Description
Book SynopsisTells the story of tribal nation building in the modern era. Drawing on field research, oral histories, and archival sources, Valerie Lambert explores the struggles and triumphs of the Choctaw building a new government and launching an ambitious program of economic development in the late twentieth century, achieving a partial restoration of the tribe's former glory.
Trade Review"[A] thorough study, one grounded in current anthropological theory but surprisingly free of the discipline's wordy jargon... [A] good book that tackles some complex issues ... [and] has value beyond its obvious purpose of describing the growth of the modern Choctaw Nation. There are, it seems, lessons here for other tribal groups that may be seeking greater autonomy or that are trying to escape from the ravages of allotment and termination."-The Chronicles of Oklahoma -- Paul H. Carlson The Chronicles of Oklahoma "The story of Choctaw reconfiguration is both unique to specific circumstances and emblematic of experiences of modern nation building elsewhere in Indian country."-Choice -- Choice Choice "As Lambert tracks between her outsider perspective as an anthropologist and her insider's view as a Choctaw, readers are privileged to a clear-sighted and at times touching analysis of a history and of a people."-Great Plains Quarterly Great Plains Quarterly "Tribal sovereignty is an often evoked but rarely defined term in Native American studies. For those interested in how modern Indian nations exercise their sovereign powers within the federal framework, Valerie Lambert's study of the post-1970 revitalization of the Choctaw Nation of southeastern Oklahoma would be hard to surpass."-Mark Edwin Miller, Journal of the West -- Mark Edwin Miller Journal of the West
