offerings. that word offering. it is operative here for it, not just an acceptance a death, but a giving at birth. do both and do both of them with the utmost conviction. i you the best. and here's my last offering. please, please. in this season, of all seasons, especially these times, and as end with offering and giving, please don't forget to vote. thank you. hello everyone. welcome to bookmarks tonight. i'm beth seufer buss, the program director and. it is my pleasure to welcome you to bookmarks.

anybody's first time here. welcome. you may not know bookmarks is a literary arts nonprofit and our mission is to cultivate community by bringing of all ages together with books and authors who educate, inspire, challenge and entertain. we're so excited you're here with us tonight. and it's my pleasure to hand tonight's event over to laura schober, bookmarks administrator who's going to moderate event and introduce our featured author. pretty good evening and everybody hear me okay? okay. awesome. i am here to introduce our wonderful author here this evening, kathleen duval she is a professor of history at the university of north carolina at chapel, where she teaches early american and american indian history. her previous work includes independence lost, which was a finalist for the washington prize and native ground indians and colonists in the heart of the continent. she is coauthor of give me liberty and coeditor of interpreting a continent voices

from colonial america. you would welcome kathleen here tonight. i am very excited to moderate this event, a brilliant book. i'm going to sort of just dive in because you're here to hear from kathleen and not me. there will be a question answer at the end of our conversation. so, kathleen, if you summarize, just to begin the scope of the book and share us your goals for writing native nations. right. thank you, larry. it's such a pleasure. be here. i think the main reason i wanted to write this book is that i sort of think that a lot of americans nominate americans. they see native americans, we see native americans in all kinds of places these days in movies and tvs and in big supreme court cases, art museums, a big show at the north

carolina museum of art right now. and i it can be hard for a lot of people who aren't native american themselves to square that realization that a lot is going on with native americans today with what what we may have been taught about native american history, native american history. i think the way a lot of us learned it was was in the past, you know, far in the past, there were native americans here in 1492. but maybe pretty quickly decline for various reasons because of their with europeans, maybe we sort of hear about them again in classes when we get to indian removal and then maybe not that much more after that. and so what i really wanted do is for readers kind of bridge that gap to say, you know, native americans are still here today and not as descendants, but as nations. there are almost 1600 native nations today in the united

states, and that's just counting federally recognized nations in the united states, not counting mexico, canada not counting state recognized tribes. there are the survival of native nations is a long and important history that i think that i think all should know. and so the u.s. but the scope of the book what i try to do here is really tell a millennium of native american history kind of all between two covers starting in the in about the year 1000. so quite a while before any europeans people from other continents came. so some of the ways that native americans lived in north america before the coming of europeans and then goes the book goes slowly through the centuries after 1492. i think one of the things that we tend to do move too quickly from the arrival of europeans to

the united states spreading across the continent, which really doesn't happen till after the civil war many centuries after 1492. so book goes through centuries, i think, at a pace that i think is more reasonable for that sort of seeing eras in which native americans were the majority of the population and of the continent of north america and held most of the land and the power on the continent really into, well, the 19th century and then the book also it goes sort of the sort of the worst times for native americans, the hardest times for retaining their nations in the 19th century, 20th century, and to and so today is part of the story and sort of the renaissance that's going on in native america. these days. this is how i sort of close the book and then to build on that in each chapter, you're focusing on a specific nation. so how did you make those choices and what did you consider? yeah, what i what i when i realized i wanted write a

millennium of history, i thought i better just choose a few nations to highlight and not not try to cover everybody. so i have so, you know, most of the chapters introduce one native nation in one particular place and time. and so the book goes chronologically forward time but introduces native nations along the way and and then as we get toward the end into the late 19th and 20th and 21st century sort of braids them together, but i chose them in part, i wanted there's been a huge amount of scholarship by historians on native nations, and so i wanted that that historians have have written about that i can sort of compare to each other. there was a rich body of scholarship could i could use for that and i wanted i chose them sort of for particular times when they were had a lot of influence in their region.

