where the olympic and who coined the term genocide noted in his book on the subject, access rule in occupied europe, he says it's often misunderstood it needs to

be clear. he was also very important in lobbying for the genocide convention. and here is his interpretation. generally speaking genocide does not necessarily mean the music description of the nation except with accomplish by as killings of all members of the nation. it is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aiming as the destruction of the central foundation of the life of national groups with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves. the jacket of such a plan would be the disintegration of the political and social instituti institution, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of these groups. and the destruction of the personal security, liberty,

health, dignity and, of course, the from the lives of people belonging to such groups. >> so u.s. history as well as the inherited indigenous drama -- trauma from a genocidal campaign and experiences cannot be understood without feeling very openly with this reality. only does it affect the casualties of genocide, yet affected those who carried out those policies and the whole society that is, not even actively enough recognizing it to be in denial, but simply the racing it from memory.

so it finds itself i believe in the subconscious and comes up in many ways. we do live in one of the violent countries in the world, even if some countries that are at war, people killing each other, not succeeding as killing as many people as we do. we have to consider the past to understand the situation of the country today. through the founding of the united states and continued 21st century, this has compelled for new people, massacres, systematic military operations and occupation, removal of indigenous people from the incest oral ticker,

forced to no longer speak their languages or practice any of their religion or cultural practices. the absence of even the slightest note of regret of tragedy in the annual celebration of u.s. independence is the deep disconnect in the consciousness of americans. so it is inherently genocidal in terms of the genocide convention as i laid out. in the case of the british north american colonies in the united states, not only extermination and removal of practice but also the disappearing of the prior existence of indigenous peoples. this continues to be perpetuated in local history. a historian names this practice

of writing indians out of existence bursting and lasting. that's a book i highly recommend. she tells all of the continent local history, monuments and signage near the first settlement, the founders, for school, the first dwelling, first everything as if there had never been occupied to thrive in those places before euro-americans. the national narrative tells of the last indians, the last tribes such as the last of the mohicans, an end of the trail, a famous sculpture by james earle fraser, it's titled. documented policies of genocide on the part of u.s. administrations can be identified in at least four distinct periods. the jacksonian era doing the

u.s. independence, the jacksonian era of forced removal, the california gold rush in northern california, the post-civil war era of the so-called indian wars in the great plains, and the 1950s termination period, all of which are discussed in this book. cases of genocide may be fine and historical documents as well as in the world history from indigenous communities. as an example from 1873 is typical, very explicit orders from general william t. sherman. that may ring a bell as the general that burned atlanta during the civil war. all of the civil war union generals would ride out into the planes and what they really

hard-core military, that brutal civil war, to eliminate the planes people. so he set in 1873, we must with earnestness against the sioux indian, even through their extermination men, women and children during an assault. the soldiers cannot cost to distinguish between male and female or even discriminate as to h. that's pretty explicit. that's pretty typical. it was policy. the peculiarities of colonialism is that the goal is the elimination of indigenous populations in order to make land available to settlers.

that's what colonialism is. not all colonialism, very few areas were under colonization, under imperialist or british or french, spanish with the settler colonialism. the anglo colonies of new zealand, australia, united states and canada, the primary ones in the later period of spanish colonization, argentina, chile, paraguay, uruguay, those were subtler and very similar settler colonial elimination policies. under classic colonialism the indigenous population is wanted for labor. in south asia, south america and so forth. so that project is not limited

government policy but rather involve all kinds of agencies, voluntary militias and the settlers themselves acting on their own but never been punished or curtailed from doing so. immigrants are brought over by the scandinavians and settled in minnesota, a territory, their way paid one way, given some tools. they had to fight, kill the indians. they call the military and to do the job. so that's not worked over and over. but paradoxically the way in which many have acknowledged the fact that genocide leads them to write off near the americans as

irrelevant to politics. they don't exist anymore. actually made of americans have the fastest growing population in the united states right now. never recovering their original 10 million. i mean, maybe one day but nevertheless robust numbers. this new erasure because in the winner takes all kind of democratic politics in the united states, would you indians matter? this was the nature of the politics. this is what an anthropologist calls terminal narrative. it's walking a fine line to explain genocide and then not have people come oh, that's so side, but they're gone. we don't have to do without

anymore. so wilcox called for the active dismantling of the counts of indian histories which explain the absolute cultural death or disappearance of indigenous people. in the wake of u.s. 1950s termination and relocation policies, and indigenous movement arose with the powerful african-american civil rights movement and the broad-based social justice and antiwar movements of the 1960s to indigenous rights movement succeeded in reversing you as termination policy. however, repression, armed attacks of legislative attempts to intrigue rights begin begin in the late 1970s giving rise to the indigenous movement which greatly broadened the support for indigenous sovereignty and territorial rights in the united states.

