What’s up with African American literacy rates? David L. Horne, PH.D. | 10/3/2013, midnight

In the world of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and other quick strike information processes, why is there a definite lack of evidence of a steady upward progression of reading and writing skills among African American contributors?

Post secondary education statistics continue to demonstrate that far too many African American students who finish high school do so as functional illiterates—that is, they cannot read and write at a basic level requisite for functional participation in modern life. In California, both the California State University system and the University of California system still annually allow (and mainly require) a significant proportion of incoming freshmen to register for developmental English courses—sometimes called “dumbbell” English— in order to assist the students in preparing to take regular-level freshmen college basic education courses. These developmental courses generally do not count toward a student’s graduation but must still be paid for through regular tuition. Both university systems realize this is not a very efficient use of taxpayer dollars, however, the literacy levels of the students coming to them out of high school require this kind of intervention. As of 2009, the Department of Education reported that literacy rates for more than 50 percent of African American children in the fourth grade nationwide was below the basic skills level and far below average; and by the ninth grade nationwide, the situation had gotten worse, with the rate dropping below 44 percent. Yes, there is still an unemployment crisis in the nation’s Black communities, but what is feeding and ensuring the longevity of that crisis is the ballooning illiteracy rate among Black youth and adults. What happened to that post-antebellum slavery zeal that put educational attainment, including reading and writing skills, as the sustained priority for advancement in American society? How did we drop that ball? These are bedeviling questions especially with Sept. 24 labeled National Punctuation Day, and it was accompanied by a broad national reflection on the lack of proper writing skills among modern American youth. Officially, NPD, “is a celebration of the lowly comma, correctly used quotation marks, and other proper uses of periods, semicolons, and the ever-mysterious ellipsis.” Giving even a casual glance at regular comments typed into Twitter, Instagram and on Facebook pages, American youth are in deep need, accompanied by deepening denial, of literacy help. And, citing the old chestnut, “when White folks sneeze, Black folks catch the flu,” where there is this dire a problem among America’s youth in general, African American youth are staring at death’s door regarding functional literacy in America. What can be done about it, if anything? Where there is still parenting going on, we need to encourage the love of reading (not just urge our youth to read so-called great books), and we need to encourage African American youth to actually write sentences in letters, notes, homework assignments, etc. We might even spend a little time checking—proof-reading—their material ourselves. African Americans simply cannot afford this self-imposed hump onto already overloaded backs. It’s one thing to still have to fight everyday acts of random racism in our lives. That’s the nature of the beast we deal with. It is another thing altogether though, to handicap ourselves. Suicide has never been our favorite or most popular response to oppression, but we have to call this literacy problem what it is—cultural and political suicide. C’mon ya’ll. Let’s get with it. Forward not backwards. Professor David L. Horne is founder and executive director of PAPPEI, the Pan African Public Policy and Ethical Institute, which is a new 501(c)(3) pending community-based organization or non-governmental organization (NGO). It is the stepparent organization for the California Black Think Tank which still operates and which meets every fourth Friday.

DISCLAIMER: The beliefs and viewpoints expressed in opinion pieces, letters to the editor, by columnists and/or contributing writers are not necessarily those of OurWeekly.

Source: http://ourweekly.com/news/2013/oct/03/whats-african-american-literacy-rates/

This article discusses an issue that has dogged that African American community for centuries.

Black couple who refused vaccine due to infamous Tuskegee syphilis study die from COVID-19 three hours apart—Raw Story—Celebrating 17 Years of Independent Journalism. (n.d.). Retrieved August 1, 2021, from https://www.rawstory.com/black-couple-who-refused-vaccine-due-to-tuskogee-study-die-from-19-three-hours-apart/

If we mutually exclusively split America into these four classifications, what would be the proportion of people within each?

What do the overlaps of these four groups look like with respect to Colin Woodard's eleven American Nations?

The deregulation part has hurt us immensely. Cross reference this with the thesis found in American Amnesia by Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson.

Which parts of the Democratic party went along with this? Evidence? More of the deregulation parts seemed to be identified with the Republican party.