so for example, i talk about the mohawk set in the 1600s when they were trading with the dutch and having huge influences on other native nations as and then the sort of final thing i sort of used for choosing did i know people today of that nation do i know scholars within those tribes or of those tribes who who are you know in academia that i could, you know, sort of lean and learn and maybe had or in some cases had already learned a lot from, but who could introduce me to people, introduce me to sources i might not know otherwise. and and also read those chapters and make sure i wasn't making any big mistakes and misrepresenting their history and that leads to my next question. in the foreword you states, i have tried to live up to the call of shawnee tribe chief benjamin jay barnes for scholars to work with and not on indigenous communities. so what steps did you take in the research for book to meet those calls, sort of building on

what you're saying? yeah, this is know been a real a real turn in in sort of the way academic scholars have have written about have worked with native nations and i think you sort of you know that has happened in anthropology, in archeology history and some other disciplines. and so it was yeah, it is really important to me to, to, to not follow that sort of old model of just looking at documents, just, just thinking i could know something about native nations without knowing how they see their own history. and so what i did with, with all of the other nations i focus on is is that i really tried to see what they say today about their history. and sometimes that was to talking to tribal scholars, seeing what's going on in their nations today and every chapter i talk about the present as well and sort of try to remind the reader this nation is still around has survived all centuries and and also just many of them have have centers, have

their own museums where they have a sort of full picture of how they understand their history, the things they about their history. and so i try to incorporate those as well. thank you. there are many parts of this book that i feel are very important and i'm a one person. so you all have question and answer periods. you ask other things, but i my following question is going to sort of pull out the things i thought through the book were emphasizing his or her points made and i want to begin with this idea of the value of reciprocity and could you discuss the nations value of reciprocity? this value shaped their lives? well, one of the reasons i start a millennium ago, i don't know how many of you know, but there was there were there were cities. there were large civilizations across north america in, you know, in the around around a thousand years ago, cahokia and

other mississippian societies, large, large civilizations in the southwest, based on a huge irrigation projects. and so one of the things i talk about in the early chapters of the book is, is first, those cities those urban civilizations and then the fall those that that with the coming of the little ice age around 1200s, those societies those sort of very centralized societies fell in north america. and often that's been told as a sort of a story of decline that. there was a great know this golden era and something worse came later. and but really oral histories of of the descendants nations of those old urban civilizations talk about it as as as an improvement. and so i trace some those changes that came about. and one of those was the really reciprocity becomes a value a value in in but also in

economics politics. and so the many, many histories and that sort of archeology this up and when i know and the way that polities native polities have ever since oral histories really talk about this this extreme rejection of hierarchy a very powerful religious political leaders that existed in some societies at the time, urbanization and the replacing of that with with values, reciprocity and consensus and so it's sort of c one of the reasons that this comes about is is sort of in a time when when winters were colder and and growing seasons were shorter it was harder to depend on agriculture trading much more important that had been the path certainly been trade in the path but but but of food became more important in this new era and recipes paucity in economics meant that if they were to trading peoples it was the

responsibility of each to sort of take care of the other. and so if one trading partners, you know crops had not done well in a certain it was the responsibility through reciprocity of the other group to to feed them that year and if you were the one feeding being generous us with somebody else then you were sort of building up credit. so reciprocity is also, you know, building up credit for, hard times. and so you really see reciprocity as this give and take and that that value of giving really has at the center of native economies and and politics and sort social system something that that that native people today many them still still talk about as a value like all values it's exasperate all right we don't always live up to our values but but it is that native nations just return to again and again is talking about what they want to do. the reciprocity is supposed to be something that they that they strive for. i mean, going to your previous

question, i think reciprocity, something that i hope that i've also practiced in in sort of some of my relationships with with tribal scholars or bringing them some, you know, documents from french and spanish spanish archives that i've collected and learning in return from them, although all the things they now. nice i love that you native nations long resisted colonial efforts to take their resources for the colonists own gain and profit i think we're well aware of that sort of narrative and i what i love about your book is that you really talk about how the native nations really use their diplomatic skills to maintain relationships that benefited their community for a large, like you said the centuries before. yeah yeah. would you mind if i read a little bit? no, i do not. yeah, i think i might read a little bit from my mohawk chapter because it's perfectly illustrates what what you're asking and you find it.

