.
I read this book once.
I would recommend Encounters with Star People by Ardy Sixkiller Clarke. Amazing collection of American Indian stories, spanning multiple generations.
Nazi Germany and Mussolini's Italy were fascist, not communist.
The USSR and China called themselves communist but I don't think they actually were. Kind of like the United States calls itself a representative democracy but it is actually neither. Both were totalitarian regimes which implemented very violent forced collectivization. If we were living in Russia or China 50 years ago, I too would argue that we should be resisting what was being called communism. Today, both are thoroughly capitalist regimes.
The history of what has happened in the United States is very different. Rather than forced collectivization, we had the very violent allotment programs which forced native american tribes to split up collectively owned land into segmented private property: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dawes_Act
The result was devastating and ended up in the majority of that land passing from native american to european hands. Tribal understandings of collective ownership could be considered successful instances of communism. One reason I am not a Marxist is because he was eurocentric, and called these kinds of societies "primitive" while arguing that they needed to pass through feudalism and capitalism to reach communism.
One example of tribal societies which resembled communism is the Ohlone prior to european colonization. Their value system strongly emphasized the importance of the common good and strongly discouraged being rich (social status was gained not by having wealth, but by giving it away). This is a good book about them: http://www.amazon.com/The-Ohlone-Way-Indian-Francisco-Monterey/dp/0930588010/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1375510482&sr=8-1&keywords=the+ohlone+way
Cuba and Venezuela have both have their problems, but there have been many upsides to their experiments with communism. Cuba has amazing health care and things have gotten better since the communist revolution. The U.S. and its capitalist elite are pulling the strings, not cuba or venezuela. In a global context, U.S. imperialism is a much bigger issue: http://news.rapgenius.com/Hugo-chavez-remarks-at-the-un-general-assembly-sept-2006-lyrics. And the conspiracies which circulate around Cuba and Venezuela that concern me are ones like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods and this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_Venezuelan_coup_d'%C3%A9tat_attempt, not the fact that they call themselves communist.
This is how I feel about North Korea as well. The regime is obviously terrible, but the fact that a dynastic dictatorship wraps itself in the mantle of communism does not mean there is a communist conspiracy or that we should be resisting communism. I think that in whatever capacity we are resisting regimes like Cuba, Venezuela, and North Korea, we should not be resisting their communist leanings but their undemocratic nature. Today, the zapatistas in mexico are a good example of a living communist experiment which also resists the state.
I am totally with anyone who does not want to see the institution of a regime like the ussr or communist china in the united states, i just think it's totally ridiculous that these cold war spectres that resemble totalitarianism far more than communism continue to discourage identification w/ communism, ESPECIALLY because I have yet to see any evidence that there are closet communists pulling the strings today.
The fusion of state and corporation far more closely resembles fascism than democratic communism. I am a communist second, and a democrat first. I am very wary of the dangers of a revolutionary vanguard taking over and instituting a totalitarian regime, a la: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hgVWGWKjDDU.
That's why this is the system I advocate, which I believe avoids the problems of totalitarian co-option of communism as well as of revolutionary vanguards: http://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/1jfhcd/national_impeach_obama_day_set_for_august_6th/cbebxsx
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P.S. I'm still interested to hear what you think about the possibility that Alex Jones is a CIA double agent. OWNtheNWO has continued to ignore my request to enter /r/conspiracyv2, and like you he ignored my pm inquiring into his opinion regarding alex jones = CIA double agent conspiracy theories. I even deleted my post in /r/conspiracy which claimed that /r/conspiracyv2 was a conspiracy (due to being secret and private, which seems antithetical to what /r/conspiracy is about) in order to placate him, but that didn't seem to get anywhere. Since the only claim I made was that Alex Jones might be a double agent whose goal is to cause conspiracy theorists to lean rightwards by combining disinformation and strategic silence along with legit conspiracy theories, this seems pretty relevant to the discussion we're having right now. I've been going back and forth on this a lot, and still haven't made up my mind. Thoughts?
Turns out my community college has a fuckton of books about American Indians.
Empire of the Summer Moon is very engaging and very disturbing. There's a copy of The Great Father I want to dive into when I have a month or so of free time. Plus a bunch of assorted books about assorted peoples (Very little on the Shoshone though.)
I'm reading Gwynne's book Empire of the Summer Moon about Cynthia Ann and Quanah Parker and the Comanche tribes in Texas. Astonishing and captivating read for those interested in early Texas history.
