Editor's Commentary

This issue continues the theme of colonization/decolonization from the previous issue and contains transcriptions of two sessions of the 2004 American Indian Studies Consortium annual conference, entitled "Who Stole Indian Studies?" at Arizona State University. The articles add to our knowledge by contributing important discussions addressing such issues as empowerment, law, research ethics, Freedmen entitlements, reproductive rights, spiritual appropriation, and identity. The Consortium transcripts provide invaluable presentations by key native scholars about the past, present, and future of American Indian studies.

This issue begins with Sidner Larson's discussion of the the U.S. Supreme Court's problematic relationship with native nations. He notes that attorneys and scholars, Indian and non-Indian alike, believe that Indians must avoid taking cases to the Rehnquist Court because of its predilection to further erode tribal sovereignty. To cure problems stemming from inconsistent court decisions, he suggests the need for a political solution in which representatives of Indian nations, states, and Congress meet so they can engage in dialogue that fosters compromise and pragmatic remedies.

Susan Miller examines the controversial issue of Freedmen citizenship in the Seminole Nation. She counters the popular and uncritical position held by the media, scholars, and attorneys that racism has encouraged the Seminoles to deprive the Freedmen of their legal entitlements as citizens of the Seminole Nation. According to this perspective, the Freedmen, who became Seminole citizens by virtue of an 1866 treaty, were incorporated socially, economically, and politically into Seminole society. Noting that erroneous and fictitious narratives support this view, she persuasively stresses that relatively few black Freedmen were ever integrated into Seminole culture because they had no clan member-ship, a necessity for acceptance into Seminole society. She lays blame for the controversy on the colonialist behavior of the United States, which violated Seminole sovereignty by mandating the enrollment of the Freedmen by treaty.

Duane Champagne and Carole Goldberg examine the relationship between researchers and Indian nations. They note that Indian nations want to use their values, histories, and cultures to live, grow, and prosper in a rapidly changing and globalizing world that increasingly relies on research, technology, and science. Recounting that researchers have often obtained information from Indians without giving back anything of value to the native communities, Indian governments have begun to take proactive measures to control the behavior of researchers through the establishment of tribal research and ethics policies and research review boards to weigh the outcomes of proposed studies on their people as a whole rather than on individuals. They point out that universities are not well prepared for establishing research projects with Indian nations because these institutions lack a fundamental understanding of Indian issues. This problem can be overcome, they state, by the negotiation of mutually beneficial agreements between tribal governments and universities for research that addresses the needs of the Indians.

D. Marie Ralstin-Lewis probes the battleground of reproductive rights for Indian women and the psychological, cultural, and demographic effects of the campaign to reduce their birthrates. She argues that genocidal attitudes toward indigenous populations are an ongoing aspect of dominant society in the United States. She points out that the eugenics movement of the early 1900s, which targeted women of color and poor white women, had such a heavy residual influence on Indian Health Service policies during the 1970s and 1980s that doctors routinely subjected unwitting Indian women to "voluntary" sterilization procedures. More recently, physicians have impacted the Indian birthrate with new birth control devices that may have harmful side effects. Indian women, Ralstin-Lewis states, were particularly victimized by this campaign because of their heavy reliance on federally funded health facilities. She concludes by examining strategies to combat this assault on native women.

Andrea Smith equates spiritual appropriation with sexual violence in her discussion of the cultural exploitation and commodification of Indian spirituality by pornographers, New Agers, scholars, and others. She asserts that non-Indians often enter Indian country and religious studies classes thinking they can quickly acquire ceremonial knowledge without permission and without realizing that such information is transmitted gradually in tribal communities over the course of many years. To her, these abusive...