see if i can hold the microphone and read at the same time and distance. i can actually see. as this guy began to lighten the enemy came ashore and the mohawk warriors came out of the barricade. the mohawks, an impressive sight. nearly 200 of them painted for war with wooden armor and helmets to protect themselves from their enemies. arrows and wearing their distinct haudenosaunee short feathered headdresses which inspired terror in their enemies. the approaching at algonquin and any let out a cry and then did something unusual when. they were about 30 steps away from the mohawks they parted into two groups, leaving in the middle. one man covered in metal from his hat to his knees as the mohawks pulled back their bows, preparing to shoot their first round of arrows, they heard an enormous cracking boom as if thunder and the sound of a waterfall had combined and struck for just a moment right in front of them. one of the mohawk standing near the front down, dead shot right

through. his wooden armor, the enemy force shouted in delight. another bang. another man fell the mohawk had never yet seen. and it was astonishing to see people without being hit by an arrow. if we rushed too fast through the 17th century, we might interpret. the arrival of guns and metal tipped arrows as the start of native dependance and european dominance. but we would be wrong. local rivalry, customs and geography continue to the most important factors in native decisions and determine the opportunities and limits for europeans. there been new weapons here before and new ways of defending against them. when your gained some advantage, you adapted. and that is what the mohawks did. and then i won't read this part, but they go on and they they develop the mohawks, develop this fur trade with the dutch. the dutch are completely dependent on them and. one of the things that the dutch make are right, right, right, right. they make cakes at dutch, right?

they make cakes out of white. they make white bread. they make these things that it turns out the mohawks really like because everybody likes cake. right? and so the mohawks have so much economic power through the fur trade, military power to that they start buying everything that's made out of white flour from from albany, but comes albany later and the reason i know about this, that there are these letters from dutch colonies writing to the netherlands company, complaining that they can only afford very heavy bread. right, because the mohawks buy all the white flour and buy all the cakes. so it's one example of of how if you slow things down a little bit, not to not to deny you know all the horrors of colonialism, but if you slow things down, remember, there are there are eras in which native nations have more power than europeans that there other stories too. that is of my favorites. so really glad you talk about

that because if we have time i want to go back to that. one of the things i loved you know, i a teacher for many years so learning is very important to. and so one thing i loved is that you really address some inaccuracies in what we may have learned or what was presented in textbooks or the narratives that we were given and that we've been taught. so i just wanted to see if you would discuss a little bit about the choice to adopt horses into the cultures, how that changed the lives of the plains nations, right? so one of the people that i look at that i examined closely are the kiowa is in the 19th century, but previously, so there are no horses on the plains before come. there's a very small horse that's extinct by then. but not not the horse. not the horse that you ride. right. so yeah, there's this. yeah. if there's any stereotype of

native americans, it is that they ride horses, right? and yet that's something happens after the coming of europeans spanish the spanish who bring horses to north america. but you know that's it's you know colonists enforce their will on indians actually plains indians that the spanish didn't really want them to get horses they at first tried to have a monopoly on horses and keep native americans from having horses. and very quickly, native americans started taking horses, stealing horses, then breeding them themselves and creating an economy and a culture, the sort of the plains indian culture that it's a a creation of. yeah. as say as of choice of people who decided to live a different way, you know, another stereotype of native americans is that they're nomadic. these are people who were not nomadic. they lived on river, you know, in river. and they farmed and they went on hunts, you know, only part of the year, maybe one big bison hunt a year on foot.

but with the coming of the horse some of them chose to actually become and live in teepee, no teepees or tents, right. they're not they're not their housing. you can move around and are an invention of this new culture that that is horse bound and then there are other native peoples in the same region who don't make that choice. right. who stay in their river towns. and in fact, many of them become more because they now are growing more and more food feed. you know, agricultural project products to sell to these bison hunters who live all year on the plains. thank you for that throughout book you emphasize how native never surrender their. i think you talked a little bit that earlier or their languages or religious beliefs practices can you talk about the ways they ensured their nation survival really just to underscore the of

the present as well right right yeah yeah i'm glad you asked that i mean it's almost miraculous. so it really shows the determination of of ancestors of today's nations just that to who? not, you know, not only not to stop being native american, but also not to stop being their particular or that chickasaw or choctaws, you know, navajos or they were. now, not to say that no native nations sort of combined or, you know, had to give up things. they certainly did. and many of them did lose their languages and such. but the sort of determination, um, to remain their own people, their own peoples is really striking with. all the, the pressures to change that and particularly the united states in the late 19th century and the early 20th century, when the united states outlawed a practicing culture, you know,

publicly outlawed native religions, outlawed native languages, took children their homes from their cultures, and put them on trains too far away to try to make them not to be part of their community anymore. the fact that, you know, some of those children went back home and learned those lessons from their grandparents and their parents insisted on continue, you know, that their grandparent and parents insisted on that their kids would continue you to be kiowa or whatever they you know they were is just is just amazing and i think one of the things i try to talk about in every chapter is the importance of women in in just that. why utah maintaining maintaining even through adaptation, through change because all cultures change. right. but but just maybe quietly speaking the language at home, telling kids over and over who they are, you know who you are, we know who you are. even if if it's school or whatever, you you don't talk about it.