To begin with, I'll tell you my methods are regarded by my friends as unorthodox.
I began with going online onto a blog which had some LSAT questions. I got like 3/5 right, and I was like fuck, what have I gotten myself into? I'm poor, so I immediately decided to study on my own. I bought this, this, and this. After taking like ten tests, I decided to spring for the Logical Reasoning Bible and Logic Games Bible. Overall, I read through those two bibles from cover to cover doing the exercises through and through, not trying to cheat myself of any material. I did it for a month, cause that's all the time I had, but I wish I had spent at least a month and a half. That consisted of four hours of studying (three of which were taking a diagnostic and re-checking wrong answers and another one or two reading the bibles) every day on the weekdays and six or seven on the weekends with no breaks.
I've heard Kaplan is shit. A good friend of mine took Blueprint, and did really well his second time, but knowing him, he would have done so studying himself. If you're going to be using the prep books, I recommend, if you can, doing so at least three months in advance of the June test. The thing is that if you fuck up, you wanna retake Sep/Oct as opposed to retaking Dec. Because admissions are rolling, you're at a huge disadvantage having your app done in December. So your 11th year around March is when you wanna start looking at it. April and May would have to be intense but seeing as finals can be around that time, I would suggest February and March.
In the end, whatever works for you. Just know that Dec applicants are at a huge disadvantage compared to October ones. Also, I was told by students in the admission committee that they look for students who've taken time off after their undergrad. Cal's ratio is 60% who haven't and 40% who have, so keep that in mind. I went straight, because I didn't trust myself.
This is the best book about those times that I've ever read.
Cynthia Ann Parker's son was Quanah Parker. The John Wayne movie The Searchers was either 'loosely based' or 'suggested by' the Parker kidnapping, depending on how you want to view the movie.
I'm currently reading 'Empire of the Summer Moon' by S.C. Gwynne. Read the blurb here to see what it's about - it's really interesting and I'm loving it.
>it's just surreal that the natives of this land only gained the right to vote in it less than one century ago and it's kind of sickening to think about how archaic this time is.
I don't want to look like I'm forming a pity party, but the Civil Rights Movement didn't really help out Indian Country. We had to have our own round of protests and fighting in the 1970s. Check out the American Indian Movement, the Occupation of Alcatraz Island and especially the Alcatraz Proclamation, among others. What really stunning is that the American Indian Religious Freedom Act didn't come about until 1978, let alone the fact that they had to pass it at all!
>Are there any books, movies, or another form of media that are true stories or realistic fiction that depict American Indians in a way that you find to be interesting and faithful?
Anything by Vine Deloria, Jr. is awesome, although he is more historian and scientist than he is story-teller. A short list of my favorites:
If you want to read some great fiction that depicts American Indians accurately, start with Sherman Alexie:
Outside of those authors, some popular picks are Black Elk Speaks and Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee.
As far as movies go, any self-respecting Indian has seen the movie Smoke Signals dozens of times. Powwow Highway is a favorite of mine, and Dance Me Outside is movie gold, although it doesn't get enough attention.
>I'm thinking - why hasn't HBO or some big network done a drama that focuses on American Indians? This could be a very interesting book, as well... Or is this idea something even somewhat appealing to you as a young American Indian?
I'm not sure what you are thinking, but I have my own ideas. I'd like to see a series that focuses on a single reservation for each episode, and details the hardships that the people of that reservation deal with on a daily basis. Call it a pity party, but there are children in the United States right now that live in houses with dirt floors and sleep on pallets and go to school on 30-year-old school buses on unkempt dirt roads (and sometimes off-road) where they learn a curriculum outdated for a decade or more........ I can go on and on. Get in your car and drive to Pine Ridge Reservation RIGHT NOW, you'll be convinced that you walked into a third world country in the middle of a war. Its not pretty. The corruption in the tribal government needs to be put in the spotlight, and the part that the Federal and State governments have played in this tragedy need to be righted. That's the facts.
May I recommend The Ohlone Way? heart-warming and gut-wrenching. Also very inspiring.
Hey there, /u/Apollo_Manton. Honestly, I think some of the people in this thread are being a bit dickish, so I'm going to try to provide you with a satisfactory answer and some resources.
