First Panel: Reclaiming American Indian Studies

Introduction by James Riding In

Let me make a few introductory comments about what I see as important about American Indian studies and about this conference. Many of us in attendance today are committed to the development of AIS as a discipline, not as a stepchild of anthropology, history, English, social work, or sociology, among others. Our status as members of distinct political entities and the future of our respective nations is too significantly great to accept the practices, theories, methodologies, and canons of others. We cannot forsake meaningful service to our nations. American Indian studies must never function as the handmaiden of colonialism. The intellectual information we gather, analyze, and synthesize must be for the collective purpose of defending sovereignty, lands, economic well-being, human rights, and religious freedom of our peoples and our nations. Our careers in academia in any event are secondary to this goal.

Colonialism has branded indigenous peoples with a mark of inferiority. Put another way, we have blocked the colonizers' progress, or Manifest Destiny, and their claims of preemptive rights given to them by their Creator to the lands and resources of our peoples. Unfortunately this attitude of the colonizer has resulted in such destructive policies as forced removals, coercive assimilation, and genocide. The Supreme Court continues to draw on imperialistic legal theories and discourses to render decisions that adversely affect our land claims, sovereignty, and religious freedom.

These factors demanded action. Beginning in the 1960s, intrepid Indians on many campuses, carrying the torch of indigenous empowerment, strove to establish American Indian studies as an autonomous discipline devoid of control and domination by other disciplines. Despite facing liberal and conservative paternalistic racism and being relegated to a marginalized status, they persevered. We all owe those brave individuals a debt of gratitude for their unswerving commitment and sacrifices to the development of AIS and to the survival of Indian peoples as culturally distinct, sovereign entities. Their message, that we must decolonize ourselves, our communities, academia, and mainstream society, resonates loudly today. We have a growing number of intellectuals, many of whom are in this room today, following the vision of decolonization of AIS and the decolonization of ourselves. The struggle to develop AIS in that model is ongoing. This forum holds a promise for furthering this dream.

Our first panelist, Elizabeth Cook-Lynn, is a professor emerita of English and Native American studies at Eastern Washington University. She is a writer, a poet, and a member of the Crow Creek Sioux tribe. Her books include Anti-Indianism in Modern America: A Voice From Tatekeya's Earth, and Why I Can't Read Wallace Stegner and Other Essays: A Tribal Voice.

Elizabeth Cook-Lynn

I'm very happy to be here. As you know, Dr. Riding In is the new editor of the Wicazo Sa Review, the source of the topic that we're discussing at this consortium gathering, "Who Stole Indian Studies?" We publish twice a year, and we think that we publish the quintessential important texts in Indian studies.

You know that Indian studies is probably the important intellectual effort in this country in the latter part of the twentieth century. And it took us a long time to get here. Those of us who have been in boarding schools, those of us who read history books such as Frederick Merk's History of the Western Movement without one mention of the tribes, know that we have come a long way. I'm very much impressed with the young Indian scholars that I'm seeing, who are committed to working with their tribes. And my hope is that, when we talk about the issues that we have at a meeting like this, we don't forget we have come a long way.

Nearly eight decades after the passage of the Indian Reorganiza-tion Act by the U.S. Congress, American Indians remain among the most rigidly colonized people in any democracy. And we have taught ourselves to be bureaucrats on every reservation. I don't say this with any...