i think that's just that's maybe the biggest key to how they how survived as nations and throughout the book european and colonial colonial colonialists views of land are central to the relationships between them and native nations. what were those views and how did they transition over the centuries to the increased detriment of native americans? yeah, so, um, you colonization has at its root the idea that you could take other people's stuff. it's sort of the opposite of reciprocity and it gave european an idea that they, they had a right to what they wanted and they in no way were always able to do that. there are plenty of times when when native nations had the power to keep them from doing, um, but there's an under current

of sort of belief from the beginning that native nations don't quite own the land. maybe it doesn't completely belong to them, maybe god doesn't. for them to still stick around. um, there's, there's very sort of religious tone to early on in, in colonization of, of the americas and then it, it continues in various forms over the over the centuries through indian removal sort of, you know, say maybe a native nation does have a right to some, but the u.s. government can say where that land can be. and it isn't their homeland anymore. if if there are u.s. citizens who want that and through through allotment in the in the late 19th century and early 20th century, when reservations were carved up once again in, an attempt to make their not be an attempt by the u.s. government to, make their not be communal lands anymore, to make their not tribal lands to have, uh, native people only be individual

landowners as part of a, um, attempt to take land and to break up tribes. um, yeah, i think and in the book it's very stark, when you see the maps right that you include and how sort of gets to the ends, of, of the reservation lands and sort of the very narrow small areas. yeah. in the afterword you write white settlers who took land wrote a new that hid native nationhood and power and made their own rise seem inevitable and justified. how would you rewrite that history? um, yeah. so i think. this is in some ways my, to answer that question, right, that native nations were a long time ago. they're, they survive colonialism here today and they'll be here in the i think

is the counter to that. and you know, i think one of the things that many native americans keep saying today is we're still here. and that is just the direct response to that sort of settler colonial attempt, not not only to take land and to to break up tribes, all of those things we've been talking about. but then to paper it all over as if it hadn't is if, you know, native americans, they were sort of here, but they never really owned on the land. and, uh, yeah i think i would just say exactly opposite. they, they've been here the whole and many have legal rights land and we were talking in the back about sovereignty especially with the cherokee nation. if you want to speak a little bit about both the use of the law to keep lands also to reclaim them today and i know there's some work to do that right right right. so so one of the things i think

a lot of people don't know today is, is is how tribal sovereignty today that that was federally recognized tribes have have under the under the federal government have um have certain elements of sovereignty that some of that is rooted that cherokee court case was true versus which was the first case to use the term domestic dependent nations. i at the time the cherokees and those native nations think they were domestic to the united states all they were their own nations. but it's a very powerful tool forward of, uh, of asserting sovereignty within the united that, uh, tribal nations recognized. tribal nations, at least are not under the states. they are sort of alongside the states, under the federal government. they have treaty rights certainly, um, that, that uh, they can enforce through, um, in the courts and they know people have been paying attention to. they've won a couple of really important u.s. cases before the u. for the u.s. supreme court recently, including, um, uh, the

mcgirt case, which, uh, which is about, about sort of exercising sovereignty over criminal cases among many of the tribes in oklahoma. um, and so a lot of this is still just being worked out exactly what sovereignty will look like going forward. but just a, just a couple of examples, if, um, if you looked at the, the infrastructure bill or, the covid relief acts, you can see those that aid was going to or federal dollars were fund or were flowing to states, counties and tribal governments. that and tribal governments is at the end those lists and it's a really important reminder that um these are functioning governments that have a huge amount of, of, of presence in the lives of their tribal if you want easy way to do is just go to a tribe's website and many tribes have a website that you know, has a lot about history and a lot about culture, but is mostly about social services and the kinds of things that governments do. and it's a really good reminder