strengthening indigenous sovereignty and self-determination to prevent the further loss of native lands will take general public outrage and demand which in turn will require that the general population, those descendents and the settlers and immigrants, know their history and assume responsibility. resistance to the powerful forces that prey on the land and on indian country continues to have profound implications for really the future of the united states. i will finish this by having a little bit clear picture of where native people all are physically in the country.

there are more than 500 federally recognized indigenous communities and nations comprising the 3 million people in the united states. that term recognized or acknowledged is an important term because you are probably about three times that many native people who don't have federal acknowledgment. all of the native people were moved from east to the mississippi river to indian territory during the jackson administration, the indian removal. not just the five nations. these are the largest nation's, but all of these nations. so the remnants, not everyone went but those who did not go lost all their rights to be

identified in a collective identity east of the mississippi. there's been this process of the regrouping and reforming their communities or reconstructing their nation's and attempting to get federal acknowledgment. these are the descendents of the 15 million original inhabitants of the land, the majority of whom were farmers who lived in town. this is a very important point. just like other parts of the world, those who live by the ocean were fishers, but that, in the planes they were bison, people of the bison or other animals. but in the chances populations -- densest populations where the farmers comment invented corn.

most of the foods that sustains today. so they were very, a very wealthy people in terms of culture and long life and good health and substance. so that's another myth that there really were only a few people running around. they didn't have any connection with the land itself because they didn't own it individually. they owned land has communities. the united states established a system of indian reservations which doesn't include all native people by any means. some of these are colonies, called colonies in nevada. some of our larger land bases like navajo being the largest.

beyond the land bases within the limits of the 310 federally recognized reservations, indigenous land water and resource rights extend to all federally acknowledged indigenous communities whether they have reservations or not. as a result of federal land sales, seizure and allotment, most reservations are severely fragmented. each parcel of tribal trust and privately held lands is a separate enclave under multiple laws and jurisdiction. the now foundation has the largest contemporary contiguous land base among native nations, nearly 60 million acres, or 25,000 square miles.

it's larger than about 25 states that have membership in the united nations. and several native land bases are. following, this is the other aspect of this book i will just touch on as a major theme. the following world war ii, the united states was at war with much of the world just as it was at war with indigenous people of north america in the 19th century. this was total war demanded the enemy surrender unconditionally or face annihilation.

it was called regeneration through violence, the force that repeat themselves. in the 20th century after the end of warring against the indians, that the overlap because the u.s. moved into the philippines, into the caribbeans with wars of occupation and annexation after the massacre at wounded knee in 1890. so according to the origins, it is more of a rebellion against oppression. that narrative flows from a policy. the broadening and deepening of democracy, the civil war and the ensuing second revolution of the emancipation ending slavery. the 20th century mission to save europe from itself, and the

ultimate triumph and fight against the scourge of communism with the united states inheritance the difficult and burdensome task of keeping order in the world. it's a narrative of progress and benevolence. 1960s social revolutions ignited hyphenated american's, i mean by the african-american liberation movement complicated the origin narrative but it's structure and periodization have been left intact. this incorporation of women, african-americans and immigrants and latinos as contributors to the commonwealth. this narrative produced a nation of immigrants framework and rhetoric, which obscures the u.s. practice of colonization merging colonialism with immigration, where we all came

from somewhere else. how often have you heard that? to the metropolitan centers during and after the industrial revolution. native peoples to the extent they were included at all were renamed first american's and thus themselves cast as distant immigrants. the provincialism and national chauvinism of usage reduction makes it difficult for patients to gain authority to scholars, both indigenous and several important nonindigenous scholars, who attempt to restore the label are rejected for publication on the basis. indigenous scholars look to research and thinking that has emerged in the rest of european colonized world. to understand the historical and current expenses of indigenous people in the united states, these thinkers and writers drop on creatively come and creatively apply the historical

materialism of marxism in some cases, the liberation theology develop in latin america, social analysis of sets of colonialism on the colonizer and the colonized, and other approaches including development theory and postmodern theory, postcolonial theory. while not abandoning insights gained from those sources do the the exceptional mission of the u.s. colonialism among 19th century colonial powers, indigenous scholars and activists are engaged in exploring new approaches. in this book i claim it's a history of the united states from and indigenous peoples perspective, but, of course, there's no such thing as a collective indigenous peoples perspective, just as there is no monolithic asian or european or african people perspective.

