Spirit Capture: Photographs from the National Museum of the American Indian

Spirit Capture: Photographs from the National Museum of the American Indian. Tim Johnson. ed. Washington. DC. and London: Smithsonian Institution Press in association with the National Museum of the American Indian, 1998. 206 pp.     

Pomo Indian Basket Weavers. Their Baskets and the Art Market

Pomo Indian Basket Weavers. Their Baskets and the Art Market Grace Hudson Museum and Sun House, Ukiah, California, May through September 1998; National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., October 1998 through January 1999; National Museum of the American Indian, George Gustav Heye Center, New York, May 9through August 15, 1999 (review venue); University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, PA, October 1999 through September 2000.
Pomo Indian Basket Weavers. Their Baskets and the Art Market. Special issue of Expedition, The Magazine of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology 40(1), 1998.     

Clay People

Clay People: Pueblo Indian Figurative Traditions. Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian, Santa Fe, NM,May 14–October27, 1999.
Clay People: Pueblo Indian Figurative Traditions. Jonathan Batkin. comp. and ed. Santa Fe: Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian, 1999. 95 pp.     

The Role of Education in American Indian Self-Determination: Lessons from the Ramah Navajo Community School

Since 1975 the Indian Self-Determination and Educational Assistance Act has enabled American Indian communities to enact self-determination through community-based schooling. In this study conducted by a Navajo researcher, the Ramah Navajo community defined self-determination and how it was operationalized within the community and school. The study demonstrates how education based on Navajo epistemology has been integral to self-determination at Ramah, underscoring the importance of incorporating Native American epistemologies in schooling for Indigenous students.     

Gifts of Pride and Love: The Cultural Significance of Kiowa and Comanche Lattice Cradles

Gifts of Pride and Love: The Cultural Significance of Kiowa and Comanche Lattice Cradles. Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology, Brown University, Bristol, RI, 1998; Gilcrease Museum, Tulsa, OK, December 4, 1999-February 2000; Heard Museum, Phoenix, AZ, April 20-July 16, 2001; Fowler Museum of Cultural History, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA, August 27, 2000-January 16, 2001; National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution, Gustav Heye Center, New York, NY, March-May 2001; Oklahoma Museum of Natural History, Norman, OK, June-September 2001; Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center, Ledyard, CT, October 2001-January 2002.
Gifts of Pride and Love: Kiowa and Comanche Cradles. Barbara A. Hail. ed. Bristol, RI: Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology, Brown University, 2000. 135 pp.     

Museum Exhibit

Book reviewed in this article:
Sacred Circles: Two Thousand Years of North American Indian Art. American Exhibition: Nelson Gallery of Art-Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, Missouri, April 16 to June 19, 1977 (European Exhibition: Hayward Gallery, London, October 1976 to January 1977).
Sacred Circles: Two Thousand Years of North American Indian Art. Ralph T. Coe .     

Crafting Exhibitions

Book reviewed in this article:
Crafting Exhibitions: Contemporary Navajo Weaving: The Gloria F. Ross Collection of the Denver Art Museum .
Crafting Exhibitions: Reflections of the Weavers' World: The Gloria F. Ross Collection of the Denver Art Museum .     

Anthropological films and the myth of scientific truths

This article describes, analyzes, and interprets various cultural influences on the representational drawings of young Navajo students, in order to understand their changing cultural viewpoint. The data and drawings were gathered from two elementary art classes in one Navajo public school in northeastern Arizona, as part of an ongoing study. This information is compared to anthropological data gathered on adult Navajo drawings nearly 30 years ago, as well as to some dominant theories on child art. Data reveal students are influenced by Navajo traditional images, classroom teachers’ versions of school art, popular art images, pan‐Indian influences, and peer copying. Results reveal the persistence of traditional nature imagery, the incorporation of similar schemas and color use with mainstream children, a keen ability to render realistic images and space, and the incorporation of those American things that the Navajo regard as “good for them.” Keen drawing abilities appear at a young age among the Navajo because of the high status of the arts, traditional education through observation and demonstration, peer imitation, and male drawing competition.     

Baseball as America/Baseball as America: Seeing Ourselves through Our National Game.

