2015 Recipient of the American Book Award
The first history of the United States told from the perspective of indigenous peoples
Today in the United States, there are more than five hundred federally recognized Indigenous nations comprising nearly three million people, descendants of the fifteen million Native people who once inhabited this land. The centuries-long genocidal program of the US settler-colonial regimen has largely been omitted from history. Now, for the first time, acclaimed historian and activist Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz offers a history of the United States told from the perspective of Indigenous peoples and reveals how Native Americans, for centuries, actively resisted expansion of the US empire.
In An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States, Dunbar-Ortiz adroitly challenges the founding myth of the United States and shows how policy against the Indigenous peoples was colonialist and designed to seize the territories of the original inhabitants, displacing or eliminating them. And as Dunbar-Ortiz reveals, this policy was praised in popular culture, through writers like James Fenimore Cooper and Walt Whitman, and in the highest offices of government and the military. Shockingly, as the genocidal policy reached its zenith under President Andrew Jackson, its ruthlessness was best articulated by US Army general Thomas S. Jesup, who, in 1836, wrote of the Seminoles: “The country can be rid of them only by exterminating them.”
Spanning more than four hundred years, this classic bottom-up peoples’ history radically reframes US history and explodes the silences that have haunted our national narrative.
From the Hardcover edition.
The first history of the United States told from the perspective of indigenous peoples
Today in the United States, there are more than five hundred federally recognized Indigenous nations comprising nearly three million people, descendants of the fifteen million Native people who once inhabited this land. The centuries-long genocidal program of the US settler-colonial regimen has largely been omitted from history. Now, for the first time, acclaimed historian and activist Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz offers a history of the United States told from the perspective of Indigenous peoples and reveals how Native Americans, for centuries, actively resisted expansion of the US empire.
In An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States, Dunbar-Ortiz adroitly challenges the founding myth of the United States and shows how policy against the Indigenous peoples was colonialist and designed to seize the territories of the original inhabitants, displacing or eliminating them. And as Dunbar-Ortiz reveals, this policy was praised in popular culture, through writers like James Fenimore Cooper and Walt Whitman, and in the highest offices of government and the military. Shockingly, as the genocidal policy reached its zenith under President Andrew Jackson, its ruthlessness was best articulated by US Army general Thomas S. Jesup, who, in 1836, wrote of the Seminoles: “The country can be rid of them only by exterminating them.”
Spanning more than four hundred years, this classic bottom-up peoples’ history radically reframes US history and explodes the silences that have haunted our national narrative.
From the Hardcover edition.
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An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States
August 11, 2015 | 312 pages
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1
DadDigits
(Grade: B+) She writes a passionate history of the genocide perpetrated against the indigenous tribes located in what is now the United States of America. I did notice a few factual mistakes but she definitely knows her stuff.
(Grade: B+) She writes a passionate history of the genocide perpetrated against the indigenous tribes located in what is now the United States of America. I did notice a few factual mistakes but she definitely knows her stuff.(Rated on Aug 30, 2020)
1
bennett_the_ceo
(Grade: B+) This is a very worthwhile reading experience for any American who received a traditional whitewashed education in US history (and the military fanaticism which comes with it). Yes, the author has a clear agenda and no intent of writing a true textbook, but the points raised ought to be considered by every citizen of this nation who is living on stolen land. The book's only shortcomings are related to structure and the rushed depictions of pivotal events like Wounded Knee and the Trail of Tears.
(Grade: B+) This is a very worthwhile reading experience for any American who received a traditional whitewashed education in US history (and the military fanaticism which comes with it). Yes, the author has a clear agenda and no intent of writing a true textbook, but the points raised ought to be considered by every citizen of this nation who is living on stolen land. The book's only shortcomings are related to structure and the rushed depictions of pivotal events like Wounded Knee and the Trail of Tears.(Rated on Sep 18, 2020)