Before even starting, I'm curious what these four parts will be? Will they map in some way onto Colin Woodard's eleven American Nations

Roy Perlis. (2021, May 21). Finally: We looked at rates of vaccination among depressed/non-depressed people. 13-point gap, but not because of resistance. Underappreciated opportunity to reach people who need more help accessing vaccines? @celinegounder @CDCDirector @ASlavitt @MDaware https://t.co/EHa80z1YCH [Tweet]. @royperlis. https://twitter.com/royperlis/status/1395744126813937666

A stunning little essay on a small section of the massive problems we face in America viewed through the lens of our teeth.

Time in the US, Pastimes, Music; Feelings, Despair, Hope

Time in the US, Pastimes, Music, Playing, Favorite; States, North Carolina

Do we actually need social mobility?

Social mobility and the goods it can purchase can be a useful social motivation.

However, social mobility for the poorest amoungst us would be good, but how much additional marginal good does society derive from continued social mobility of the middle and upper classes continuing to gain wealth and moving up?

Perhaps there's a myth of social mobility confounding the issue with the myth of meritocracy as well.

Certainly the idea of raw capitalism without caps is at play as well. Could providing better governmental oversight of this be a helpful factor for society? (At least American society at the moment? As international competition may drive other broader problems vis-a-vis other pieces of global domination...)

What other common pieces make up the American dream? This is surely one of the deepest roots which allows others like "buying and owning one's own home".

Freedom certainly makes a play, but there are certainly freedoms we give up and others that are impinged upon to actually live and exist here with respect to the rest of society.

the United States is a meritocracy

We've liked to tell ourselves this myth, but it's demonstrably untrue.

This seems reminiscent of the reminder to recall that ancient writers actually lived and eventually quit living. C. Matthewes quote perhaps about Augustine?

What effect does the personal relationship with Christ play in this catastrophe? (the one described in American Nations). I need to return to this thesis and examine it closer.

What a fantastic sentence!

Li, S., Sim, S.-C., Lee, L., Pollack, H. J., Wyatt, L. C., Trinh-Shevrin, C., Pong, P., & Kwon, S. C. (2017). Hepatitis B Screening and Vaccination Behaviors among a Community-based Sample of Chinese and Korean Americans in New York City. American Journal of Health Behavior, 41(2), 204–214. https://doi.org/10.5993/AJHB.41.2.12

EDITORS, T. (n.d.). Too Many Black Americans Are Dying from COVID-19. Scientific American. https://doi.org/10.1038/scientificamerican0820-8

This page has an audio clip of the speech, but the US National Archives has captioned video as well:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVvTk9ThEG4

Lui, P. P., Parikh, K., Katedia, S., & Jouriles, E. (2021). Anti-Asian Discrimination and Antiracist Bystander Behaviors amid the COVID-19 Outbreak. PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/eaz3k

Chen, Shawna. ‘Biden Administration to Offer $250 Million in Grants to Help Address COVID Response Inequities’. Axios. Accessed 10 March 2021. https://www.axios.com/covid-inequities-biden-250-million-grants-faf391fc-53e5-409b-94c8-894426108d05.html.

I'd be curious to see Miller take his high school textbook and point to specific phrasing to back this up. Even now most US History textbooks are espousing American exceptionalism.

Important Point

Real economic numbers validate a 25 year period (or more) of manipulated inflation and low growth economy. INCOME INEQUALITY statistics and recent studies ALL validate fuzzy math, rosy picture for the 1% and stagnant dismal picture for average Americans. Trump based his entire campaign and Presidency on Making America Great Again

Supporting Link

Great Question

This is an easy question to answer from my perspective. For me (age 62) and most of my peers, their kids and their peers, we are NO better off than we were a quarter century ago! A large part is the change from Industrial/Manufacturing to Technology and the outsourced labor and manufacturing. America has changed, this is FACT

Defend this argument in 2021 America.<br> Refute this argument in 2021 America.<br> Contemplate the genesis behind this argument Share opinion regarding this argument.

What kind of capitalism are we talking about?

We are starting to see critical thinking and discussion around "hard" but necessary truths. These truths center around complicated concepts, controlled by politicians, MSM and others who would rather not have this discussion. America's general population seems lost, gorging on the dumb-down need to know culture (those that have and can dictate what the rest need to know) and group think, herd mentality.

I feel like schools should read this book in order to acknowledge how badly African Americans were being treated even after fighting for America.

I never realized how horrible the African Americans were treated in the army during this time. They were being abused by Americans after putting their lives in danger to fight for America.

Jamison, A. M., Quinn, S. C., & Freimuth, V. S. (2019). “You don’t trust a government vaccine”: Narratives of Institutional Trust and Influenza Vaccination among African American and White Adults. Social Science & Medicine (1982), 221, 87–94. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2018.12.020

Ibrahim, F. A., & Dykeman, C. (2020, October 23). Counseling Muslim Americans: Cultural and Spiritual Assessments. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1556-6676.2011.tb02835.x

This is not wrong, but I wanted to flag somewhere that Britain actually possessed a representative government (Parliament) at the time. George III did his best to ignore it, but it existed. It just didn't include representation for colonies.

I'm not tagging this "these people are stupid" because that's not the issue; they are attempting to make US representative government look more innovative than it actually was.

• There were many American peoples. None of them were White.
• "those subjects became a people by declaring themselves such and then by winning the independence they had asserted as their right" - OK no. Quite a lot of people did not have the autonomy to "declare themselves" part of a people, and indeed were not recognized as such. There were also loyalists. And this idea of "a people" is...really complicated.
• While it's true that the first citizens of the United States were former British subjects, it is worth noting that a lot of other people lived in the current United States at the time who were tribal citizens, French colonists, Spanish colonists, and enslaved people who weren't considered citizens of anywhere.

We gotta do this clause by clause:

• "its people have shared a history of common struggle and achievement" - no. Aside from the long history of dispute about who born in the United States really "counts" as an "American", there has never been a common struggle.
• "carving communities out of a vast, untamed wilderness" - no. As of this writing I have finished reading the first half of the document and there has, as yet, been no mention of Indigenous peoples. (Also, see the vast literature on the relationship between expansionism, the "frontier", and American exceptionalism.)
• "winning independence and forming a new government" - dramatic oversimplification. Interesting fact about this document: in contains almost no references to state government.
• "wars, industrialization, waves of immigration, technological progress, and political change" - not highlighting this because it's wrong, but because it implies a strictly linear progress of history that is typical of American exceptionalism and intellectual arguments for racism, colonialism, etc.

All in all, what Luke said.

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA crack a book, y'all.

We are not going to do an accounting here of whether "America" (hi, America is two continents, we're talking about the US) has on balance done more good than harm. That is disingenuous. The fact is that the United States has done great harm that is not erased by its good, and it is more urgent to deal with the harm than to pat ourselves on the back about the good.

This line, associated with Reagan, is from a sermon by John Winthrop, a Puritan immigrant who was primarily interested in establishing a theocracy. It is emblematic of the idea of "American Exceptionalism", which you are about to be beat over the head with. See further https://www.neh.gov/article/how-america-became-city-upon-hill#:~:text=That%201630%20sermon%20by%20John,center%20of%20his%20political%20career.

This writing is an absolute perfect example of romanticized and even heroic themed literature. The personification of the trees as characters who complement each other paired with the reoccurring theme of the application of femininity to nature both contribute to American pastoral romanticism. The careful, detailed, and delicate descriptions of nature within this excerpt are key signs of its romantic qualities, which results in the reader consuming nature more poetically and intellectually. This influence creates and supports a relationship with nature that is characterized by inspiration, awe, and observance. This personified narrative supports pastoral leaning tones by emphasizing a courted relationship between the trees and describes the dogwood as this desired beauty of many. This leads one to further question what American pastoralism exactly means. Here Gordon M. Sayre points out the oxymoron of the idea. “In Marx’s formulation American pastoralism is an ideology that has mediated conflicting desires for technological progress and bucolic retreat, “a desire, in the face of the growing power and complexity of organized society, to disengage from the dominant culture and to seek out the basis for a simpler, more satisfying mode of life in a realm ‘closer,’ as we say, to nature”” (1). This definition understands American pastoralism as a progressive search for technological advance, but also as a desire to live a simpler life more in touch with nature. I think Cooper’s A Dissolving View leans heavily into an emotional connection with nature, but not so much in a simple way. This poetic comprehension of nature provides a deep appreciation and admiration of nature which submits to the gratuity motifs of pastoralism, but more so aligns with a romantic enlightening idea of nature.

Arizona Quarterly: A Journal of American Literature, Culture, and Theory, Volume 69, Number 4, Winter 2013, pp. 1-23 (Article)

it happened again in 2016

I have to wonder who the sociologists were from the 60's that interviewed teens about how the telephone changed their lives. Or perhaps the 70's sociologist who interviewed kids about how cars changed their lives? Certainly it wasn't George Lucas' American Graffiti that informed everyone of the issues?

Very likely true.

The Republican party will never stop claiming the media is bias, so I am surprised they are claiming they have resolved this issue. I would think they would want to keep acknowledging it as an issue.

"The President has been regulating to death a free market economy" - it's interesting how much this preamble throws Trump under the bus

"our enemies no longer fear us and our friends no long trust us" - I guess the democrats and republicans agree on this.

"This platform is optimistic because the American people are optimistic." This is completely unsupported by everything stated before it.

"covenant" "Creator" "God-given natural resources" "prepared to deal with evil in the world" show religious tone

I feel like there are countries who fear his leadership.

I know that we are making history but it doesn't exactly feel like it. The election feels like a joke. There is a stark difference between what came out of Roosevelt's mouth and either of the presidential candidates mouth's. Now it is a matter of choosing the lesser of two evils than a heroic leader to help our country achieve greatness.

I feel like this goal has been abandoned.

IZA – Institute of Labor Economics. ‘COVID-19 and the Labor Market’. Accessed 6 October 2020. https://covid-19.iza.org/publications/dp13707/.

IZA – Institute of Labor Economics. ‘COVID-19 and the Labor Market’. Accessed 6 October 2020. https://covid-19.iza.org/publications/dp13650/.

What makes Americans not have a social solidarity?

What makes Americans so individualistic? What is different about Taiwan’s society that made their people more selfless?

This is so true with the Trump Administrations "Alternative Facts" it is as though we will soon be living in the dystopian novel Brave New World.

I want to reference the Netflix documentary Social Dilemma. The documentary says that the reason politics has become so polarized is because of social media. Everyone is operating off of a different set of facts.

Is it within Trump's right to do this?

Is it within trump's rights to do this?

Why did this not happen? I feel like it isn’t the federalist system in general that are failing us— it’s the leaders of the system. Why did congress not make a playbook and create incentives for states to follow them? This reminds me of how the drinking age became 21 in every state from the funding of the highways.

I wonder if a democrat was in office when covid hit if we would have stronger federal leadership. Would we have been in a state of emergency if someone who believed in the facts of science wasn’t in office? I have trouble believing that there is nothing the president could have done to prevent covid from getting this out of hand.

I didn’t know that it is within our rights to travel and associate with whomever we choose. I wouldn’t think the government would be able to control who would be able to leave their house or hang out with who anyway. I guess this shows how right the article about uninformed citizens we read last week is right.

I could not agree with this statement more. I think if the US had some kind of national healthcare program the coronavirus would be much more under control.

Some profound ideas here about the "American Dream" and the dark underbelly of what it may take to achieve not only for individuals, but to do so at scale.

Druckman, James, Samara Klar, Yanna Krupnikov, Matthew Levendusky, and John B. Ryan. ‘The Political Impact of Affective Polarization: How Partisan Animus Shapes COVID-19 Attitudes’. Preprint. PsyArXiv, 19 August 2020. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/ztgpn.

Hamermesh, Daniel S. ‘Lock-Downs, Loneliness and Life Satisfaction’. Working Paper. Working Paper Series. National Bureau of Economic Research, April 2020. https://doi.org/10.3386/w27018.

Knittel, C. R., & Ozaltun, B. (2020). What Does and Does Not Correlate with COVID-19 Death Rates (Working Paper No. 27391; Working Paper Series). National Bureau of Economic Research. https://doi.org/10.3386/w27391

Vachuska, K. (2020). Initial Effects of the Coronavirus Pandemic on Racial Prejudice in the United States: Evidence from Google Trends [Preprint]. SocArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/bgpk3

A Path to Reproductive Justice: Research, Practice and Policies. (2020, July 15). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YYQ_bKQij0&feature=emb_logo

Racism: The Ultimate Underlying Condition. (2020, June 18). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cozo8lj_RTA&feature=emb_logo

APHA. (n.d.) Advancing Racial Equity Webinar Series. https://www.apha.org/racial-equity

Webster, G. D., Mahar, E., & Wongsomboon, V. (2020). American Psychology Is Becoming More International, But Too Slowly: Comment on Thalmayer et al. (2020). https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/wqmer Ame

Going back a few generations, apparently what Stalking Cat is doing was a "fairly common thing" in the Huron (may've misspelled that) tribe, according to a professor of Native American Studies.

Make note of Sarah Marie Henry's Furries, Fans, and Feminism: Querying and Queering of the Furry Fandom. Sarah Marie Henry made a very good point about the appropriation of Native American culture in the furry fandom, something that is not exactly the nicest thing to do. Traditions stay within certain groups for a reason. A direct quotation/reference may be impossible, as the only copy of this master's thesis is locked up in San Francisco State University, and there's a pandemic. 😕

I would argue that this is too loose of a definition. It does not simply refer to a physical body, which has pretty clear criteria for being considered 100% human. To be "less than 100% human" psychologically, while being a good basis for a disorder, does not adequately consider groups with a spiritual connection to animals, such as the Native American tradition of "spirit animals". This vague definition and exclusion of established cultural practices could prove harmful to the legitimacy of "species identity disorder".

Bender, M. (2020, June 12). Coronavirus second waves emerge in several US states as they reopen. New Scientist. https://www.newscientist.com/article/2246057-coronavirus-second-waves-emerge-in-several-us-states-as-they-reopen/

US VS THE PRESS

Craven, J. (2020, May 21). It’s Not Too Late to Save Black Lives. Slate Magazine. https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/05/covid-19-black-communities-health-disparity.html

Nazi Germany

Enemy of the people

To serve and protect

from 25 November 1941

Yu, Q., Salvador, C., Melani, I., Berg, M., & Kitayama, S. (2020, May 14). The lethal spiral: Racial segregation and economic disparity jointly exacerbate the COVID-19 fatality in large American cities. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/xgbpy

The Santa Fe Institute - SFI Transmission PDF

Sood, L., & Sood, V. (2020). Being African American and Rural: A Double Jeopardy from Covid‐19. The Journal of Rural Health, jrh.12459. https://doi.org/10.1111/jrh.12459

Zahnd, W. E. (2020). The COVID‐19 Pandemic Illuminates Persistent and Emerging Disparities among Rural Black Populations. The Journal of Rural Health, jrh.12460. https://doi.org/10.1111/jrh.12460

Dyer, O. (2020). Covid-19: Black people and other minorities are hardest hit in US. BMJ, m1483. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.m1483

Do borderlands create this area for testing because they are regions of no-man's land? That they aren't robustly populated and thus available for this interplay? If we take this out of an American context - in places that don't see borders in the same way as Americans do - would this hold up?

AFC is about to open trade port at Leech Lake

AFC is affecting population surrounding the missions

Aitkins didn't remove the AFC, just the one post near Red Cedar Lake

Seymour suggests to Greene that the missions severe connection to the American Fur Company

Hall says that Greene can send goods to the Mission through the American Fur Company

Sobre derecho de autor en EEUU

"The Fifteenth Amendment stated that people could not be denied the right to vote based on “race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” This construction allowed states to continue to decide the qualifications of voters as long as those qualifications were ostensibly race-neutral. Thus, while states could not deny African American men the right to vote on the basis of race, they could deny it to women on the basis of sex or to people who could not prove they were literate." Before the 15th amendment women and colored men and women were not allowed to vote but the 15th amendment allowed these privileges and prevented discrimination amongst the rights of someone based on their race and gender and states cannot deny these rights to the people because it is a constitutional law.

Civil Rights Museum

Revista de ALA

Tor como navegador en la Biblioteca Pública de Toronto. ¡Súper!

Están preocupados por las propuestas de préstamo de libro digital.

Bibliotecas y diversidad

Revista de ALA, Junio / Julio 2019

The study suggests that people are willing to self-police to protect their communities and others.

A simple title, but there is a lot to unpackage here! Just from skimming, I can tell this is a very dense read, and it will take a lot of work and time to analyse this from a feminist, militarist, economic, ethnic, racial, religious, linguistic, and legal perspective.

I suppose I may be a bit biased, being a "Warren" college student. ; ) In all honesty however it is likely that it is the high profile nature of the claim, and the intense politicization that brings so much publicity to this particular case.

Wow! such a shame :(

What more can Elizabeth Warren do to placate the Cherokee? It looks like this might seriously hurt her campaign, and if she does become president, then this could simply sour relations between the United States and the Cherokee. Some have accepted her apology, and “understand that she apologized for causing confusion on tribal sovereignty and tribal citizenship and the harm that has resulted,” Julie Hubbard, a spokeswoman for the tribe said. “The chief and secretary of state appreciate that she has reaffirmed that she is not a Cherokee Nation citizen or a citizen of any tribal nation.”

But others are still not satisfied. “This still isn’t transparent,” said Twila Barnes, a Cherokee genealogist who has been critical of Ms. Warren’s claims of native ancestry since it became national news in 2012. “She needs to go public and say she fully takes responsibility and that the DNA test was ridiculous. There is still something about this that feels off.” It seems that only time will tell in this case. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/01/us/politics/elizabeth-warren-cherokee-dna.html

I believe the precise term to be used here is Anthropometry, or human measurement, which was a key aspect of pre-genetic Eugenic ideology, and continues today in genetic biology, under more 'subtle' labels such as euthanizing, sterilizing, or preventing intermarriage between people with 'genetic diseases.' http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/html/eugenics/static/themes/6.html (I mean i'm not saying I am denying genetic disease research and treatment is based on science, but so was eugenics back in the day, it's just science has 'improved' since then... or has it? Maybe, but it is policy that is more important in these regards.)

What does this mean exactly? This is extremely important and I don't know exactly what is being articulated here.

This isn't really subtle at all. Most of the public I speak to outside of my family and college seem to view Native Americans as a racial classification that receives certain government benefits as reparations based on past discrimination. Reservations tend to be spoken of as segregated zones, rather than sovereign nations. Public misconceptions by Non-Natives seem to inform the issue.

This statement is vague because it does not clarify what the misunderstanding is, and what it means to weigh in, and precisely what kinship means. Ethically, what is the distinction here? Did Warren make an ethical violation when she publicly claimed to have Cherokee ancestry, without first notifying tribal authority? What constitutes as kinship, versus ancestry. It seems to take the power away from individual identity, and grant it to institutions. It is an opportunity cost of self-determination. What would be the proper course of action for Warren to take afterwards? Make a public apology, or publicly make a statement denying kinship?

Based on this Rhetoric, she sounds sincere, but what is so controversial about this statement? Are there other statements where she made different kind of claims?

Assimilation and 'whitewashing' could indeed produce a large number of un-enrolled people who are of Cherokee descent, and also produce false accounts where people genuinely believe they have some Cherokee ancestry but are mistaken based on an old family story. What is implied here is that there is a malicious, intentional fabrication of Native Ancestry to advance one's own personal agenda. There is a fine line between a claim that should illicit the response, "Really? How neat, what an interesting heritage story," and "I see under race/ethnicity you put down 'Cherokee' on your application. That is very serious claim, do you have any documentation?" I think there is a difference. How harmful is it for someone to claim 'unofficial' or unverifiable ancestry, and what problems does this present? How should these be viewed/enforced differently.

