Lakota America: A New History of Indigenous Power (The Lamar Series in Western History)

It is with a sigh of relief to read this inclusive text researched and written by an Indigenous author. Thank you for this book.

This is one of the best books on American History I have read in years. The writer is clearly an expert. I urge you to read this book and his book on the Comanche Empire.

The conventional image of Native Americans- even when articulated by highly sympathetic recent movies like "Dances with Wolves"- is of nomadic, horse-using buffalo hunters. In other words, the Lakota Sioux in their mid-19th century pomp are treated as normative (as Hamalainen pointed out in his previous study of the Comanches, the said film was based on a novel set among the latter people but relocated northwards to fit audience expectations) . One of Hamalainen's great services in this fascinating book is to point out that even the Lakota had only been full-on mounted nomads for little more than half a century before their dramatic triumph on the Little Big Horn. He traces their history from their origins (or at least their earliest appearance in written records in seventeenth century French accounts) as hunter-gatherers to the south west of the Great Lakes, though successive geographical shifts and reinventions of their way of life up to their moment of glory, bringing the story down to the present day. The Lakota emerge as supreme opportunists with a quite amazing ability to shift their shape to fit the changing environment around them- and to dominate their neighbours. Right up the eve of their fateful clash with the US in the 1870's they were an expanding power, thriving on trade routes across North America (in some respects they were better armed than the cash-strapped US soldiers who had to fight them). For a long time there was no particular reason for the two expanding American imperial powers- the Lakota and the USA- to come into conflict (indeed for much of the first half of the 19th century they were effectively allied, with US vaccinations sometimes enabling the Lakota to avoid the smallpox that devastated their neighbours). Even when the clash came, the Lakota were well placed to win it, facing post-Civil War US administrations unwilling to invest huge sums of money in Indian Wars and pressured by a vocal pro-Indian lobby in the eastern states which the Lakota proved well able to play to. Hamalainen tells the story brilliantly. If there was a option to dock him half a star, I'd be tempted to do so. At times he has a slightly rose tinted view of his subjects, who were capable of being every bit as ruthless and exploitative in their dealings with their neighbours (including white ones) as any European or Euro-American colonialist. It's also clear that Lakota society in its mounted buffalo hunting prime was undergoing rapid social and economic stratification which cut against the assumed egalitarian ethos of the nation (and which came out in increasingly heavy work burdens on less favoured women). Karl Marx would have been fascinated to observe what looks remarkably like an example of class formation in action. Hamalainen also slides round the question of how far the rather enviable material position the Lakot...

Having read “Comanche Empire” I knew I had to read this book. .My general impression is that the Comanche rule over vast land masses was triggered by incessant violence, horsemanship, and raiding, to establish wealth and dominance until the loss of buffalo, widespread disease, and, finally, organized plans of extermination by Texans wiped the tribe away. Unlike the lack of any central authority over Comanche people, the fascinating history of the Lakota people reflects a massive number of members constantly building a ferocious image as quick to violence as a lever to bolster its decades of success in holding off the inevitable end of its hunting culture and as stewards of land. Leaders like Red Cloud in particular are featured as shrewd in manipulating government officials, no less U.S. Presidents, in stalling off numerous deceits, broken promises, and corrupt maneuvers to end the vast power and military threat that the Lakota nation had amassed over centuries, not just decades.. My constant criticism is really a backhanded compliment..The author has provided such exhaustive detail that one must imagine he included every inch of his research, to leave nothing out..The saving grace to me is his writing skill, which presents the material so graphically and cogently that the temptation to skim never really gets going very far. Over and over, as reading, I asked myself how did he find the time to tell so much? To our good fortune, he somehow did so

Tacitly just a history book about the Lakota tribe, this book delves deep into daily tribal life, economics and trade, diplomacy and war strategy. Pekka Hamalainen states at the beginning why the Lakota are such an interesting people to study: They emerge as superbly flexible people who went through a series of geneses from pedestrian foragers to sedentary farmers to equestrian hunters to nomadic pastoralists, each a precarious attempt to carve out a safe place in a world where European newcomers had become a permanent presence. They come to life as fiercely proud people who easily embraced outsiders, turning their domain into a vibrant ethnic jumble. Perhaps most strikingly, they emerge as supreme warriors who routinely eschewed violence, relying on diplomacy, persuasion, and sheer charm to secure what they needed—only to revert to naked force if necessary. When the overconfident Custer rode into the Bighorn Valley on that June day, they had already faced a thousand imperial challenges. They knew exactly what to do with him. And: That is where, supposedly, all the pivotal imperial rivalries over North America took place, France vying for supremacy with England on the eastern seaboard; Spaniards, Comanches, Mexicans, and Americans jostling for position in the Southwest; and Russians pushing down the Pacific Coast in search of pelts and challenging Spain’s claims to California. The interior world was a sideshow, too marginal to stir potent imperial passions, too vast and vicious for proper colonies. It was Thomas Jefferson’s imagined Louisiana whose settlement would take a thousand generations. This book is essential for understanding American history. How about the congruence of these seemingly different cultures? Neither Lakotas nor Americans compromised their core convictions about themselves and the world. Convinced of the essential rightness of their respective beliefs and principles, they created a yawning mental crevasse where two expansionist powers could fit. They valued, desired, sought, and fought for different things and often talked past one another, which, ironically, made them compatible. It was only when nature itself failed to sustain both that coexistence became impossible. Lakotas used every possible tool in their efforts to keep what they held most sacred. When dealing with the French, they could be happy to submit to a paternalistic relationship. With the relatively weak Spanish, they could take a more privileged position. And with the British, they could be violent: They killed one of the traders, cut his heart out, and ate it, and they boiled and ate Memeskia in front of his relatives. The attack was a sensation, and it sent British traders fleeing from the Ohio Country in panic, leaving behind a firmer French-Indian alliance Amazingly, the Lakota co-opted the Eur...