Great Lakes Indian Accommodation and Resistance during the Early Reservation Years, 1850–1900 (review)

Bowling Green University’s Ed Danziger has produced an innovative study of nineteenth-century First Nations history in the Great Lakes region. This is a significant contribution to the historiography of the region because, while there are numerous studies of specific peoples and places, very few scholars have attempted to look at the area as a whole during this period. The book focuses on the impact of Canadian and American colonial systems on First Nations communities and their varying responses in the late nineteenth century. Danziger looks at Aboriginal nations and communities north and south of the border and finds that ‘whether living on a reservation in Canada or America, natives responded in similar ways to their new circumstances’ (xi). In particular, the central argument of the book is that Great Lakes peoples survived ‘as Indians’ as the result of their agency. Danziger acknowledges that Aboriginal people were victims of the colonialism of both the Canadian and American governments, but he emphasizes how communities and leaders ‘determined their own destinies and preserved core values, lands, and identities against all odds and despite ongoing marginalization’ (jacket flap).

Danziger’s book is extremely useful, as it allows for comparisons between circumstances in both countries and in different states and provinces, but as with other studies of large regions, the investigation is both wide and shallow; there is not much room for depth, and a more comprehensive study would be more valuable. The book is organized thematically around the ‘tools’ of colonialism. Chapters deal with politics, education, religion, and agriculture, and each goes back and forth between the American situation and the Canadian one. The book relies heavily on government records, but Danziger explains that he makes use of ‘Indian voices’ where possible, although he did no oral history himself. The book is very much a compilation of work by other historians; there seems to be very little primary research in it, which is to be expected of a survey. One concern, however, is that the vast majority of the ‘eyewitness accounts’ Danziger uses are from Aboriginal men. In part, this is a result of colonial patriarchy that is perpetuated in the archives – government agents wanted to speak to men and recorded what they had to say and very often ignored Aboriginal women’s voices. Women are less present in the records, but many historians also ignore what women’s voices are available. Danziger has found and included a few, for example, when Aboriginal mothers wrote letters to the governments complaining about the treatment of their children in residential schools (148–50), but more sources like these would be welcome. Too often in Aboriginal history the stories of individuals are left out in favour of generalizations about the community. Danziger does an impressive job of telling us about specific people, quoting them where possible, and so we get a more detailed, and likely more accurate, picture of the peoples of the region (or at least the men).

Not only are few stories from Aboriginal women included, the book also lacks a comprehensive examination of how colonialism affected gender relations on reserves and reservations in the region. A comparative look at the topic across the border would have added much to our understanding of gendered colonialism in North America. A second, perhaps greater, concern is Danziger’s treatment of Aboriginal agency and victimization. Perhaps he has gone too far trumpeting the resistance and survival of Aboriginal peoples, and thus downplayed the devastation and hardships they faced in this period. General readers and junior undergraduate students would benefit from a more thorough discussion of the tragedies that took place in Aboriginal communities. A much smaller concern is an error on the map on page iv. While it is useful to have all reserves and reservations in the region on one map, it would be more useful if the Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte...