Native American Testimony: 2a Chronicle of Indian-White Relations from Prophecy to the Present

Anthropologist Nabokov ( Two Leggings ) here reorganizes his impressive 1978 book of the same title and expands it with additional material on relations between Native Americans and whites to cover the reservation period of the mid-1800s to the present. This unique history is told in the voices of the vanquished Indians as they contemplate the whites' invasion of the continent and observe threats to their survival and that of their culture. Using government documents, recorded speeches, newspaper interviews and autobiographies, Nabokov revivifies the words of Sitting Bull, Ely Parker, Tecumseh and others as they speak on such themes as first encounters with Christianity, education in government schools and defiance of the status quo in the 1960s and '70s. Coupled with Nabokov's lucid lead-ins, the testimony recorded here offers a compelling alternative view of U.S. history. Photos not seen by PW. (Dec.)