Because they are so primitive, the Comanches have no history: the way they lived in the 1800s is assumed to be the way they had always lived, and the only way they ever could live.Ī good counterpoint to this book would be Comanche author Paul Chaat Smith’s funny and insightful Everything You Know About Indians Is Wrong. The Comanches as a whole are treated, not as a nation with a history and culture, but as a body of fierce, “primitive” horseback warriors with women and children stowed back at camp under tepees. Because race explains so much, the book dwells with fascination on the “white squaw” Cynthia Ann Parker and her “mixed-blood” son, Quanah. The contest is a racial one and the outcome is inevitable. This old-fashioned western history pits civilized white people against savage redmen in a bloody contest for control of land. Reading the book is like having the ghosts of cavalrymen and settlers rise up to harangue us about the bloody deeds of “wild Indians,” while Indian ghosts remain quiet in their unmarked graves. But my first scout through the pages, including a long camp in the bibliography, showed me a history as dead and barren as Ezekiel’s plain of dry bones. Knowing how much better Indian histories have become in recent years, I came to Empire of the Summer Moon with high hopes. But I do have an in-depth understanding of how challenging it is to write the history of a people whose records were kept by their conquerors. I’m no expert on the Comanches and only have a general acquaintance with the Great Plains nations. ISBN 978–1416591061Īs a student of American Indian history (in the Southeast), I have been asked more than once whether I’ve read this popular book. (Wikimedia Commons) EMPIRE OF THE SUMMER MOON : Quanah Parker and the rise and fall of the Comanches, the most powerful Indian tribe in American history, by S. C. politics video viola da gamba war War of 1812 Wikipedia writingĬomanche warrior “Ako” and horse, 1892. Orobpa, Qoqzaz… Is the "ISIS map" for real?Īrchives Archives 2008 academia Afghanistan American Indians American literature bait & switch baroque Birmingham books campaign finance Christianity Congress conspiracy theories consumer courts Creek Indians culture Dems dissertation economy education elections environment feds Florida Georgia German grocery tax Haydn health care Hespèrion XXI historians history human rights internet Iraq Islam Islamophobia Israel Jordi Savall Justice Dept language Marais media music Muslims mvskoke Obama Palestine parody peace philosophy place names poetry propaganda race Repubs Siegelman South South Carolina Spanish talk radio taxes terrorism this blog torture TV U.S.Where does the name Waxahatchee come from?.Notes and chicken jokes by a Muslim grad student who does history in Alabama.
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