it's not a history of the past civilizations and communities that thrive and survive between the gulf of mexico and canada and between the atlantic ocean and pacific. these histories are being written now and they are extremely important and i couldn't have written this book without having access to those written by historians of the indians, and other indigenous communities and nations that have survived. what this book attempts to do is tell the story of the united states as a colonialist settler state, one black colonialist european states subject of the original civilizations in the territories it now roles. indigenous people now in the colonial relationship with united states drive for

millennia before they were displaced or to fragmented reservations and economically decimated. but they are here today and they are still in a colonized situation. we actually have a colonial situation in the united states today, not just in its history. but until history is understood, it's hard to understand that. what the implications are for the whole society, one implication is that there will be, there will have to be geopolitical rearrangements and changes. because about 100 million acres of land in total just in the continent, not including alaska

and hawaii or guam or other colonies of the united states were taken illegally outside treaties and need to be restored as land. there are sacred areas that were taken, just simply seized for national parks or for other reasons like the black hills, yellowstone, grand canyon. of course they were the sacred places of the native people and they were all taken as the settler states property. i think if you think about it most people have no problem about having to ask permission of native people to go to these sacred sites. it doesn't mean being excluded but it means being responsible to the people who are the stewards, the natural stewards of those lands. so i hope you will think about

these things and that you have some provocative questions and comments, and i thank you very much. [applause] >> most people -- is this working? i think most people are sympathetic with your views and understand most of this history, but when i talk to people in the larger culture, i am greeted with an extraordinary hostility. i mean, non-patriots, you know, on hostile to the united states, why don't i move somewhere else? is really a conflict of worldviews which is laid out as a difference in values talking about manifest destiny. to use modern terms, they are

genocide deniers. they just don't even want to the attention to debate. it doesn't matter if 97% of historians agree. how do we deal with that? >> if anyone has a better answer -- open it up. well, i guess, you know i have been committed to working on that. all i can say is that, and i think you're perhaps for my generation so you can also say it has changed somewhat. for those of us who started -- first of all started making this analysis, to really start in the 1950s with some extraordinary

aid people whose names are kind of forgotten even by those of us who got active in the '60s and the '70s. we did know we are kind of reinventing the wheel because back in the 50s people like darcy mcnichols and others have begun to see these things, just like malcolm x did, connected up with this really rang bells. comes out of the age of colonization but i think a lot of consciousness was raised at the time and there were grand events like alcatraz and the wounded knee siege of two and half months but that has waned and it has waned in the world because i call it a counterrevolution against the national liberation movements that had we colonized. these great liberation movements that had so much potential were

crushed, and all kinds of dictatorships and horrible governments, optimistic people came to power, and corporations are big role in going for the resources. we made gains then, important games that i see. when we first started out, there were only about, i don't know, eight or nine may the people with doctorate degrees. trying to break through and going to conferences. the only good anthropologist was

a dot dot dot. a little shocked. anthropology is funny. they just stopped studying indians. they look at gangs and all kinds of things now, but there's not many that study native americans anymore. i think the history is the appropriate discipline for studying, not study characteristics of peopople and pick them apart, human behavior things, but anthropology was invented to tell the settler, europeans, these pages of catawba. these stone age people is that human beings use to be but now we're all modern people. as i said these are all modern

societies, modern societies that were already colonized. this is when i decided to write this book as a way of maybe just laying out in as clear a way as possible, trying to make it available. i had the really good fortune my publisher, beacon press, is an associate of the universal unitarian church. the unitarian church has been in the forefront of condemning the doctrine of discovery of trying to educate their own congregations about, and some of the other churches, but they are committed to putting out a study guide in their own, they get a chimp communities to get this word out.

