American Indian Ethnic Renewal: Red Power and the Resurgence of Identity and Culture by Joane Nagel (review)

102Rocky Mountain Review relationally located and circumstantially shaped and motivated by the passions and interests of their advocates" (105). This theatricality reveals, as Montrose shows in his analysis ofMidsummer Night's Dream in part two of the book, the extent to which both the sovereign and the playwright, the ruler and the ruled, "are construable as subjects differentially shaped within a shared conjunction of language and social relations, who jointly reshape that conjunction in the very process of performing it" (177). Such dialectical reflexivity, Montrose argues, constitutes the hallmark of Shakespeare's theatre. Although followers of Montrose's work will recognize many themes and formulations from his prior work, the book is much more than a summary of Montrose's achievement to date. What emerges is a coherent, theoretically motivated framework for the examination of Elizabethan drama (and other elements of culture) in relation to its historical context. And as always, Montrose's writing remains clear and graceful in the face of complexity. The opening discussion provides a remarkably systematic, coherent, and lucid exposition of relevant theoretical developments and debates. If one feels a bit uncertain in the transition between the two parts of the book, a rereading of the preface (which handily summarizes the overall design) may help. I have also found myself wishing for more discussion of Shakespeare's works (for example, of the history plays), but the book is clearly intended to articulate a critical framework for continuing work. CEZAR M. ORNATOWSKI San Diego State University JOANE NAGEL. American Indian Ethnic Renewal: Red Power and the Resurgence ofIdentity and Culture. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996. 298 p.«Joane Nagel's book on American Indian ethnic renewal and resurgence participates in an important and heated discussion currently taking place inside and outside the academy and across Indian country. Her contribution identifies forces that led to Indian ethnic and cultural renewal and resurgence during the civil rights movements of the 1960s and 1970s. In addition to claiming that federal Indian policies worked to "encourage and fund the formation of multitribal" (32) Indian ethnicity, she states that American ethnic politics in the 1960s "encouraged ethnic identification, pride, and activism " (12) that became the impetus behind the Red Power movement. Moving beyond traditional explanations for demographic growth, she demonstrates that political forces can explain the tripling of the Indian population in the census data from 1960 to 1990: large-scale ethnic switching (when individuals switch racial identification) by Indians, prompted by the Red Power movement's political activism, led to increased Indian selfidentification . Native American political activism also identified Indians' Book Reviews103 common problems and "reaffirmed ltheir] shared history, values, and meaning " (158). She confirms these findings through interviews with Native Americans and demonstrates that Red Power was indeed important to Indian self-identification. In contrast to the critiques of scientific analysis made by Native American scholars M. Annette Jaimes or Ward Churchill, Nagel discusses racial classification and population count in a way that does little to place in a historical context the social constructions of race or the maintenance of power and knowledge through science. Yet "scientific" and racialized constructions need to be accounted for. In Red Earth, White Lies: Native Americans and the Myth ofScientific Fact (1995), Vine Deloria asks readers to be skeptical of analyses using scientific research to explain phenomena. This is especially pertinent to Native American issues, because population numbers, or the racist policy of federally recognizing "authentic" Indians, carry social, political, and economic ramifications that make these issues much more complex than they initially appear. For Nagel to say that federal policies "encouraged" (12) Indian ethnic identification ignores the long process of statistical extermination by the federal government in order to free itself from the Indian Problem. Critics such as Churchill claim that undercounting American Indians has become a tradition in academia as well. In The State Of Native America (1992), Jaimes claims that inconsistencies between the Census Bureau and federal /state guidelines concerning Indian identity are undoubtedly meant to foment discord among Indian peoples. Indeed, the native-run newspaper, Indian Country Today (1 April 1996), reported that the Office of Management and Budget is asking the Census Bureau to place individuals not identified...