Indigenous Persistence in the Colonized Americas - by Heather Law Pezzarossi & Russell N Sheptak (Hardcover)

About the Book

This scholarly collection explores the method and theory of the archaeological study of indigenous persistence and long-term colonial entanglement.

Book Synopsis

This scholarly collection explores the method and theory of the archaeological study of indigenous persistence and long-term colonial entanglement. Each contributor offers an examination of the complex ways that indigenous communities in the Americas have navigated the circumstances of colonial and postcolonial life, which in turn provides a clearer understanding of anthropological concepts of ethnogenesis and hybridity, survivance, persistence, and refusal.

Indigenous Persistence in the Colonized Americas highlights the unique ability of historical anthropology to bring together various kinds of materials--including excavated objects, documents in archives, and print and oral histories--to provide more textured histories illuminated by the archaeological record. The work also extends the study of historical archaeology by tracing indigenous societies long after their initial entanglement with European settlers and colonial regimes. The contributors engage a geographic scope that spans Spanish, English, French, Dutch, and other models of colonization.

Review Quotes

"The book's editors . . . offer the advantage of reframing perseverance or cultural persistence in ways that consciously eschew questions about authenticity and legitimacy, given that these ideas were colloquially used to disenfranchise, erase, delegitimize, or otherwise deny Indigenous descendant communities their cultural identities. With consideration of a set of concepts (e.g., residence, sovereignty) that contribute to Native self-determination, the contributors' approaches actively contribute to the larger project of decolonizing the discipline."--Christine D. Beaule, American Antiquity