i decided that it seems like a small thing but i think the consciousness was very important, and maybe something like this is needed as a way for people to reconceptualize and begin talking without being so defensive. in my own family, i may settler colonial and indian in the same family. my dad's family is scott's irish south from the beginning. we were tied to the -- my part indian mother, so in my own family i have those kind of accusations that you get when you get the pat buchanan accusation, yeah, he thinks

mexicans coming to the united states is trying to retake northern mexico. i hope so, you know? [laughter] i don't think so but i hope he is right. >> i recently had opportunity to meet one of -- [inaudible] when she was introducing herself, they were absolutely ignorant to whom russell means. can you speak a little bit about the american indian movement? >> yes, thank you. yes, i always like to talk about the american indian movement. it certainly came to my life. i got involved right after wounded knee and i kind of had

to be brought kicking and screaming into the movement because i wasn't raised in native community. my dad was a farmer, a sharecropper. although we lived in an area with lots of native towns, there were plains indians. my mother was part cherokee, and those almost no communication between the little baptist towns and come indian baptist towns and black baptist towns in oklahoma. but a real system of apartheid. i kind of got recruited to work on the wanted me cases. there were more than 300 people arrested and criminal charges, and i was in law schools i got recruited by some of the lawyers working on it.

of course i got hooked on it. the leadership trials when i got involved, the leadership trials of russell means and others have ended, and they served some prison time. it went on and on and on. i had done my dissertation on the history of land tenure in new mexico. i was interested in a place where three colonialism's had taken place, to heirs of spanish colonialism, the mexican state which was an interesting 20 year period of time, in the united states. sort of looking at these layers of colonialism and how they worked and how it affected land tenure. so that was my specialization. i want to move into looking at oklahoma, other different

situations. but i hadn't thought of the planes at all. i found myself being asked to do this oral history of the suit treaty. that wasn't what i planned to do -- the same indian country. when you get asked by elders to do something it's very hard to say, it's impossible to say no. it would ask you the question. this is what you are going to do now. so i did the great seal nation. it was my first -- sioux nation. it was my first published book. important thing i think russell means was the main mind behind this was forming international indian treaty council 1974, to take that treaty to international levels. these treaties between the united states and different native people, there were 300 legitimate treaties, plenty of

treaties, like to remove the cherokee from george -- georgia, andrew jackson's -- that locked the leaders up and close down their newspaper. that'that's not a legitimate trs but to our legitimate treaties and they are extremely important. that's work i've been doing since we went to geneva in 1977. i'm going to a u.n. conference on indigenous peoples that the u.n. general assembly is having

next week, september 22 and 23rd. it's important work. it's worldwide indigenous peoples personal only the treaty council and started the ball rolling. >> another thing, an example of how important it is to look at, i think many of you are interested in social justice. many people in the united states our, and issues you face climate catastrophe and so forth, that some of the kinds of strategies that native americans have developed are almost always

based on survival. we're all getting a survival mode so it's important to look at the strategies for survival. human solidarity, so the work of the united nations is very important for people to be doing because it's like any government body, it's a government of governments. they will just go off on their own and as politicians do and not do anything very useful unless they have a massive push behind them. they wouldn't be an international treaty of the protection of women if it had not been for the massive worldwide women's movement back in the 1970s. there wouldn't be the rights of the child had it not been for child advocates all over the world gathering, and there's a treaty, a treaty against torture. these things do make a

difference but the media in the united states and the government, of course the right wing, they want you to think that the united nations is a completely useless body, or it's just a security council. security council of its own thing completely separate and it's a problematic institution. but the general assembly and all of the committees. what many people have been doing, at the end of this book i explain it and i have references to other books that can be read on the subject but you can also just go to a u.n..org and look of indigenous people and find the whole history of this movement, what was accomplished. >> and you talk about your research process? were there any unusual documents or interviews that you

encountered in the process of putting this book together? >> that's a really good question. they were. i have to say with all, you know, my long-term real discussed -- discussed the character of andrew jackson, i did not know that he, after the battle of worship and to annihilation of the muskogee creek resistance in alabama, before he was president when he was a major general in the army, that he had his soldiers stripped the bodies of the dead and use the skin to make horse reins.