Baseball as America. National Baseball Hall of Fame Museum and Library, at the American Museum of Natural History, New York. March 16-August 18, 2002, traveling exhibition.
Baseball as America: Seeing Ourselves through Our National Game. National Baseball Hall of Fame. Washington, DC: National Geographic, 2002. 330 pp.     

Indigenous Media Gone Global: Strengthening Indigenous Identity On- and Offscreen at the First Nations/First Features Film Showcase

For 12 days in May 2005, the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York and the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI), as well as several other screening venues in Washington, D.C., hosted a group of renowned indigenous filmmakers from around the globe for the groundbreaking film showcase, "First Nations/First Features: A Showcase of World Indigenous Film and Media." This film showcase highlighted the innovative ways in which indigenous filmmakers draw on indigenous storytelling practices to create cinematic visions that honor their long-standing indigenous cultural worlds while reaching local and world audiences. In this essay, I highlight the onscreen impact through an analysis of several films featured in First Nations/First Features, as well as the offscreen impact emphasizing how the indigenous directors used this opportunity to strengthen social networks and share experience in this industry, which may develop into future collaborative film projects.     

The whole universe is my cathedral: a contemporary Navajo spiritual synthesis

This article discusses the three major spiritual healing ways used by Navajo Indians today: Traditional healing practices that have been used for generations and still have a dynamic existence relevant to everyday Navajo life; Christian healing traditions, ranging from Catholic Charismatic to Protestant Pentecostal; and practices of the Native American Church (NAC). The complex relationship among these healing traditions on the Navajo reservation is examined through a case study of a Navajo woman whose personal spirituality includes all three. Faced with serious medical problems, this devout Catholic turned to Navajo Traditional and Native American Church spiritual diagnosis and treatment. This analysis is the occasion for a reflection on the contemporary relevance of the kind of spiritual synthesis characterized in this woman's experience.     

Aldehyde dehydrogenase polymorphism in North American, South American, and Mexican Indian populations.

While about 40% of the South American Indian populations (Atacameños, Mapuche, Shuara) were found to be deficient in aldehyde dehydrogenase isozyme I (ALDH2 or E2), preliminary investigations showed very low incidence of isozyme deficiency among North American natives (Sioux, Navajo) and Mexican Indians (mestizo). Possible implications of such trait differences on cross-cultural behavioral response to alcohol drinking are discussed.     

Exhibit Review Essay

Book reviewed in this article:
Science in American Life . Arthur Molella, curator. Permanent exhibit at the National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, opened April 1994.     

Best of the Sámi Film Festival 2008

ABSTRACT  In June of 2008, the American-Scandinavian Foundation and the National Museum of the American Indian presented a screening of selections originally shown at the 12th annual Sámi Film Festival held in Norway. This marked the first time that a version of the festival, which features works by and about the indigenous peoples of Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Russia, was presented in New York. Three of the films shown— Last Yoik in Saami Forests?, Herdswoman, and Calmmis Calbmái ( From an Eye to an Eye) —examined how Sámi communities draw on shared traditions as a productive resource for reimagining Sámi identity in a contemporary context. [Keywords: Sámi, Scandinavia, indigenous media, ethnographic film]     

Book Notes

Textiles of Pre-Columbian Chihuahua. L ila M. O'N eale
The McDougall Collection of Indian Textiles from Guatemala and Mexico. L aura E. S tart
Plumbate: A Mesoamerican Trade Ware. A nna O. S hepard
The Symmetry of Abstract Design, with Special Reference to Ceramic Decoration. A nna O. S hepard
Acclimatization in the Andes. C arlos M onge
The Pre-History of the Lagoa Santa Region ( Minas Gerais ). H. V. W alter
Philippine and East Asian Archaeology and its Relation to the Origin of the Pacific Islands Population. H. O tley B eyer
Excavations in Mayurbhanj. N irmalkumar B ose and D harani S en     

A 122.5-kilobase deletion of the P gene underlies the high prevalence of oculocutaneous albinism type 2 in the Navajo population

