Heeding the Voices of Our Ancestors Kahnawake Mohawk Politics and the Rise of Native Nationalism

by Alfred, Gerald Robert

• ISBN13: 9780195411386
• ISBN10: 0195411382
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1995-09-21
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

This book is the first comprehensive study of the driving force behind Native political activism, and the only scholarly treatment of North American Indian politics which integrates an explicitly Native perspective. With a broad historical scope rich in detail, and drawing on the particular experience of the Mohawks of Kahnawake, it offers an explanation of Indian and Inuit political activism focusing on the importance of traditional values and institutions in shaping Native responses to the state. The book explains the recent rise of a militant assertion of sovereignty on the part of Native people in terms of three major factors: the existence of alternative institutions in the body of the nation's traditional culture; the self-conscious development of an alternative identity; and a persistent pattern of negative interaction with the state. It differs from other analyses focusing on similar factors in that it views nationalism not as a movement which activates in response to external factors, but as a persistent feature of political life which manifests itself in either a latent or active form in response to the interaction of the three factors discussed in the model.

Author Biography

Gerald Robert Alfred is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science and Director of the Centre for Native Education at Concordia University in Montreal.

Table of Contents

Preface

Introduction

Reconceptualizing Nationalism

Theoretical Framework

People of the Flint, Sign of the Cross: The Origins of Kahnawake's Political Culture

Kanienke - Ancestral Mohawk Homeland

The Mohawk Nation and New France

Motivations for the Mohawk Movement

Depopulating the Mohawk Valley

The Mohawk Nation and Trade

Shifting Goals and Strategies

The Dragon of Discord: Kahnawake in the Modern Era

The Indian Act

Reaction: The First Traditionalist Revival

Promise of the Past: The Second Traditionalist Revival

Back to the Woods: Traditionalism in Kahnawake

Views on Reformation

Iroquois Political Tradition - Kaienerekowa

The Traditionalist Vanguard in Kahnawake

Mainstream Nationalist Ideology in Kahnawake

Three Mohawk Chiefs

Views on Sovereignty

Views on Identity

The Structure of Government in Kahnawake

Delegitimizing the Indian Act System

Revitalizing Confederacy Linkages

Current Institutions of Mohawk Government

Reforming the Canada-Kahnawake Relationship

Interactions and Their Impact

Conflict over Territory and Membership

Interaction I - The Mohawk Land Base

Interaction II - Membershi

The Rise of Native Nationalism

Key Elements

Comparative Framework

The Pervasiveness and Persistence of Ethno-Nationalism

Bibliography

Notes

Index

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