So I guess I would start by saying that asking for a summary of "Native American Spirituality" is similar to asking for "Asian Spirituality," in that you can have hundreds of different spiritual views existing on a single continent. Asian spiritualites include ideas from India, China, the Middle East (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all technically come from Asia), indigenous cultures in eastern Russia, Tibetans, and hundreds of others. Native American spirituality can be thought of as even more broad, because America is two continents, while Asia is really just two thirds of one continent (considering Europe is in Asia). That's first of all.
Having said all that, there are certain common themes which can be found in a great deal of indigenous cultures around the world, not only in the Americas but also in Australia, Asia, Africa, and even in Europe before the Neolithic invasions. Some of these themes include respect for the Earth; respect for humans, other animals, and plants; and taking only what is needed.
If you are interested in the subject, I have several books to recommend. The first is called Circle of Life: Traditional Teachings of Native American Elders by James David Audlin. If you don't read any other books, read that one. It is excellent, and is one of my personal favorite books, not only on this subject but in general. It's well-written, readable, informative, and enjoyable. Audlin (also known as Distant Eagle) has Lakota heritage, but is also familiar with Cherokee and several other indigenous spiritual traditions. In addition to that, he is quite familiar with several Asian religions, including Christianity (he is an ordained minister), Judaism and Islam, and he frequently draws comparisons between native spirituality and newcomer religions.
If you search for this book on Amazon, there is a newer edition called "Circle of Life: A Memoir of Traditional Native American Teachings." I recommend the older edition, because it is shorter, somewhat clearer and more accessible.
There is another book called The Wisdom of the Native Americans, by Kent Neburn. This book is much shorter, an easy read, and is almost entirely quotes from famous Indians in the eighteenth, nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries. It's worth looking through, and will give you a very good summary of the native worldview. There is an entire chapter dedicated to the difference between native spirituality and Christianity which is quite good.
Another book I recommend is The Other Side of Eden, by Hugh Brody. Brody is a Canadian anthropologist who lives for several years with different indigenous groups in Canada, including the Inuit. This book is partially about his experiences, but is also about the history of humanity and how it relates to the story of Adam and Eve in the bible. It does a great job documenting the differences - and the relationship - between Christianity and indigenous spirituality during the European invasion. I recommend it because it is good, and because it will provide you with a broad perspective on human history that few people have, even among the educated.
One more book is Conversations with God, by Neale Donald Walsch. While not directly about native spirituality, it gives an excellent overview of spirituality in general, and is worth a read if you are interested in those topics. It is far more compatible with indigenous philosophies than with the Abrahamic religions, and it provides a refreshing and reasonable approach to the concept of God.
Finally, I recommend this YouTube video, Toby Hemenway: Redesigning Civilization with Permaculture. Permaculture is a design technique that was developed in Australia in the 1970s, but was largely inspired by the success of indigenous cultures before the European invasions. In this video, Hemenway gives a general overview of the historical and agricultural differences between Native America and Europe, and it's an enjoyable lecture.
As far as your second question, which asks for a basic description of beliefs and worldview, it's not really possible to reduce it to a basic description, just like you probably wouldn't be able to give a basic description of the Bible or the Quran in a few paragraphs. The best description available for that, in my opinion, is Audlin's book, Circle of Life. Any short description anybody can give here will not do justice to the rich traditions and philosophies that made up the various spiritual ideologies of the peoples who thrived in this continent before Columbus's arrival.
And having said all of that, I will try to give the best summary I can of native spirituality.
First, comes the idea of respect. Respect is the cornerstone of functional living. If you respect others, they will respect you. This goes not only for other humans of all nations, but for non-humans of the other nations, too - the dog nations, the fish nations, the bird nations, the plant nations, and so on. The spirit, my spirit, your spirit, whoever's spirit, does not die, but changes form. Reincarnation is very much a thing. The spirits of the grandparents are in the great-grandchildren, that kind of thing. Respect for all of life is a great priority. Respect does not necessarily mean do not kill, but it does mean, be thankful for the gifts given to you by members of other nations.
It's a lot more complex than you might think. I'm not an expert by any means, but it's worth reading some history books to learn more. One I just read that was very interesting was Empire of the Summer Moon
>I think it goes back a lot further than that. I don't know where he gets his data, but Steven Pinker argues that this is possibly the most peaceful time ever. Article
I had a feeling that Pinker was going to rear his head sooner or later.
The thing about it is that Pinker is a cognitive scientist, not a historian and certainly not an anthropologist.
