Legacies and Landmarks of the Plains Native Americans

FAIN: BI-50148-11

Central Community College (Grand Island, NE 68801-7279)
Dianna L. Parmley (Project Director: March 2011 to September 2013)

Two one-week Landmarks workshops for fifty community college faculty members to study Plains Native American history and culture from the eighteenth century to the present day.

"Legacies and Landmarks of the Plains Native Americans" consists of two one-week NEH Landmarks of American History and Culture Workshops held during summer 2012 for fifty community college faculty members on Plains Native American history and culture from the eighteenth century to the present day. Hosted by Central Community College in Columbus, Nebraska, the project focuses on three Great Plains tribes: the Pawnee, the Ponca, and the Omaha. It examines their history through scholarly lectures, literature, film, art, and music, as well as the stories of tribal leaders. It also addresses the tribes' efforts to preserve cultural identity, particularly with regard to U.S. tribal policy, past and present. The faculty team comprises scholars, regional professionals, and cultural representatives. Professors Donna Roper, Renee Laegrid, Beth Ritter, and David Wishart address, respectively, Pawnee archaeology, the history of Native American women, Native American anthropology, and the dispossession of the Nebraska Indians. Robert Palmquist, a tribal attorney, outlines the federal/tribal relationship, and Judi Gaiashkibos, Executive Director of the Nebraska Commission on Indian Affairs, discusses the Genoa U.S. Indian School that educated children from ten states and twenty tribes, illustrating the challenges of Native American assimilation. Matthew "Sitting Bear" Jones, an Otoe-Missouria, and Pat Leading Fox, Chief of the Pawnee Nation's Nasharo Council, also offer their perspectives. Specific landmarks, such as the Pawnee Indian Museum and extensive archaeological site, the Genoa U.S. Indian School, the Joslyn Art Museum's Ponca art and artifacts, the Neihardt Center and Sacred Hoop Prayer Garden, and an Omaha Reservation and Tribal Office, augment the immersion in the Great Plains landscape. In addition to Gene Wiltfish's acclaimed The Lost Universe: Pawnee Life and Culture, key readings consist of books by five of the faculty.

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