Oculocutaneous albinism (OCA) is a genetically heterogeneous disorder. There are four known types of OCA: OCA1-OCA4. The clinical manifestations of all types of OCA include skin and hair hypopigmentation and visual impairment. Although there are a few documented observations of high frequency of albinism among Native Americans, including the Hopi, Zuni, Kuna, Jemez, Laguna, San Juan, and Navajo, no causative molecular defect has been previously reported. In the present study, we show that albinism in one Native American population, the Navajo, is caused by a LINE-mediated 122.5-kilobase deletion of the P gene, thus demonstrating that albinism in this population is OCA2. This deletion appears to be Navajo specific, because this allele was not detected in 34 other individuals with albinism who listed other Native American origins, nor has it been reported in any other ethnic group. The molecular characterization of this deletion allele allowed us to design a three-primer polymerase chain reaction system to estimate the carrier frequency in the Navajo population by screening 134 unrelated normally pigmented Navajos. The carrier frequency was found to be approximately 4.5%. The estimated prevalence of OCA2 in Navajos is between approximately 1 per 1,500 and 1 per 2,000. We further estimate that this mutation originated 400-1,000 years ago from a single founder.     

Book Review

Book review in this article:
Archeology: Settlement of the Prairie Margin: Archaeology of the Richland Creek Reservoir, Navarro and Freestone Counties, Texas: 1980-1981 . L. Mark Raab
Historic Indian Groups of the Choke Canyon Reservoir and Surrounding Area, Southern Texas . T. N. Campbell and T. J. Campbell
Archaeological Investigations at Choke Canyon Reservoir, South Texas: The Phase I Findings . Grant D. Hall, Stephen L. Black, and Carol Graves
Excavations at 41 LK 67: A Prehistoric Site in the Choke Canyon Reservoir, South Texas . Kenneth M. Brown, Daniel R. Potter, Grant D. Hall, and Stephen L. Black
Anasazi and Navajo Land Use in the McKinley Mine Area Near Gallup, New Mexico, Volume 1, Parts 1 and 2: Archeology . Christina G. Allen and Ben A. Nelson
Anasazi and Navajo Land Use in the McKinley Mine Area Near Gallup, New Mexico, Volume 2: Navajo Ethnohistory . Klara B. Kelley     

Shonto Revisited: Measures of Social and Economic Change in a Navajo Community, 1955–1971

Between 1954 and 1956 the senior author of this article carried out a detailed social and economic study of the community of Shonto, situated in what was then a particularly remote corner of the Navajo Indian Reservation in northeastern Arizona. In 1972 the junior author returned to do a restudy of the same community. A comparison of the data obtained in the two studies provides unique measures of social and economic change, and also of social and economic persistence, during a period of unprecedented growth and modernization of the Navajo Reservation . [social change, economic change, Navajo]     

Cyanobacteria cause black staining of the National Museum of the American Indian Building, Washington, DC, USA

Microbial deterioration of stone is a widely recognised problem affecting monuments and buildings all over the world. In this paper, dark-coloured staining, putatively attributed to microorganisms, on areas of the National Museum of the American Indian Building, Washington, DC, USA, were studied. Observations by optical and electron microscopy of surfaces and cross sections of limestone indicated that biofilms, which penetrated up to a maximum depth of about 1?mm, were mainly composed of cyanobacteria, with the predominance of Gloeocapsa and Lyngbya. Denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis analysis revealed that the microbial community also included eukaryotic algae (Trebouxiophyceae) and fungi (Ascomycota), along with a consortium of bacteria. Energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy analysis showed the same elemental composition in stained and unstained areas of the samples, indicating that the discolouration was not due to abiotic chemical changes within the stone. The dark pigmentation of the stone was correlated with the high content of scytonemin, which was found in all samples.     

The Story of American Glass

MaCrame you Can Wear Ballantine Books, Inc. List Price $3.95. Reviewed by Laura Torbet.

Designing and Making Dolls Watson-Guptill List Price $8.95. Reviewed by llse Gray.

Bridgman's Life Drawings. Dover Publications, Inc. List Price $2.00. Reviewed by George B. Bridgman.

Rug Weaving for Beginners Watson-Guptill List Price $7.95. Reviewed by Margaret Seagroatt.

Encouraging American Craftsmen. National Endowment for the Arts List Price $.45. Reviewed by Charles Counts.

Tie and Dye: As a Present Day Craft Ballantine Books List Price $2.95. Reviewed by Anne Maile.

The af Encyclopedia of Textiles by Editorial Board of American Fabrics Magazine Prentice-Hall, Inc. List Price $39.95

The Hudson River and its Painters. The Viking Press, Inc. List Price $25.00. Reviewed by John K. Howat.