Box 1.3
(cultural anthropology), learning and recording
languages (linguistic anthropology), measuring
the physical attributes of the people (biological
anthropology), and excavating archaeological
sites.
Anthropology in North America has a long
history of entanglement with Indigenous
peoples of North America. From the late 1800s
to the late 1900s, the overwhelming focus of
anthropological study was on Indigenous groups
in the territories now known as Canada and the
United States. Anthropologists saw the rapid
rate at which Indigenous populations were
declining, traditional lifeways were changing,
languages were disappearing, and archaeological
sites were being destroyed. This led to many
anthropologists undertaking what is known as
salvage ethnography, recording as best they
could what life was like before the influence
of Europeans. There was some specialization,
but many anthropologists were practicing fourfield anthropology, meaning fieldwork for them
usually included studying the Indigenous peoples
in their own territories, undertaking ethnography
Although there were certainly some good
relationships between anthropologist and
Indigenous peoples, it is justifiable to state that
until the latter part of the twentieth century,
the relationship was largely exploitative.
Anthropologists would often take much from
the Indigenous peoples in regard to their cultural
knowledge and beliefs, as well as hundreds of
thousands of human skeletons and millions of
artifacts, while providing nothing or very little
in exchange. Anthropologists were advancing
their own careers, filling museums, and making
contributions to the discipline of anthropology
at the expense of Indigenous peoples.
Anthropologists began to be called out by some
Indigenous peoples in the 1960s. One of the most
prominent voices, Vine Deloria Jr. (Dakota Sioux)
published a scathing criticism in his book Custer
The Indigenous Peoples
of North America and
Anthropology
© 2016 University of Toronto Press
credited with many important developments in the field of anthropology, including the four-field approach in anthropology as it is practiced in North America. He
became one of the first professors of anthropology and obtained significant funding
for anthropology research projects. Boas also trained many of the most prominent
North American anthropologists of the early 1900s (including Alfred Kroeber,
Margaret Mead, and Edward Sapir), encouraged women to become anthropologists, and formally trained and collaborated with Indigenous peoples (including
Ella Deloria and George Hunt).
The history of anthropology in North America has been intricately intertwined with the Indigenous peoples of the continent. Since the late 1800s some
anthropologists have had good relations with Indigenous peoples, but for many
the relationship can be characterized as exploitative on the part of anthropologists.
Serious and widely published criticisms of anthropology in North America, by
Indigenous people, began to become well known in the 1960s, and since that time,
the relations can generally be characterized as better. Most anthropological work
involving Indigenous peoples, for example, is now done only with the consent of
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Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto (1988:78–
100), which includes the following excerpt:
INTO EACH LIFE, it is said, some rain must
fall. Some people have bad horoscopes;
others take tips on the stock market …
but Indians have been cursed above
all other people in history. Indians
have anthropologists…. Over the years
anthropologists have succeeded in burying
the Indian communities so completely
beneath the mass of irrelevant information
that the total impact of the scholarly
community on Indian people has become
one of simple authority…. The implications of
the anthropologist … should be clear for the
Indian. Compilation of useless knowledge “for
knowledge’s sake” should be utterly rejected
by the Indian people…. In the meantime it
would be wise for anthropologists to get
down from their thrones of authority and
PURE research and begin helping Indian
tribes instead of preying on them.
The relationship between Indigenous peoples
and anthropologists has significantly improved
in recent decades. Many Indigenous people have
entered the profession, and anthropologists
who continue to work with Indigenous people
in North America do so largely with their
permission and on their behalf. Linguistic
anthropologists often work with Indigenous
groups in efforts to record and revitalize
languages; archaeologists often work in support
of claims of Indigenous rights and territories;
and cultural anthropologist are often involved
in assisting with documenting Traditional
Use Studies (TUS) and Traditional Ecological
Knowledge (TEK). Anthropologists are also
often involved in supporting Indigenous peoples
in addressing stereotypes, misconceptions,
cultural appropriation, and commodification of
their heritage. In many ways, the relationship
that anthropologists have with Indigenous
peoples can now be characterized as supportive,
rather than exploitative.
© 2016 University of Toronto Press
the Indigenous peoples and with the anthropologist providing something of value,
including knowledge, back to the Indigenous peoples.
Over the past few decades, anthropologists trained and working in North
America have disentangled the relationship between the discipline and the
Indigenous peoples of the continent. Indigenous peoples are not as central to
North American anthropology as they once were. Anthropologists still work with
Indigenous peoples in the traditional areas of research such as ethnography, archaeology, and linguistics, but their interests in Indigenous peoples also include many
other areas, including Indigenous identity and cultural appropriation.
There are many other threads of interest in contemporary anthropology in
early twenty-first-century North America, including but certainly not limited to
corporate culture, youth culture, popular culture, militarization and warfare, terrorism, food, sustainability, disease, education, queer culture, gender, and much more.
Many anthropologists now work among the voiceless and disenfranchised in North
America, such as the homeless in urban areas and undocumented migrants, often
challenging widely held misconceptions about their lives. Many anthropologists
also address the concept of race, covered more fully in Chapters 4 and 8.
Chapter 1: Introduction: Viewing the World through the Lens of Anthropology
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