Only a fraction of a percentage of Americans claim to be Cherokee, but high profile cases make a big impact. "In 2000, the federal census reported that 729,533 (0.26%) Americans self-identified as Cherokee. By 2010, that number increased, with the Census Bureau reporting that 819,105 (0.26%) Americans claimed at least one Cherokee ancestor" https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2015/10/cherokee-blood-why-do-so-many-americans-believe-they-have-cherokee-ancestry.html

About 300,000 Cherokee are enrolled, so that is under half of all Americans who claim to be of Cherokee descent. In other words, there is about 3 Americans who claim to be Cherokee for every 2 enrolled Cherokee. It is difficult to say how big of a problem this really is; it could be a minor inconvenience, or it could be a catastrophic threat. It is difficult to say how this should or can be enforced. It could be that a simple fine could dissuade people, or even a public service announcement, or this may be a breach of freedom of speech. Maybe only in instances where fraud is involved, for financial gains or in high profile cases? It is hard to say.

This seems to be at the heart of the issue. Indian gaming can best be viewed as an exercise in self determination, and an important asset on the road towards economic self sufficiency.

In the readings, this seems to be a recurring theme. There is no one-size-fits-all approach, no magic bullet solution that will work for all tribes, which are highly diverse in values, economy, and needs.

This is a really epic story. The theme of butterflies makes sense because of butterfly migrations through the region.

They are rather spectacular. https://dgomag.com/contents/get-outta-town-bisti-badlands-near-farmington-nm-2751

That might be a good opportunity for someone studying Native American History to pursue! It seems like an exciting topic to research.

Can this be considered defamation? It must have had a substantial monetary impact.

"The California Genocide refers to actions in the mid to late 19th century by the United States federal, state, and local governments that resulted in the decimation of the indigenous population of California following the U.S. occupation of California in 1846.

Actions included encouragement of volunteers and militias to kill unarmed men, women and children.

Location California

Date 1846–1873 Target Indigenous Californians Attack type: Genocide, ethnic cleansing Deaths 4,500-16,000 Indigenous Californians outright killed, thousands more died due to disease and other causes Perpetrators: United States Army, California State Militia, white settlers"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Genocide

This is problematic. Most scholars agree, but does the United States government? Does the American Public? Outside of Historians and scholars, do most agree?

Really? Wow, now that's hate speech. Fuck whoever sprayed that, seriously.

In other words, "They don't LOOK Indian." Whatever that means and who's the judge of that, other than their tribe?

This is an important statement. It is a commonly accepted narrative that must be challenged. It is considered 'common sense' to the average American that Indian gaming increases crime in America, because it attracts organized crime, or money laundering or some such narrative. Media portrayal is invariably consistent with this. James Bond would be less cool if he were gambling at a Casino and he WASN'T attacked by mobsters. Right?

While controlling criminal activity is important, doesn't it fall under jurisdiction of tribal law enforcement? Even organized crime?

I have always considered this term to have a sexual connotation, but did not associate it specifically with use by male visitors potential to encourage gender violence, especially in the context of Native American women.

This sounds like economic envy! What is the problem with these 'special privileges?' A sovereign nation can use its independence as it pleases, but this is a decision that they must make and assume responsibility for; what about Swiss banks? They have an international reputation for better or for worse.

It can sometimes be overlooked that Native American issues can have a drastic impact on the nation as a whole, the development of a massive gaming industry is an example of this, also natural resources such as fossil fuels and uranium.

Cheryl Redhorse Bennett is an author, as well as an "Assistant Professor in American Indian Studies at Arizona State University. Bennett is an enrolled citizen of the Navajo Nation and also descended from the Comanche Nation." And focuses on issues such as justice and violence against Native Americans and their communities.