UNIVERSITY of CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO Inhabiting Indianness: US
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UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO Inhabiting Indianness: US Colonialism and Indigenous Geographies A Dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the Requirements for the degree of Doctorate of Philosophy in Ethnic Studies by Natchee Blu Barnd Committee in charge: Professor Ross Frank, Chair Professor Yen Le Espiritu Professor Rosemary George Professor David Pellow Professor Paul Spickard 2008 Copyright Natchee Blu Barnd All rights reserved. SIGNATURE PAGE The dissertation of Natchee Blu Barnd is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication. ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________ Chair University of California, San Diego 2008 iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Signature Page...............................................................................................................iii Table of Contents ..........................................................................................................iv List of Figures................................................................................................................vi List of Tables................................................................................................................vii Acknowledgements .....................................................................................................viii Vita .................................................................................................................................x Abstract of the Dissertation.........................................................................................xxi Introduction: ...................................................................................................................1 Chapter 1: Thanking the Intellectual Ancestors: A Literature Review ..........................6 Differential Inclusion..................................................................................................8 Indianness .................................................................................................................13 Culture ......................................................................................................................21 Indigenous Geography..............................................................................................34 Chapter 2: What’s Under the Mascot’s Costume?: Spectacular and Mundane Productions of Neocolonial Space................................................................................44 Revisiting Mascots ...................................................................................................50 Vallejo Apaches........................................................................................................62 Elsie Allen Matters ...................................................................................................75 Conclusion................................................................................................................84 Chapter 3: “M-M-M, This Is Living!”: “Inhabiting Indianness” in the United States.88 Colonial Culs-De-Sac...............................................................................................92 Indian Street Clusters and Whiteness.....................................................................103 Blackness, Browness, Asians, and Indians.............................................................111 Indians and “Race-Free Men” In Paradise .............................................................124 Conclusion..............................................................................................................142 Chapter 4: Punching John Wayne in the Mouth: Contesting Indianness and Reclaiming Indigenous Geographies..........................................................................146 American Indian Intellectual Traditions and Indigenous Geographies..................150 iv Heap of Birds: Re-Placing Indigenous Geographies..............................................161 Who’s Your Pilgrim? .............................................................................................171 Erdrich: De-Facing the West..................................................................................179 Alexie : Queering the West .....................................................................................187 Alexie: Songs of Dislocation..................................................................................193 Echo-Hawk: Displacing Heroes .............................................................................200 Conclusion..............................................................................................................209 Conclusion..................................................................................................................211 References ..................................................................................................................214 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure 2.1: 1954 Vallejo High School Yearbook........................................................66 Figure 2.2: Vallejo High School “C” Building Wall...................................................67 Figure 2.3: 1996 Vallejo High School Yearbook........................................................68 Figure 2.4: Photograph (detail) of Naiche by A. Frank Randall .................................69 Figure 3.1: Locations of Top Twenty-Five Clusters ...................................................95 Figure 3.2: Detail of Photograph Overlooking Portion of Ahwatukee, Arizona.........97 Figure 3.3: Country Lake Estates, New Jersey “Super” Cluster Use of “Trails”......100 Figure 3.4: Map of Cherokee Village, Arkansas.......................................................106 Figure 3.5: 1957 San Diego Magazine Advertisement for “Clairemont Hills” ........128 Figure 3.6: “Kumeyaay Lands 1769-2000” Map ......................................................141 Figure 4.1: Barona Reservation Sign in San Diego County, California....................159 Figure 4.2: “Don’t Want Indians” (2005)..................................................................164 Figure 4.3: “Today Your Host is Shinnecock” (1988)..............................................166 Figure 4.4: “New York: Purchased? Stolen? Reclaimed?” (1997) ...........................167 Figure 4.5: “Your Hero” (2004) ................................................................................204 vi LIST OF TABLES Table 3.1: Cluster Categories Summary......................................................................94 Table 3.2: Regional Locations of Twenty-Five Largest Cluster Cities.....................101 Table 3.3: Racial Composition of Largest Indian Cluster Cities/Towns...................105 vii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS If I could thoroughly and sufficiently offer my written thanks and recognition to those who I owe debts, I would be required to write another dissertation length document. I hope that those special people who have enabled me to embark upon and complete this long and challenging academic quest will accept this document in its place, and as brief testament to their important roles in my life. In the spirit of my research concerns, I must begin with my acknowledgements of the native peoples in the various lands where I worked to complete this project. In San Diego, I inhabited the lands of the Kumeyaay. Growing up, I shared the geographies of the Pomo and Coast Miwok, many of whom were good friends and family. In Sacramento, I occupied space in the lands of the Nisenan Maidu and Mewuk. I offer this humble work as partial payment for my passage through and use of these lands, and as petition that others make the same kinds of acknowledgements and offerings. Of course, my ultimate debt is owed to the woman who bore and raised me almost entirely single-handedly. If I am a good man, as she says, it is undoubtedly because of the love, support, and inspiration she always offered. Grace Anongchanya supported me in every way she could, even after it meant a slight divergence of our individual paths. Shamani may not know it, but she provided necessary perspective and support. She always asked me about my work and life, and tolerated the unusual lifestyle of her graduate student father. She inspired/s me daily. I thank the staff of Sonoma State University’s Upward Bound for their persistence in getting a rambunctious teenager with too much of a smart-mouth, an attitude, and designs on playing football to accidentally go to college. Thanks to: Jose Hernandez, Morena Taylor, Gene Calhoun, and Lanette Brown. I would also like to note all of those mentors who supported me during my undergraduate years. My EOP counselors, Ken Levels, Toni Castro, and Leo Alvillar. Later, I received tremendous support from Joyce Chong. Many thanks to several colleagues in UC San Diego Ethnic Studies: Sandra Angeleri, Lisa Cacho, Faye Caronan, Tere Ceseña, Lilia Fernandez, May Fu, Monika Gosin, Julie Hua, Denise Khor, Grace Kim, John Marquez, Paula Seniors, Ruby Tapia, Michael Troung, Theo Verinakis, and Thuy Vo Dang. Special thanks to my own cohort: Theresa Cenidoza-Suarez, Ralina Landwher-Joseph, and Jesse Mills. In the Literature department, my thanks to Jinah Kim and Morelia Portillo. I also learned immensely