(These first three is where I would start for introductions to the relationship between early Europeans and Native people of the Americas, and how that history has shaped destructive and myopic modern American attitudes toward non-Americans, non-Caucasians, non-Christians, etc, and toward Nature itself).
American Holocaust: The Conquest of the New World, Stannard, 1992.
This was the first book assigned to me in my undergraduate Native American Studies coursework. It is an unflinching look into what happens when certain nations who are crazed by dreams of religious salvation and gold get too much power.
“The Spaniards took babies from their mother’s breasts, grabbing them by the feet and smashing their heads against rocks…They built a long gibbet, low enough for the toes to touch the ground and prevent strangling, and hanged thirteen natives at a time in honor of Christ Our Savior and the twelve apostles…Then, straw was wrapped around their torn bodies and they were burned alive.”
(see the last verse of Psalm 137 for the origins of this Christian practice: “Happy is the one who seizes your infants and dashes them against the rocks.”)
Pagans in the Promised Land: Decoding the Doctrine of Christian Discovery, S Newcomb, 2008.
This book uncovers the uncomfortable truth that our foundational American National Myth is not based in some enlightened, philosophical, flowery ideals as found in the Bill of Rights or Declaration of Independence, but instead on something found deeply set in the very Id-guided urge to conquer, to violently expand limitlessly. It is an urge for infinite growth, which is neither reasonable nor sustainable, and is found both in the evangelical demands of Christianity as well as in the modern Western myth of endless economic growth through the exploitation of unlimited natural resources. Fancy names like Manifest Destiny and the Doctrine of Discovery do not cloud their catastrophic effects on an entire hemisphere of people and natural world.
It begins with very “sciencey” things like Cognitive Theory – or how people think, where ideas come from, etc – so this that could bog things down for some people. The goal is to understand terms like the Conqueror Model, States of Domination, and Ideas of Progress that are the building blocks of modern civilization, and of course, completely destructive to indigenous peoples and Nature. The author summarizes findings from Lakoff/Johnson (Don’t Think of an Elephant, Metaphors We Live By, Philosophy in the Flesh, etc) and Steven Winter (A Clearing in the Forest: Law, Life, and Mind).
Mental categories, including laws (specifically Federal Indian Law in this context), which we typically think of as being based on reason and/or objective reality, are according to Cognitive Theory, mostly made without conscious reason, and instead are based more on human imagination and metaphorical experience.
One model/mental category this book looks at is the Chosen People / Promised Land Model, which is a fundamental mindset of American history, from the first colonizers to the present day (modern wars of aggression, political coups, covert CIA operations, etc). It will show direct links from Christian/Biblical Dominion ideas, that we think of as Medieval or Ancient, and how they influence Supreme Court decisions to justify the subjugation of indigenous peoples (not the chosen ones, heathens, savages, etc) and the violent conquering of America and beyond.
The Conquest of America: The Question of the Other, Todorov, 1984.
Similar themes to the above books, but particularly focused on the Spaniards in Mesoamerica. It’s noteworthy that it takes a non-American to write an honest look of American history.
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West, Dee Brown, 1970.
Facing West: The Metaphysics of Empire Building and Indian Hating, Drinnon, 1997.
American Indian Holocaust and Survival: A Population History, R Thornton, 1990.
An Indigenous People’s History of the United States, Dunbar-Ortiz, 2014.
Custer Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto, V Deloria, 1998.
Documents of United States Indian Policy, ed Prucha, 2000.
An American Genocide: The United States and the California Indian Catastrophe, 1846-1873, B Madley, 2017.
Indian Survival on the California Frontier, A Hurtado, 1988.
Genocide in Northwest CA: When Our Worlds Cried, J Norton, 1979.
The Destruction of California Indians, Hiezer and Hurtado, 1974.
Skull Wars: Kennewick Man, Archaeology, and the Battle for Native American Identity, DH Thomas, 2001.
Native American Post Colonial Psychology, Duran and Duran, 1995.
Going Native: Indians in the American Cultural Imagination, S Huhndorf, 2001.
Regeneration Through Violence: The Mythology of the American Frontier, Slotkin, 2000.
- https://billmoyers.com/episode/gunfighter-nation/
Beyond Geography: The Western Spirit Against the Wilderness, Turner, 1980.
Though not a Native American History book, it does reveal the mental and spiritual worldviews that early colonizers needed in order to destroy both the people and the landscape that they encountered in North America. It is a mindset that continues to perpetuate the American Myth of Progress today.
Dispossessing the Wilderness: Indian Removal and the Making of National Parks, M D Spence, 2000.
The Heart of Everything That Is: The Untold Story of Red Cloud, an American Legend, Drury and Clavin, 2014.
Crazy Horse: Strange Man of the Oglala, M Sandoz, 1992.
Sitting Bull: The Life and Times of an American Patriot, Utley, 2008.
Black Elk Speaks, J Neihardt, 1988.
Black Elk: The Sacred Ways of the Lakota, W Black Elk, 1991.
Lame Deer: Seeker of Visions, Erdoes, 1994.
One of the first books I recommend for those looking to learn about the Native American perspective of modern American life.
Neither Wolf Nor Dog: On Forgotten Roads with an Indian Elder, K Nerbern, 2019.
Commanches: The History of a People, Fehrenbach, 2003.
The Comanche Empire, P Hamalainan, 2009.
Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History, Gwynne, 2011.
Once They Moved Like the Wind: Cochise, Geronimo, and the Apache Wars, D Roberts, 1994.
The Apache Wars: The Hunt for Geronimo, The Apache Kid, and the Captive Boy Who Started the Longest War in American History, Hutton, 2017.
In the Days of Victorio: Recolections of a Warm Springs Apache, E Ball and J Kaywaykla, 1972.
War of a Thousand Deserts: Indian Raids and the US Mexico War, Delay, 2009.
Blood and Thunder: The Epic Story of Kit Carson and the Conquest of the American West, H Sides, 2007.
Nine Years Among the Indians: The Captivity and Life of a Texan Among the Indians, H Lehmann, 2018.
Life Among the Apaches, Cremony, 2015.
The Account: Alvaro Nunez Cabeza de Vaca’s Relacion, Favata, 2001.