| Why
Weed Native Americans?
Goal
3 Standards in Florida's System of School Improvement and
Accountability require students to demonstrate that they
are multiculturally sensitive citizens. So many stereotypes
exist in literature, in our minds, and in the minds of the
young people we work with--especially when it comes to Native
Americans. Many students believe that all Indians lived
in tepees (and still do), wore clothing made of animal skins
(and still do), always wore at least one feather on their
heads (and still do), and always lived on reservations (and
still do). Worse yet, because of television and movies,
many students believe that there are no more Native Americans,
that early settlers killed them all, or that they were bad
people who spoke in stilted language: "See soldier. Me brave.
Take prisoner."
 For
a selective bibliography and guide for your Native American
collection, look at the following web site: "I"
Is Not for Indian: The portrayal of Native Americans in
books for young people.
Suggested
Dewey Numbers to Check:
Check the following areas: 970-980, 704, 398.2, 301. Remember
to look at related biographies (Maria Tallchief, Jim Thorpe,
Sitting Bull, Geronimo, Sequoyah, Sacajawea, Crazy Horse,
Chief Joseph, Quanto, Black Hawk, Osceola, etc.), reference
materials, and fiction. In elementary schools, check your
picture books and concept books. Is "I" always an Indian?
What about "Ten Little Indians" in counting books? Are images
stereotypical?
Specific
Criteria for Weeding:
 This
may be a difficult area for non-Native Americans to weed.
Although date of publication is not always a clear indicator,
the publication of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
in 1971 changed forever our perceptions of Native Americans.
Anything published before that date should be examined carefully,
although stereotypes exist in materials published even today.
Eliminate items which depict Native Americans as savages,
where they are stereotypically alike, or where they are
illustrated as white people with brown faces. Look for any
distortions of history or accounts of Indians as passive
people. Be sure that materials do not refer to Native Americans
only in the past tense. Remember that there are many different
Native cultures, each with unique language, dress, culture
and traditions. Most importantly, discard anything that
you feel would embarrass or hurt a Native American child.
Consider
Weeding Titles Like These:
- 10
little Indians : the counting song and a counting book [sound
recording], 197?.
- Adair's
history of the American Indians, 1930.
- Almost
white, [1963].
- The
amazing red man, 1960.
- America
and its Indians, 1962.
- The
American Indian, 1950.
- American
Indians, 1957.
- The
American Indians : the big book of Indians, 1950.
- The
American Indian : from colonial times to the present, 1974.
- The
American Indian then and now, [1957].
- The
American Indian today, [1968].
- American
Indians, yesterday and today, 1960.
- Apache
Indians : raiders of the Southwest, 1951.
- The
Blackfeet : raiders on the Northwestern Plains, [1958].
- The
brave little Indian, c1951.
- Breeds
and half-breeds, [1969].
- The
Cherokee story, c1950.
- Cherokees
of the Old South : a people in transition, 1956.
- Chi-Wee
: the adventures of a little Indian girl, 1925.
- The
complete book of Indian crafts and lore, 1954.
- Contemporay
American Indian leaders, 1972.
- Crazy
Horse : the strange man of the Oglalas, 1942.
- The
Crow Indians, 1956, c1936.
- The
Crow Indians : hunters of the Northwest Plains, 1953.
- Custer's
last stand : the story of the Battle of the Little Big Horn,
1966.
- David,
young chief of the Quileutes : an American Indian today,
[1967].
- Echoes
of the red man : an archaeological and cultural survey of
the Indians of southern Illinois, [1955].
- The
fighting Cheyennes, c1915.
- Fighting
Indians of the West, 1948.
- First
book of cowboys, indians and eskimos, 1950.
- First
lady of America : a romanticized biography of Pocahontas,
[1973]
- Geronimo,
the last Apache war chief, c1952.
- Heap
hungry Indian, 1966.
- The
how and why wonder book of North American Indians, c1965.
- How
medicine man cured paleface woman, 1956.
- Indians
at home, 1964.
- Indians
of the Southwest [filmstrip], c1953
- Indians
of the United States : four centuries of their history and
culture, 1940.
- Indians,
Indians, Indians : stories of tepees & tomahawks, wampum
belts & war bonnets, peace pipes & papooses, [1950].
- Indians
on the warpath, 1957.
- Massacres
fo the mountains : a history of the Indian wars of the Far
West, [1958].
- Me
papoose sitter, 1955.
- More
Indian friends and foes, [1963].
- Navaho
land, yesterday and today, [1961].
- Our
wild Indians : thirty-three years personal experience among
the Red Men of the great West, 1960
- Our
American Indians at a glance, 1961.
- Red
children in white America, 1977,
- Some
people are Indians, 1974.
- The
Tomahawk family, 1960.
- Two
little savages : being the adventures of two boys who lived
as Indians and what they learned, 1970.
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