that they you know they're governing entities, um, and that they're, they will be for that, for, you know, well, the future. and i haven't lived in north carolina very as the couple of years. so you could speak to the native nations that are here and within north carolina. um, to those who also may not know much about them. right. i'm really glad you ask that. i've sort of had to say, except for state recognized a couple of times, i get myself rescued from that. so the eastern band of cherokee is the only federally recognized tribe that's based in north carolina. the others are state recognized tribes. and so one of the chapters, one of the actually the first chapter i have in here that has europeans it that europeans are in the whole chapter is the founding the brief founding of roanoke on the north carolina coasts. and so ancestors of many of north carolina's native nations today are in that chapter, um, sort of in this very, um, brief interaction with the english who tried to found a, uh, a colony

at roanoke and failed, obviously. and so then i do talk in the book about north carolina state recognized tribes over the, um over their centuries of history since then. and, um the very this the striking difference between what it meant to be native nation that faced the english very early right on the atlantic coast whether in north carolina virginia, new england versus peoples like the cherokees the kiowa is the chinese who had a little more time and who could do had a longer with the sort of thing i was reading about the the mohawks know people on the coast of north carolina virginia new england they are hit very hard and very fast with large large, large numbers of english settlers and the fact that they survive even as native communities is even more amazing that they still today, that they

through the centuries just kept telling their children and their this is who we are. no matter what happens in the outside world with without, you know, and jim crow and all of these efforts to, you know, turn them into either white people or black people or or maybe just generic native people. um, they kept their, you know there's some of them definitely combined, but they, they, they kept their native communities and they kept many separate native communities through to today. and they too, i think are having a renaissance. and um, in various ways though still struggling about sort of recognition. when you all purchased the book and walk away with it, what would you like your readers to maybe take away or with or yeah, yeah. i think it's just my main messages would be this a long history native nations. i think i said this already. basically native nations were here long, long time ago.

they're here today. they're going to be here in the future. and they're an important part of u.s. history. but on the flipside, u.s. history is just you know, it's only 250 years old. it's there's a, um it's it's a bit of a blip in native history. and, you know, we'll what the future holds. but, um, you know, i, it's, it, it may end up that's a that's a smaller, smaller segment of the history of this continent in the long, long run than the united states, even. thank you. i wanted to give folks an opportunity to ask any questions they might have. and i'm sorry i, um there are there will be if you raise your hand, someone will bring you microphone. and if you would just kind of speaking to about as close as i am, i should state that. thank you so as a historian and

i'm curious to know and talked about there being sort of ah the nation especially native americans being in the midst of a renaissance currently historically. we've also named various moments in native american history right remove all that you know as eras removal and things like that. what do you think we'll name this moment and what will historians call this moment in the future? if you had to project. yeah, yeah. that that's that's a great, great question. and i think, you know, historians calling it the self-determined era and sort of the revival of sovereignty, um, i wonder if we're now moving even into sort of the next phase and it may be too early to, uh, to name it, but i maybe, maybe self-determination is sort of 70 years or very late 20th century, beginning of the 21st century. maybe now we're in something, you know, people use the word renaissance a lot i think that probably doesn't work because it was a different historical era. but but i think maybe there there's going to be some some

word that gets at the sort more than self-determination, using that self-determination, that increase of sovereignty to, you know, so, so say, you know, places that have casinos or have other sort of, um, sort of ways of starting bring income in that they didn't have before. many are pumping that money back into, you know, into new tribal businesses, into small business loans for tribal and all that and this sort of virtuous circle of investment that and then also putting money into cultural revival language. so i think it will be a word or a couple words that gets at that kind of moving even what you can do with, sovereignty, even, you know that that affects people's lives even more. thank you. because it feels like it just sort of stops with the seventies and eighties and that might be how history sort of happens. like we're just haven't quite gotten around to renamed to naming a new thing. but it does feel like i teach native american literature when

i teach i. and when you teach native american literature, you're teaching native american history because we don't get it so you don't get it. and so it is funny because everything still seems to stop in the seventies and eighties so and so then that still feels like ancient to young university students. yeah, i would. yeah. yeah, exactly. and yet you go into bookmarks and and there's there's clearly a renaissance going on in native literature today. so maybe. yeah, maybe. yeah. that makes me now want to use the word renaissance. just go ahead and use that and students now, they've been using it in native american for long. oh, okay. good, okay, good, good. yeah. so maybe you need a but. yeah, thanks. but it's okay so high. it takes me a long time. check things out and i've only just watching yellowstone. but i've been interested in the native. american storyline and i if in

current culture what feel is an accurate of the current native themes or reality yeah, yeah. so, so i do have a few favorites. i like reservation dogs, which is based on, on the creek reservation in the. in oklahoma. and uh, um, uh oh. what's the ed helms rutherford falls. rutherford. and it's about history. it's, it's this town where. two best friends, one who's whose ancestor founded the town, right? he's sort of this new england guy. and and then and his best friend who runs the tribal cultural center and museum. and and she's she belongs to the it's sort of made up, but it's like, you know, the local tribe. and it also has lots of native actors and writers and, um, and it's funny reservation dogs is

funny too, but it's a little, uh, rougher. um, and what? oh, and uh, um, uh, um. resident alien. is maybe going a little bit further, right? but it's, it's about. so this, this guy who's actually an alien, but then he makes friends with, lots of indians and he know an alien. yeah. and also funny, funny and very smart so. and also, you know, again, you know, just it's this renaissance period like there are so many native writers and native actors, native showrunners who are involved in these, um, in these shows, it's it's really, i think it's an exciting time and then if you really like mohawk girl, it's just a girl. so. so, so you had mentioned, um,

sort of that reciprocity you were sharing with the tribes and then also coming back with literature and other sources from different european nations. when you shared that information with them, did you like little vignettes where they kind made connections or maybe found something contradictory, something shared based on that new interaction? yeah, that's a great question. so so most of that for me has been with the co-op has because i my first book had to do with co-op on osage history. and so that i got to know, um, the tribal historic preservation officer and some of the people there. and so the, these documents that i was using are from the 18th century, the french and, spanish. and so it's one of the things that they're wanting to do is, is just really have this long history of their own, that they that they're writing and telling to their own people. and so just having those as part of, uh, of their archive is

really important and then the co-op boards can go look at them themselves. and i think some the most interesting conversations have been about language because um, the french missionaries who would come in and they wanted to learn and in this case they wanted to learn cobol language in order to, for it to be part of their mission izing effort. and so they would write down vocabulary words as were trying to learn for themselves. and those are really documents to a tribe today. it gives them a into the language of their ancestors, which has changed over time. some of been lost, but also some of it is just changed because languages change over the centuries. and so to sit down those and sort of say those words out loud, because, you know, the french guy is writing down with a lot of extra letters because the french has a lot of extra letters. and so you sort of say it out loud if, you read french and then a couple who who knows language hears it and it oh that's this word, even though it doesn't look like it right when

a frenchman wrote it down. so those have been some of the most exciting conversations. so i hope those kinds of things will continue. but, um. but yeah, i think. how were you able to incorporate mythologies or religious or spiritual, um, you know, themes, stories into the work that you did? i mean, i, i do some of that and i try to be careful with there's lots i don't know, there's tons. i don't understand. and so religion, something i probably try to be even more careful with than other things. but, um, and to try to keep it on a pretty general level, one of the things that, um, i think is really important for understanding this long history is these inclusive ascetic nature of most native religions that, you know, at least in theory, islam, judaism, those are all exclusivist. you, you are or you aren't, right? and you become christian.

you're supposed to stop being the non-christian you were and become. now, you know, it's a little more complicated that in actual life, but native religion to generalize were esthetic are inclusive ascetic in that if you and your people you know it's not willy but you see you learn about a belief a religious belief or a religious that seems true that seems valuable. you can pull in and make it part of your religion having to get rid of anything else. if you think it doesn't make sense, then you don't have to. right. but, um, and i think that's, that's a really way of understanding ending interactions or religious between europeans and native people. there were plenty of times when christian missionaries thought they had made converts and they thought that meant they'd got of their old religion and then found actually, no, that they're had used their own methods of of inclusive, ascetic religion and

had, uh, had added christianity to that of parts of christianity to what they already believed practiced. um, and i think that's one of the ways in which native religions been able to survive in various forms and adapt because they're supposed to adapt or they're supposed to change as they add new things. but without, uh, you know, complete giving them up. how did you get interested in? are you part native american? no, but yeah. so i'm not native at all. i got interested in it because i went to grad school and i wanted to i wanted to study, um, colonial history interactions in early america among various europeans and various native americans. i, um, i knew that's what i wanted to do. i took on a class in, in college that got me interested that but i really thought to be more a little bit more about europeans and the native americans would just be part of the story. but um, i ended writing my first

book, my dissertation and my first book on, on arkansas, which is where i'm from. and i knew the french and spanish had had sort of settled there and i thought, well, i can read those documents in french and spanish. and we were talking about and but it turned out those are places where the fa in both case the fa edge of of the french or the spanish empire, arkansas was not where you wanted to be sent. if you worry i officer in the french or spanish empire and so so this official unofficial would be sent out there with maybe ten soldiers. right because these are empires are very spread out surrounded by thousands and thousands dozens of of oh of cops right there. and then many, many more osage were incredibly and dangerous tribe anybody who crossed them the 18th century and so their documents the letters the reports that these men had to write back are just they're just

full of everything that. what was said or that the osage did. and it and as i read those and wrote dissertation, i thought, well, this is this is a place that where native americans are in charge and and europeans are just there writing down. they're not doing much else. they're, um, plenty of other places. europeans were doing terrible things right. but, but in place, it sort of taught me that there were places of places and times across continent where native americans had a lot of power. and that just got me really interested that, um, and then i, you know, been doing this for several decades now. i got to know just lots of native scholars both within tribes and in the academy and, um, just started realize how connected the present is with the past. um, and sort of, that sort of eventually led me to this, this book and then i think a much richer understanding of native american history than i had, uh, when i wrote my first book, maybe time for one or two more questions.

so maybe the last two here. so my question has to, do i'm the sort of person who likes to build my cultural literacy through fiction, wonder stories? so i wondered if whether you as a historian, just as a reader, whether you enjoy native american fiction, indigenous literatures, if so, whose work you might recommend? yeah, yeah, i really do. yeah. though i think we should throw it back to you probably write. yeah so i'm excited to read tommy orange his new book. i liked his first book a lot. i we were just talking about, about susan in my native american history class, which is a sort of freshman and sophomore level class at usc they read her grass dancer. and i think that's, uh i, i loved all of the things that she's written, but i really like that. um and i mean, there are just so many these days, right i would have to sort of sit down and write a, write a big list and um, yeah, but, uh, yeah. and then and then yeah. so there's little fiction there.

i quote some fiction authors in the book and a lot of poetry, um, through joy harjo and, um, and natalie diaz, um. thank you. no, sir. yeah and i will say that, um, maybe last year or the year before they had an author here who wrote a book called calling for a blanket down. and that was, that was really good. yeah. so yeah, was really good. um, so was wondering, i feel like my education native americans was pretty much a watered down version of what really happened, kind of basically the thanksgiving great we all shared food and it was fun but it wasn't to a college that when i history classes that like oh my gosh is fascinating and horrible all at the same time and i just wonder you know, i feel like my children who are now college age learned similar

even though they did incorporate a native american maybe it was that class that my daughter took in high school. however, i'm wondering if you know if changing what children are learning in elementary school about native history. yeah i'm i you know my kids are now teenagers i was really interested in this and. i, i don't know. i think like so things it completely depends on the individual teacher and some are doing a terrific job and read a lot and bring in speakers or just because i think one of the most like one of the most important things for non-native kid to learn is is is to meet a native person and really okay yeah you really are here today and, and, uh, and then i think in others they aren't, i mean, history is also hard to teach elementary school kids, for sure. it's horrible right. even the good parts are adult content only right, but, but i

don't know. we're we're certainly trying the college level at least to, to provide, um, yeah. i don't know, i don't it's hard. i mean, teachers to do so much and then trying fit really in depth native history into a u.s. history class when you're going at breakneck speed anyway. um, yeah i don't know power to them right well. we're almost out of time. is there anything you like to leave with or else you'd like to say or no. this has been just such a pleasure. i'm so glad to have come to bookmarks where i haven't been before. it's it's such an exciting space to be and and it's great wonderful to have have your questions later. this has been just a delight. well, think everyone would agree we really appreciate you coming sharing your book with us and your knowledge with us. and so i'd like to thank you. and if we do a round of applause

paul hendrickson is a three time finalist for the national book critics circle award and a winner of it once