The data he used to support this claim is as worst fabricated (Ancient Greece, Rome) and at best cherry picked (the data relating to violent deaths later).
He relies heavily upon the controversial work of the anthropologist Napoleon Chagnon, and he is only second to the uncritical accepting of Chagnon's findings about the Yanomami to Chagnon himself. Chagnon's work is still hotly disputed. Even a Yanomami shaman has written a book partly in response to Chagnon's work.
The thing about it is that total war is a modern phenomenon, and prior to that the closest we came to it was the imperial wars - Chinese, Mongolian, Ottoman, Persian etc. - colonization, and the Crusades/reconquista etc., but even so that only goes so far back as agriculture and human settlement.
I enjoyed reading....
https://www.amazon.com/Heart-Everything-That-Untold-American/dp/1451654669
Quanah Parker.
An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
Osceola and the Great Seminole War: A Struggle for Justice and Freedom by Thom Hatch
I've personally become very interested in the Pueblo Revolt of 1680 which ended colonial occupation of native lands in New Mexico for a period of 12 years. Here's a short article on it from the Magazine of the National Endowment for the Humanties and here is a podcast from r/askhistorians briefly covering the subject AskHistorians Podcast 038 - Pueblo Revolt of 1680. I've just ordered a copy of [The Pueblo Revolt of 1680: Conquest and Resistance in Seventeenth-Century New Mexico](https://www.amazon.com/Pueblo-Revolt-1680-Resistance-Seventeenth-Century/dp/B0118255A8/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1477984977&sr=8-2-fkmr0&keywords=Knaut%2C+Andrew+L.+The+Pueblo+Revolt+of+1680%2C+Norman%3A+University+of+Oklahoma+Press%2C+1995.+14.](https://www.amazon.com/Pueblo-Revolt-1680-Resistance-Seventeenth-Century/dp/B0118255A8/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1477984977&sr=8-2-fkmr0&keywords=Knaut%2C+Andrew+L.+The+Pueblo+Revolt+of+1680%2C+Norman%3A+University+of+Oklahoma+Press%2C+1995.+14.)
"This site contains the entire English translation of the The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, originally compiled and edited by Reuben Gold Thwaites and published by The Burrows BrothersCompany, Cleveland, throughout the latter part of the nineteenth century. Each file represents the total English contents of a single published volume. The original work has facing pages in the original French, Latin or Italian, depending on the author." - Quote from linked site
The Jesuit Journals are very biased and full of ignorant assumptions on the part of the missionaries but also offer a glimpse of what they saw when they arrived and how things went (from their perspective of course).
I've missed many other amazing and probably obvious choices but these are just some that I personally find particularly interesting or informative. I hope you, and I, get some good leads for more reading material.
Edit: fixed link
Yeah, I would have said that it's absolutely worth it if you did the JD-MEM from the start, since I think you can finish that in three years. Another thing to consider is that your entire first-year law curriculum is going to be completely unrelated to environmental law, which I could see being frustrating for someone who's more interested in the policy side. The environmental law course offerings were pretty impressive, though.
Getting a high score on the LSAT is harder for some people than it is for other people. I would suggest taking a timed practice test as a diagnostic, just to get a feel for your starting point and your weak areas. After that, all I did was take a bunch of practice tests. I also went through this book, which was incredibly helpful for the logic games. Once I got the system down, I almost never missed a games question. It has been a while since I took the test, though, so I'm sure there are people here who have taken it more recently who could give you better advice.
I think that is largely correct. My sense is that the criticisms of Ohler's book also criticized his tone and the potential negative impact his would could have. Polemic doesn't often foster dialogue.
Other common criticisms of popular history are that it often fails to credit the work of academics and that it is often incorrect or not very nuanced. For example, Empire of the Summer Moon is a very popular book about the Comanche nation. Many of the main points had very recently in the extensively researched and truly brilliant book Comanche Empire. Moreover, Empire of the Summer Moon included inaccuracies that would likely have been caught during the editing of an academic book.
There are academics who see the value of popular history writing because it can so effectively share important material to a general readership. Guns, Germs, and Steel is an example of a book some academics admire. I read it and 1491 because a professor I respected recommended them.
Full disclosure, I'm an academic who works in cultural history and literature. I think about these issues a lot. I'm glad to see them discussed in a wide open forum.
