Native American Heritage Month Reading List
November celebrates Native American Heritage Month! Check out some Talking Books to learn more about the history, diversity, and culture of the Indigenous peoples of North America.
The Rediscovery of America: Native Peoples and the Unmaking of U.S. History
The most enduring feature of U.S. history is the presence of Native Americans, yet most histories focus on Europeans and their descendants. This long practice of ignoring Indigenous history is changing, however, with a new generation of scholars insisting that any full American history address the struggle, survival, and resurgence of American Indian nations. Indigenous history is essential to understanding the evolution of modern America. Ned Blackhawk interweaves five centuries of Native and non-Native histories, from Spanish colonial exploration to the rise of Native American self-determination in the late twentieth century. In this transformative synthesis he shows that: European colonization in the 1600s was never a predetermined success; Native nations helped shape England's crisis of empire; the first shots of the American Revolution were prompted by Indian affairs in the interior; California Indians targeted by federally funded militias were among the first casualties of the Civil War; the Union victory forever recalibrated Native communities across the West; twentieth-century reservation activists refashioned American law and policy. Blackhawk's retelling of U.S. history acknowledges the enduring power, agency, and survival of Indigenous peoples, yielding a truer account of the United States and revealing anew the varied meanings of America.
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Digital Book Number: DB115217
Our Savage Neighbors: How Indian War Transformed Early America
Professor asserts that from the 1750s to the 1780s provincial leaders united the diverse European settlers of the rural mid-Atlantic colonies into a cohesive unit by using the fear and horror of Indian attacks. Posits that settlers became united against a common enemy and established democracy.
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Digital Book Number: DB067329
The Longest Trail: Writings on American Indian History, Culture, and Politics
A collection of articles, speeches, papers, essays, and book introductions and chapters, provides a look at Native American history and policies related to their rights in North America. The time period covered stretches from the first settlements in the East to the long trek of the Nez Perce Indians in the Northwest.
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Digital Book Number: DB085126
North American Indians: A Very Short Introduction
Historians describe how indigenous North Americans shaped their cultures so that they could flourish on the land. Perdue and Green stress the diversity and resilience of native societies and describe the ways Native Americans have struggled to maintain their integrity against attacks by European colonists and the United States government.
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Digital Book Number: DB086321
A Brutal Reckoning: Andrew Jackson, the Creek Indians, and the Epic War for the American South
The Creek War is one of the most tragic episodes in American history, leading to the greatest loss of Native American life on what is now U.S. soil. What began as a vicious internal conflict among the Creek Indians metastasized like a cancer. The ensuing Creek War of 1813-1814 shattered Native American control of the Deep South and led to the infamous Trail of Tears, in which the government forcibly removed the southeastern Indians from their homeland. The war also gave Andrew Jackson his first combat leadership role, and his newfound popularity after defeating the Creeks would set him on the path to the White House. In A Brutal Reckoning, Peter Cozzens vividly captures the young Jackson, describing a brilliant but harsh military commander with unbridled ambition, a taste for cruelty, and a fraught sense of honor and duty. Jackson would not have won the war without the help of Native American allies, yet he denied their role and even insisted on their displacement, together with all the Indians of the American South in the Trail of Tears. A conflict involving not only white Americans and Native Americans, but also the British and the Spanish, the Creek War opened the Deep South to the Cotton Kingdom, setting the stage for the American Civil War yet to come. No other single Indian conflict had such significant impact on the fate of America-and A Brutal Reckoning is the definitive book on this forgotten chapter in our history.
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Digital Book Number: DB118142
Indians of the Southeast: Then and Now
Conveys the religion, languages, life-style, food, games, dance, and music of the first Americans of the Southeast. Also tells of the arrival of the Europeans and the changes that took place as the Indians were outnumbered.
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Digital Book Number: DB014782
An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States
A history of the United States exploring the perspective of its indigenous peoples. Dunbar-Ortiz analyzes how native tribes actively resisted national expansion and examines the systematic destruction of the lives and cultures of the native civilizations present in North America before European colonization. Violence. 2014.
Book Length: 11 hours, 22 minutes
Digital Book Number: DB082383
A Snake Falls to Earth
Nina, a Lipan Apache, lives in the real world and still believes in the old stories. Oli, a cottonmouth snake boy, lives in the Reflecting World. But a catastrophic event on Earth, and a strange sickness that befalls Oli's best friend, drive their worlds together in ways they haven't been in centuries. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. For senior high and older readers. 2021.
Book Length: 11 hours, 22 minutes
Digital Book Number: DB082383
Firekeeper’s Daughter
Daunis, who is part Ojibwe, defers attending the University of Michigan to care for her mother. When Daunis witnesses a shocking murder, she reluctantly agrees to go undercover, drawing on her knowledge of chemistry and Ojibwe traditional medicine to track down the source of a new drug. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. For senior high and older readers. 2021.
Book Length: 14 hours, 16 minutes
Digital Book Number: DB102762
Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants
Botanist and member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation argues that the awakening of a wider ecological consciousness requires the acknowledgement and celebration of a reciprocal relationship with the world. Shares stories learned from her elders about the world around them and ways of approaching scientific inquiry. Commercial audiobook. 2013.
Book Length: 16 hours, 47 minutes
Digital Book Number: DB092274
As Long as Grass Grows: The Indigenous Fight for Environmental Justice, from Colonization to Standing Rock
Examination of the role of indigenous populations in the pursuit of environmental justice in the Americas from the seventeenth to the twenty-first century. Topics include explaining environmental justice theory, genocide, impacts of western expansion and the Industrial Revolution, sacred sites, and potential policies for the future. Unrated. Commercial audiobook. 2019.
Book Length: 7 hours, 11 minutes
Digital Book Number: DB096474
Native American Stories
Native Americans view human relationships with nature in terms of family with the Earth as mother. This collection of tales and myths from various Native American groups focuses on this relationship. Chapter titles include "Creation," "Earth," "Wind and Weather," and "Plants and Animals." For junior and senior high and older readers
Book Length: 2 hours, 45 minutes
Digital Book Number: DB034361