American Indian Culture and Research Journal

The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) is one of the most important institutions in contemporary Native American affairs. During most of the present century BIA officials have had direct administrative control over most local reservation institutions such as education, law enforcement, resource management and others. Historically, reservation tribal governments have had little decision-making power over goals and policies that affect their people. The primary task of this paper is to evaluate the effect of several reform movements that challenged BIA domination over Native American reservation communities during the seventies. An examination is made of the impact of local reservation groups, administrative organizations and legislative changes on the structure and functions of the BIA. Attempts to gain control of reservation institutions by reservation groups and reorganization efforts from within the executive branch have failed to force the BIA to relinquish its bureaucratic domination over reservation communities. The most effective means for forcing change on the BIA came from congressional legislation in the form of the Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act of 1975. Even this reform could not break the continued domination of BIA bureaucracy over local reservation institutions, since the Act was weakened both by the absence of sufficient financial and organizational resources among tribal governments and by bureaucratic opposition that developed in the area offices. A primary factor underlying BIA resistance to organizational change appears to be the area directors’ bureaucratic autonomy and power, which enables them to consolidate tribal political support and block reforms of BIA structure that threaten their control over organizational resources.

During May 1978 the United States Supreme Court secured official recognition of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw as a "tribe." Those proceedings and the problems entailed emphasize the need to examine ever more carefully the rhetorical games used by different cultural groups in this country to manipulate and abuse each other. The purpose of this paper is to examine the characteristics and implications of the Smith John case as an extended example of these intercultural games. To this end, the first section of the article briefly recounts the legal situation. The remaining three sections address the rhetorical games, looking initially at the Mississippi strategies for sustaining control over the Choctaw culture, turning then to the reactive framework of the Choctaws, and finally moving to the defensive Choctaw strategies. The Legal Circumstance In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries the Choctaw people were removed from their native Southeastern homelands to Oklahoma. Trying to avoid the Cherokee tragedy of earlier years, the United States government made provisions for the Choctaws unwilling to move to remain in Mississippi; with this option those remaining would gradually sacrifice their tribal relations, security and federal assistance. This arrangement produced what is called an "absentee" band of Choctaw; that is, a splinter group of a tribe who did not move with the main body. Unable to cope without federal assistance, the absentee Choctaw requested and received federal assistance on several occasions. Through their interactions and special provisions to accommodate them, the federal government implicitly came to recognize the group as a tribal entity, thus enabling systematic and regular assistance. Until 1974 this arrangement continued.

This article concerns William F. Cody and his influence in creating the “Sioux” image of the American Indian. It does not attempt to deal with the Siouan stereotyping which has both limited and distanced the native American but rather examines the visual imagery that later developed into that visual stereotypic image. “Buffalo Bill’s” interactions with the Indians appearing in the Wild West were at times lucrative, difficult, patronizing and adventuresome for the Indians, but malice never entered into their association with Cody. Unlike the other Wild West showmen Cody almost exclusively employed Sioux. He did not present a, or the, stereotypic image in his depiction of Indians in his posters or in the ring. He attempted to present an honest lithographic representation of the Indians on his show. The actual process of producing the artwork was carefully monitored by Cody himself. Black and white art studies were approved and final color runs were accepted only with his signature. We may now smirk at the fact that many of the posters depicted Indians charging or galloping in a war whoop, but remember the Indian men representative of those who toured with him, as well as he himself, had participated in the Great Plains Indian Wars. They were braves and chiefs who had fought along with Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse. Even Sitting Bull appeared with him for a time! The role of the equestrian was central to American life at this time and while the posters may seem a bit bombastic they were after all advertisement. Today it’s still hard to get people to spend good money to see a dull show.

The ”Incantation Songs of the Klamath Lake People,” recorded by Albert S. Gatschet, are a particular challenge to anyone who would understand them, for they generally do not exceed one line and often seem obscure in their references. Moreover, as Gatschet presents them, there is little to suggest why they were important to the Klamaths. Over and over in reading Gatschet’s transcriptions of these chants we face a mystery. How were they used? Are they fragments of longer incantations, or were they uttered as folk-wisdom in everyday conversation? Who spoke them, under what conditions and what were they referring to? The fact that the answers to these questions are forgotten (or unlearned) by the majority of the descendants whose ancestors used them forces one to alternative methods of understanding the sayings. The method I chose was to find someone with years of thoughtful learning and living in the Klamath area, an intelligent person sensitive to the cultural elements and interested in preserving them. I enlisted the help of Marie Norris, Klamath, whose age, experience and knowledge of the language made her particularly suited to the interpretation. Since I was working not far from her home in the summer of 1979, I drove to see her and to ask if my interpretations of the chants were correct. She asked for my copies of Gatschet’s transcriptions, and after several months she sent me her interpretations of the chants. While the interpretations do not reflect the original speakers, or the conditions under which the chants were uttered, they are valuable for their contributions to our knowledge of the Klamaths. Some unlock geographical references and afford glimpses of rich metaphoric imagination. Furthermore these interpretations were acceptable to someone with a lifetime in the Klamath culture. She stressed that other interpretations were possible, and this coincides with the insistence of the child “Mary,” Gatschet’s original informant. Marie was conscientious because I had promised to pass on what she gave me and to teach others. I offer them in that spirit, and out of respect for who she was, knowing they reflect her gifts for concision, directness, insight and humor.

Utilizing Oral Traditions: Some Concerns Raised by Recent Ojibwe Studies; a Review Essay Rebecca Kugel Thomas W. Overholt and J. Baird Callicott, Clothed-in-Fur and Other Tales: A n Introduction to an Ojibwa World View(Washington, DC: University Press of America, 1982). 198 pp. $23.00, Cloth. $11.00 Paper. Vivian J. Rohrl, Change for Continuity: The People of a Thousand Lakes (Washington, DC: University Press of America, 1982). 269 pp. $22.00 Cloth. $11.50 Paper. Victor Barnouw, Wisconsin Chippewa Myths and Tales; and Their Relation to Chippewu Life (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1977). 304 pp. $25.00 Cloth. $9.95 Paper. Basil Johnston, Ojibway Heritage (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976). 171 pp. $11.95 Cloth. Basil Johnston, Moose Meat and Wild Rice (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, Ltd., 1978). 188 pp. $16.95 Cloth. Eighty years ago Franz Boas urged that oral traditions be collected from Native peoples. He was convinced that such traditions could shed important light on the cultures and world views of non-Western tribal peoples. To date, the information contained in Native oral traditions has not been systematically utilized by scholars as Boas suggested it could be. The work of the exceptional few stands in contrast and once more proves the rule. These five books on the Ojibwe people attempt in varying degrees to utilize oral traditions to gain a better understanding of how Ojibwe people thought and viewed themselves, their society and the world around them. The theoretical constructs the five authors employ vary widely, as do their interpretations. Taken as a whole, these books demonstrate the difficulties inherent in utilizing oral traditions. They point up how badly a general theoretical orientation is needed if scholars are to use oral traditions to understand a culture on its own terms.