Here are all the local Amazon links I could find:
amazon.co.uk
amazon.ca
amazon.com.au
amazon.in
amazon.de
amazon.it
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Black Elk Speaks by John Neihardt.
Interesting account of Native American spiritualism by a Lakota medicine man.
Because your "points" are ridiculous.
Their central argument is that they DO have more claim to that land than the people trying to run an oil pipeline through it. Why? Because they were there first. So you're "point" about legality is absurd.
They also protest because they drink the water that will get poisoned by the pipeline. They have a real stake in not having polluted water, far more than the people who will profit from it.
Finally, they protest at the site of the pipeline to prevent it from getting built. They know, as does anyone with common sense, that protesting at an office hundreds of miles away will have no impact. You seem to not understand how effective protests work.
For you to bring up the shield of legality, you must have missed the last couple hundred years of history between American Indians and our government, where something was declare legal, then they agreed to it under duress, then white people changed the goalposts on what was "legal". It's like you are missing the entire context of land ownership and legality that make up the protest, then calling them hypocritical because they use cell phones. As if someone using a piece of modern technology means they forfeit every right to protest any technological injustice.
So yeah, I made fun of you bringing up hypocrisy, because you clearly don't have a fucking clue. If you're so brilliant, and you really want to learn, try reading this book:
https://www.amazon.com/Neither-Wolf-nor-Dog-Forgotten/dp/1577312333
It's good.
Not many historians have that nice, rolling narrative style of Mr. Foote. It's so easy to read and it tells the story in a compact, but intimate way with a focus on the people and their motives.
To answer your question I would look at histories written by journalists such as Barbara Tuchman - Guns of August. I also like S.C. Gwynne's Empire of the Summer Moon, Hampton Sides Blood and Thunder, and Ghost Soldiers. Lot's of good narrative histories out there - just keep looking and share any new good ones with Reddit! Good luck!
For most people, logic games. I didn't have trouble with them at all, probably because I worked through The Logic Games Bible like a maniac. Totally worth it. I only missed 1 question on the logic games section - the last one, because I ran short on time and guessed.
I would buy land and books.
With the land, I would set up ecovillages, and I would (also) set aside vast areas where the plants and animals would be able to rejuvenate uninhibited.
I would find like-minded people, and I would ultimately try to integrate them into the enviornment with the wolves and the buffalo and the other animals. Humans can, and have been, ecologically sustainable organisms in natural environments. Not all agriculture is bad. Many Native American groups practiced agriculture in harmony with the rest of the environment.
I am also not against technology. A bow and arrow is technology, any tool that people use is technology. I am, however, against plastics and other harmful chemicals.
I would also build an army with the people who come to live on my land. There is no shortage of people - homeless people, high-school and college dropouts, homeless children, the unemployed, environmentalists, and lots of people I talk to IRL would be down for this idea.
I would learn assorted martial arts, I would teach them to others, and I would have the others teach them to more people, and we would spend a lot of time on it. This would be both for the health benefits and the self-defense benefits. It would be an army of ninjas, who also grow their own food and are self-sustaining. This will be great in case of societal failure or economic collapse. I would also teach/learn as many natural survival skills as I can. The goal of the army would be to establish peace and not wars, and to help people achieve independence (from money, oil, and industry) while also keeping a healthy relationship with the environment and the other animals.
We would also care for our children. We would raise them to be physically healthy and open-minded. We would not overshelter them, or put taboos on their sexuality, and we would make it the job of the entire community (especially the elders) to educate and take care of them. We will not over-shelter them or raise them to be weak. We will teach them how to socialize with each other in healthy ways, in an open, nurturing, loving environment. We'll also make it official policy that everything we do is done with the well-being of the next seven generations in mind.
There are also some books that I would want to buy and distribute. They include Circle of Life Traditional Teachings of Native American Elders, by James David Audlin, The Other Side of Eden, by Hugh Brody, The Conversations with God trilogy, by Neale Donald Walsch, The Art of Shen Ku, by Zeek, The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight, by Thom Hartmann, A Practical Guide to Setting Up Ecovillages and Intentional Communities, by Diana Leafe Christian, and I'm sure there's lots of other good ones. You should really conduct your own search, but I feel all the ones I've listed have valuable information and the power to change the ideas of large groups of people. Anything on Native American culture, history, and philosophy, or on organic gardening, or self-sustainability in general. I might even set up my own bookstore or library, now that I think about it, and make more money. I'm definitley not against making money, because everyone in our world believes in money and money is power in our society.
here's a start:
A Sorrow in Our Heart: The Life of Tecumseh
you should be able to find it at any library.
Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History
and it is absolutely fascinating and well written.
The Comanche
Empire of the Summer Moon goes into great detail about it, but basically the Comanche would wreck the shit out of anyone until Texas Rangers learned how to fight them and got their hands on the first commercial revolvers in the 1840s.
The various groups who fought them (Spanish, Mexicans, Texans) with muzzle loading firearms got ripped to pieces by guys on horseback with bows and 14ft lances (that they used to kill Buffalo, so skewering people was easy). They also had shields covered in Buffalo hides that could stop bullets. They were so good at riding that they could lean sideways on their horse and fire their bow over the horse's back or under the horse' neck while on the move (using the horse's body as a shield).
Absolutely! I´m reading it right now (just a few pages left). It´s a very good read, it´s written by an american indian herself (Ardy Sixkiller Clarke). Here´s the link.
Empire of The Summer Moon about the Commanche civilization.
A sorrow in our heart, by Alan Eckert is good. I was obsessed with Native American culture as a growing teen and loved this book about Tecumseh. He is one of my favorite people I have studied about. Also, his tribe has a lot of local history to where I grew up.
https://www.amazon.com/Sorrow-Our-Heart-Life-Tecumseh/dp/055356174X
Thinking the question through; the question of who had the best cavalry is a moot point given the greater effect of battlefield tactics and military strategy on outcomes; and maybe conflates two separate questions: who had the best individual horse soldiers, and who utilized cavalry battle tactics against their peers (setting aside the issue of the progressive dominance of firearms) most effectively? It's a fun question. For my money, the Mongols take the second point- if only because they demonstrated dominance against all of their Chinese enemies on a range of terrains (they were great at sieges too) and decimated European/Polish mounted knights in the field who had superior forces, armor, and home turf advantage. In fact, the Europeans were decimated by what was effectively a Mongolian flanking force, sent to protect the much larger force en route to attack Hungary (for a great [read], (http://www.historynet.com/mongol-invasions-battle-of-liegnitz.htm) look at the battle of Liegnitz. They lost due to poor field discipline/organization and battlefield tactics, of which the Mongols were simply in another league.
The Mongols as a military force demonstrated tactical and strategic superiority as well as battlefield discipline, and in numbers that exceeded any other standing army (perhaps 1 million solders at peak), until the 1700's.
As far as individual horse soldiers and riders go, I might put my money on the Comanche Indians circa 1750-1880, who ran circles around both the Spanish in Mexico and other Indian tribes in Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Colorado to the extent that they were able to delay both Mexican northward colonization and Texas western settlement for 50 to 100 years with as few as 150,000 tribesman- perhaps 15 to 30,000 mounted warriors at any given time. Deadly with both bow and lance, they easily defeated every other Indian tribe they conflicted with, and were so capable on horseback that entire villages (men, women, children, and gear) were able to outride and evade mounted American cavalry- using Indian guides- for years. One witness described a battle tactic where individual riders would hook an ankle over the neck of their horse, then swing under, and release multiple arrows from a protected position underneath the horse's neck. I mean come on. That's movie stuff. They could also execute effective battlefield tactics (against other mounted horsemen) in parties of several hundred or more warriors. Individual war parties could and did cover 500-700 miles - from New Mexico to Kansas in a period of days or weeks, leading both the Spanish and American armies to consistently overestimate their numbers. They were highly territorial and were fully cognizant of the risk of encroachment of both the Spanish and the Americans. For information and an all around good read, check out Empire of the Summer Moon. The Texans for a time, and later the US Army, defeated them through attrition and superior weaponry once repeating firearms appeared on the battlefield scene. But man for man, horse for horse, and weapon for weapon, people who knew claimed that the Comanches were the best mounted cavalry then in existence. Individually, they probably spent more time on horseback, and on a war footing, than even individual mongol mounted soldiers many of whom were at least partially sedentary. But again, they could not defeat- and were not culturally prepared for- massed numbers and battlefield tactics involving tens of thousands of soldiers.
I will not claim to be an expert in the history of the Treaty of Fort Laramie.
But I have to take some issue with relying on The Heart of Everything That Is for an accurate account.
While the authors may have "done painstaking research", the book is described as "fiery narrative. Which suggests to me it is not a scholarly work.
Here is some criticism of the book from an Indigenous perspective. I have to agree that a book that uses "savages" to describe Indigenous peoples, is showing far too much bias or ignorance to be relied upon when discussing history.
Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History.
Best Seller in Native American & Aboriginal Biographies
“Transcendent . . . Empire of the Summer Moon is nothing short of a revelation . . . will leave dust and blood on your jeans.”--New York Times Book Review
4.5 Stars with nearly 3,000 ratings
Obviously not a great deal of history of the American Indians or Native Americans(for the PC crowd) before the 1500's but the Comanche Indians fit the bill.
This is a great book about them, vicious as can be.
http://www.amazon.com/Empire-Summer-Moon-Comanches-Powerful/dp/1416591060
The Comanche were specifically a brutal, rapey, slavery, genociding tribe as they existed in 1775 and were just getting started. It would be a bit like a Mongol Superman, but without all of the effeteness, nicety, and devotion to morality the Mongols were known for.
Source:
http://www.amazon.com/Empire-Summer-Moon-Comanches-Powerful/dp/1416591060
Empire of the Summer Moon by S.C. Gwynne
amazon
I already returned it to my library, but I looked it up for you. It's Sea People: The Puzzle of Polynesia by Christina Thompson. Amazon has it for about $14, and I'm sure any major library would have it, too. It really helped me understand the geography of the Pacific islands, as well as who the Polynesian people are.
I have been reading this book for a while now: http://www.amazon.com/Neither-Wolf-nor-Dog-Forgotten/dp/1577312333
It is almost as I do not want to finish it. Have you read it or heard of it? It is a very good book. I read about a chapter or so every once in a while. Every time I get goose bumps and realize something new. I very much relate myself to the Indian way of life I guess. That is all really. I want to say I have a lot of admiration and respect for the beautiful philosophy on life that seems so right and natural....'we belong to the earth; the earth does not belong to us'. That is all really. Good luck on your endeavors!
I highly recommend two books:
Amazon
Tells the story of the Comanche, horse nomads and the most proficient mounted warriors North America has ever seen.
Amazon
Tells the story of the Navajo, as well as the American/Mexican/Spanish expansion into the west. I really took a lot from this for my frontier world.
This website which documents fallacies should be a good start.
This is a great no nonsense book on logical reasoning actually meant for preparation for the LSAT,law school entrance exam, but serves the purpose really well.
Study for the October LSAT. Kill it. Apply as soon as your score comes out (if not before).
Make sure your recommendations are great. These matter more than people think. Make sure your personal statement is great. This matters more than people think.
As far as studying the LSAT, probably get the Powerscore Logical Reasoning Bible and the Powerscore Logical Games Bible to study from. Also get a bunch of preptests. If your score plateaus for a while and you can't seem to get past it, hire a tutor. Starting at a 167 means its unlikely you will need to take a course.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seminole_Nation_of_Oklahoma
>[The Seminole Nation of Oklahoma] members are descendants of the 3,000 Seminoles who were forcibly removed from Florida to Indian Territory, along with 800 Black Seminoles, after the Second Seminole War.
The Seminole tribe was ONE TRIBE until 1842. FSU decided on their mascot in 1947... around 100 years later. We're not talking about "descendants of ancestors of an ancient people"... we're talking about grandparents. Literally ONE generation of difference from when the Seminoles were once one tribe, that were then forcibly removed. Osceola was their chief until 1837... again, when they were one tribe.
So the people of The Seminole Tribe of Oklahoma have trouble with a Native American leader that was also their own leader. They have absolutely every single right to raise concerns about it. Just to reiterate yet again-- I do not think FSU is desecrating anything. I'm totally fine with it. My only concern is that apparently people do not understand that some Native Americans had problems with it and we should have listened to them instead of ignore them.
Of the Seminoles that managed to survive in Florida after the Second Seminole War (estimated to be around 300), they were granted land allowed to live in South Florida peacefully (kinda... they fought with the U.S. in the Third Seminole War in 1855-1858).
I really can't believe how elementary this is, and it seems like the only people that have trouble understanding what happened is 2 FSU fans that seem to think I'm arguing against Florida State's use of the Seminole name.
tl;dr Because a tribe was forcibly separated doesn't mean we ignore a whole group of them because "they aren't a part of the tribe anymore."
I highly recommend this book if you want to understand what happened to the tribe and why Andrew Jackson is a horrible, scary motherfucker.