i didn't know that fact. i didn't know, you know where the term redskin comes from, don't you? it comes from the genocidal campaign against the native, by the puritans against the native people of massachusetts bay. they stripped, pay for laid the bodies, kind of a -- fo certainy they've done it in ireland in the conquest of ireland. they stripped the bodies, and a body without skin is red and they called them the redskins. literally dead indians. that's why it's so repulsive to native people. it's almost not seating to even

talk about it. a lot of people don't understand why it is such a negative. because native americans don't mind being called other names like indians. not an authentic name or anything but this is a deep racial slur, is a symbol of genocide. so another thing more recent that i came across were the cases that were being used as precedents and the decisions what to do with of the unlawful combatants, a word that never existed in international law that the great george w. bush invented, or his aides. they're usually called pows. but in order to lock them up at guantánamo where they still are. some of them were brought to the

constitution set of rights made that possible, still fighting to get these people trials because they're just held for over without ever coming to trial. some of the cases were based on 19th century indian war case. one was a seminal case and one was a case of the pit river indians in california who killed the modoc's. the modoc war in which they killed a u.s. general. in the trial they found that they were outlaws and they deserve execution because this was a crime beyond any kind of

law, anglo idea of an outlaw, anyone can kill because they are outside the law. they are wolves. they used to call them rules, so children. and the case was, one of the seminole indians case so i was not aware the judicial, this is military justice. the military judicial system is actually using as legitimate cases genocidal wars against native people in the 19th century to justify to the wars taking place right now. so i found out disturbing but i shouldn't have been so surprised that they would do that.

that it's an active part that it's not just history. it's an active part of the press and. that's one thing i really tried to get across in this book as part of our culture right now. >> this is perhaps a bit transgendered to topic but you mentioned you were to lock in new mexico. i was curious if you could talk about this place i really spent a lot of time and i wish to see you talk about the disappearance of the pueblos in the 1650s that happened very early on. they weren't huge, thriving pueblos unlike the other indians that are still very well-known today, never survived. >> you tell me about them. >> there were three of them. in new mexico.

centered around the mountains. they were every bit as amazing as the current day pueblo, perhaps even more so. >> now i know what you are talking about. they were actually 98 when blows when the spanish king in 1598. they brought 500 settlers, settled there. within a generation the number of pueblos were reduced to 21 from 98. that was a combination of things that was mainly warfare. because the pueblos thought --

fought back to the novel and apache fighting alongside them, and they finally, 1680, 82 years after the colony began, drove the spanish completely. allowed religious practices so as a different kind of colonization. but each of those pueblos are remembered. there are sites where they are. the pueblos, part of it was a were shifting around because, that was the settler colonialism at the time. the typical colonialism where they wanted land to put them on to make them a colony so

proficient. it was a kind of experiment of the spanish because everyone else all the one was gold and silver and go into the minds in use the native people as labor, work them to death. they thought they would establish this colony and try a settler colony. the british had begun to do it. new england seemed successful. so all of the things they talk about here, settler colonialism, this elimination. the pueblos out of practice. for instance, kaibab lake was endemic to the gigantic -- bubonic plague and when played with it, they would burn down the whole city state. these are city states, they live in apartment buildings. they would burn it down and move

and build a new one. everything was for the best of human beings. things can be rebuilt but you can't replace the people who are there, who died. it's a wonderful concept, that material things are not the most important thing. the human being is. so the spanish were discouraged. so in some cases they left and many of them left to join the novel and the apache who were resisting and merging with them. that continued that there was this resistant force. they were never conquered by the spanish. but some of it was just the spanish annexing taking over these prosperous villages and forcing people out.

so those villages are among -- but they are all remembered, people remember their lineages. it was one of the first ones destroyed. >> is our time up? >> one more big round of applause. >> thank you so much. [applause] >> we can happily continue the conversation at the same table. the are still plenty of copies downstairs at the information desk when you first walk into the store. we ask you to purchase the book before we write in the sharpie in its. we will be here long enough to go to the, we will be here. transforming.

>> you are watching booktv, television for serious readers. you can watch any program you see online at booktv.org. >> richard brookhiser come senior editor of "national review" recounts abraham lincoln's affinity for the founding fathers. this program from the new york historical society in new york city last about one hour. >> we ought to be thrilled to welcome back richard brookhiser to the new york historical society. as you know he is renowned historian author, senior editor of "national review" as well as a columnist for american history. in 2004 he served as historian and curator for our really spectacular