Medicine Ways Disease, Health, and Survival among Native Americans

by Trafzer, Clifford E.; Weiner, Diane; Akers, Donna L.; Castillo, Edward D.; Keller, Jean A.; Benson, Todd; Reifel, Nancy; Levi, Jerome M.; Olson, Brooke; Hodge, Felicia Schanche; Burhansstipanov, Linda; Henderson, Eric; and Holly Tomren, Troy Johnson; and

• ISBN13: 9780742502550
• ISBN10: 0742502554
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-03-07
• Publisher: AltaMira Press

Summary

Improving the dire health problems faced by many Native American communities is central to their cultural, political, and economic well being. However, it is still too often the case that both theoretical studies and applied programs fail to account for Native American perspectives on the range of factors that actually contribute to these problems in the first place. The authors in Medicine Ways examine the ways people from a multitude of indigenous communities think about and practice health care within historical and socio-cultural contexts. Cultural and physical survival are inseparable for Native Americans. Chapters explore biomedically-identified diseases, such as cancer and diabetes, as well as Native-identified problems, including historical and contemporary experiences such as force evacuation, assimilation, boarding school, poverty, and a slew of federal and state policies and initiatives. They also explore applied solutions that are based in community prerogatives and world-views, whether they be indigenous, Christian, biomedical, or some combination

Table of Contents

Introduction	vii
Clifford E. Trafzer
Diane Weiner
Removing the Heart of the Choctaw People: Indian Removal from a Native Perspective	1	(15)
Donna L. Akers
Blood Came from Their Mouths: Tongva and Chumash Responses to the Pandemic of 1801	16	(16)
Edward D. Castillo
``In the fall of the year we were troubled with some sickness'': Typhoid Fever Deaths at Sherman Institute, 1904	32	(20)
Jean A. Keller
Blinded with Science: American Indians, the Office of Indian Affairs, and the Federal Campaign against Trachoma, 1924--1927	52	(24)
Todd Benson
Infant Mortality on the Yakama Indian Reservation, 1914--1964	76	(19)
Clifford E. Trafzer
American Indian Views of Public-Health Nursing, 1930--1950	95	(13)
Nancy Reifel
Interpreting Ideas about Diabetes, Genetics, and Inheritance	108	(26)
Diane Weiner
The Embodiment of a Working Identity: Power and Process in Raramuri Ritual Healing	134	(29)
Jerome M. Lvi
Meeting the Challenges of American Indian Diabetes: Anthropological Perspectives on Prevention and Treatment	163	(22)
Brooke Olson
Pathways to Health: An American Indian Breast-Cancer Education Project	185	(14)
Felicia Schanche Hodge
John Casken
Cancer among American Indians and Alaska Natives: Trouble with Numbers	199	(23)
Linda Burhansstipanov
James W. Hampton
Martha J. Tenney
The Origins of Navajo Youth Gangs	222	(12)
Eric Henderson
Stephen J. Kunitz
Jerrold E. Levy
Helplessness, Hopelessness, and Despair: Identifying the Precursors to Indian Youth Suicide	234	(17)
Troy Johnson
Holly Tomren
Self-Sufficiency and Community Revitalization among American Indians in the Southwest: American Indian Leadership Training	251	(22)
Jeanette Hassin
Robert S. Young
Index	273	(7)
About the Contributors	280