LAKOTA EXPERIENCES OF SECURITY: SELF AND THE SOCIAL by Justin de Leon A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the University of Delaware in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Political Science and International Relations Summer 2016 © 2016 Justin de Leon All Rights Reserved LAKOTA EXPERIENCES OF SECURITY: SELF AND THE SOCIAL by Justin de Leon Approved: __________________________________________________________ Paul R. Brewer, Ph.D. Interim Chair of the Department of Political Science and International Relations Approved: __________________________________________________________ George H. Watson, Ph.D. Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences Approved: __________________________________________________________ Ann L. Ardis, Ph.D. Senior Vice Provost for Graduate and Professional Education I certify that I have read this dissertation and that in my opinion it meets the academic and professional standard required by the University as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Signed: __________________________________________________________ Daniel M. Green, Ph.D. Co-Professor in charge of dissertation I certify that I have read this dissertation and that in my opinion it meets the academic and professional standard required by the University as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Signed: __________________________________________________________ Jennifer K. Lobasz, Ph.D. Co-Professor in charge of dissertation I certify that I have read this dissertation and that in my opinion it meets the academic and professional standard required by the University as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Signed: __________________________________________________________ Elaine R. Salo, Ph.D. Member of dissertation committee I certify that I have read this dissertation and that in my opinion it meets the academic and professional standard required by the University as a dissertation for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Signed: __________________________________________________________ David MacDonald, Ph.D. Member of dissertation committee ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am extremely grateful to the members of my doctoral examination committee, many of whom had their own busy schedule and personal challenges throughout my writing process. A sincere thank you to my advisor Jennifer K. Lobasz; my chair, Daniel Green; and to committee members Elaine Salo and David MacDonald. I wish to thank those on the Lakota reservation who opened up their hearts and their homes to me for multiple years. This includes the Tribal Council who gave me their consent to conduct research within the reservation. It goes without saying that without their trust and assistance none of this could have been created. Thank you to the continual support of my partner Niki de Leon who helped me stay focus and grounded through this process. There are also many others who assisted me in the writing of this dissertation including Patrick Thaddeus Jackson, Brooke Ackerly, and Claire Rasmussen who gave me meaningful feedback while still at the proposal stages; Margaret Stetz and Pacha Bueno-Hansen who acted as important allies throughout my graduate and writing process; Sheryl Lightfoot who took the time to provide feedback and professional guidance; Tim Pachirat for showing me that an American intervention should be concerned with phenomena within American borders; Thu-Huong Nguyen- iv Vo who helped me think of corporal regimes as a means of understanding experiences on the reservation; Sahar Sattarzadeh, Nikos Vasilakis, Frank Gonzalez, Amanda Holmes, Catherine Fox, and Liam Cunningham who all assisted me with making sense of various theoretical challenges; Samantha Kelley and Brett Remkus who assisted at various points with additional citations and formatting; and to Lynn Corbett for keeping me on track and always being a supportive figure. v To those on the reservation who are working day by day to bring light into the world. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES ...................................................................................................... xiii ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................ xiv Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................. 1 Field Note: Those who have a foundation have security ................................... 1 Section 1: Introduction ..................................................................................... 10 Lived experiences ....................................................................................... 10 Why focus on Native Americans and Indigenous peoples? ....................... 11 Fieldwork and methodology overview ....................................................... 16 Normative and positive language ............................................................... 18 Going Native and strong objectivity ........................................................... 20 Section 2: Lakota Lived Experiences of Security ............................................ 22 Historical context ........................................................................................ 22 Contemporary findings ............................................................................... 25 Spiritual metaphor of the Lakota hoop broken ........................................... 27 Reestablishing the hoop through self-affirmative cultural practices .......... 28 Engaging the past ....................................................................................... 30 Section 3: Lacanian Conceptualization of Self and Social ............................... 32 Science of the Subject ................................................................................ 33 Surveillance and confinement as the look of the subject ........................... 37 Phenomenology .......................................................................................... 40 A framework for understanding Lakota security ........................................ 44 Lacan for an Indigenous context ................................................................ 45 Foregrounding Lakota experiences and worldviews .................................. 52 Section 4: Structure of the Dissertation ............................................................ 53 ENDNOTES ..................................................................................................... 56 vii 2 STATE OF THE DISCIPLINE ........................................................................ 62 Section 1: Critical Security Studies and Ontological Security ......................... 63 Critical Security Studies and the Copenhagen School ............................... 63 Ontological security .................................................................................... 68 Section 2: The Benefits of Interdisciplinarity: IR and NAS ............................. 70 Engaging Indigenous experiences in IR ..................................................... 71 Section 3: Contributions to International Relations ......................................... 75 Lacan, IR, and security — Jenny Edkins ................................................... 75 Cosmology, IR, and security – J. Marshall Beier ....................................... 78 Section 4: Contributions to Native American Studies ...................................... 81 Politics of recognition, Indigenous politics, and IR – Glen Coulthard ...... 82 Engaging the phenomenal order, resilience, and rebuilding – Don Fixico 85 Section 5: Concluding Thoughts ...................................................................... 86 ENDNOTES ..................................................................................................... 87 3 METHODOLOGY AND ANALYTIC STRATEGIES ................................... 88 Section 1: My Place in the Academic Project .................................................. 89 Who I am .................................................................................................... 89 Getting told off ........................................................................................... 90 My brownness ............................................................................................ 91 Separating identities: station and person .................................................... 93 Who do I come from? ................................................................................. 95 Asian in America ........................................................................................ 97 Role of gender ............................................................................................ 99 Indigenous of North America and the Bahá’í faith .................................. 101 Section 2: Philosophical Foundations ............................................................ 102 Ontology: Interpretivism/reflexivism ....................................................... 102 Abductive reasoning ................................................................................. 105 Section 3: Methodological Considerations and Theoretical Perspectives ...... 106 viii Constructivism .......................................................................................... 107 Feminist methodology .............................................................................. 107 Data collected at margins ........................................................................