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I was very pleased with the responses/posts continue with more sharing and learning. GREAT JOB EVERYBODY! Mr. Salabye

As a new medium we are sure to see more of in the near future, I have set this blog up to supplement our inquiry of class topics. This is a new communication method that will benefit both students and teacher.





Thursday, January 20, 2011

Wilkins Read chapters 2 & 3

I know the covers are different, but the contents are pretty much the same. The study of Navajo culture and politics through the eyes of David E. Wilkins can be very rewarding and informative to readers and students. Sharing thoughts and reviews of the assigned readings can be very productive collaboration for all parties involved in the inquiry of indigenous political systems.

Students post your comments for these sections below, thanks.

17 comments:

  1. Chapter 2;
    What is gov't it asks. to me government is a higher power than people. there are many kinds of government such as democracy, dictatorship, totalitarian...etc. all governments require citizens to give up some of their freedom even all their freedoms.

    politics began because people were experiencing all kinds of problems and they needed a way to resolve things. politics and government have many kinds of functions such as maintaining order, resolving conflicts , protecting its people and resources.

    Tribal gov't believed that they were self-government because individuals were responsible for their own acts. Leaders in the past thought that they were only peacemakers, teachers, and comedians because there was no room for people (individuals) who seek power because there really was no power.

    In the US there are two major kinds of political ideoligies...Liberal and conservative... Liberal meaning bending the rules just a tad and conservative meaning the old school ways..like by the book man. But then again there is a small number of people in the US who believe socialism (like communism) should exist here in the United States but that is insane! i wouldnt want to follow and do the same thing everyday just because the government thinks i should do it. I'd rather go live in the mountains and get lost before i accept socialism. anyway ahem...

    Nearly all governments have three distinct funtions legislative, executive, and judicial. The legislative branch being the most powerful of the three. Mainly because they are the lawmakers. The executive branch carries out the law and can do much much much more such as Veto (reject) legislation, enforce laws...etc. The judicial branch has the power to review actions performed by the legislation and the executive branches.

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  3. Chapter 3:
    Indigenous beings make up only 1% of the US population. There are only approximately 1.9 millions natives nation wide. Since the beginning of time many american indians have become more urbanized. Natives also have the lowest life expectancy rate because of many health issues. and we have the highest unemployment rate too. we are governed by a complicated sysytem of laws and regulation mainly because we are subject to tribal, state, and federal laws. (totally messed up because we are the only "MINORITY" in the US to be so heavily regulated.)...
    Some policies in the tribal government were created way back in 1500s but still do apply today. (WOW!)
    Bartolome de las Casas and Francisco de Vitoria drafted documents in the 16th century to explain that the American Indians do have sovereignty over their lands because we "discovered" it. Indians allowed foreigners to settle on their land and as time went on Europeans started to trade things for friendship and land. Because of this things went out of whack and they started having conflicts and problems that led to wars.
    when andrew jackson became president a lot of things started to change. under his administration the removal of tribes happened. meaning they started moving the tribes out of their land and putting them on smaller, tough terrain. after the removing was done they sold off pieces of that land to profit from it.
    By 1880s the settlers decided to draw all indians into the AMERICAN WAY and change their whole image. their clothes their language their traditions and cultures. even though this went against some treaties that were formed they still went ahead with it because they thought it was a really big problem.
    The NN is bigger than all the other reservations because we had BIA agents and Navajos going out to Washington to request and addition to the land we already had because of rapid "repopulation." And it would be just a big disaster if they gave us a small piece of land because the land they gave us at first was horrible. It was NOT suitable for farming. (put us here on purpose so we could all "perish" but we didnt)After all this finally came EDUCATION.
    NOT DONE YET!!!!!!

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  4. Chapter 2:
    In chapter two i thought about what it said about "where do you stand on the government"? It said that do you think the government should control everything or have limited or no powers at all? Right now i think the government already has power over everything. The government already controls the the u.s., and i don't think the government would agree to having little or no power. I also found it interesting when it talked about a unitary system of government. If the u.s. had a unitary system of government would it be better or worse for us.

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  5. Chapter 3:
    In chapter 3 it explained the basic stucture of how American Indians were recognized as sovereign people. In the beginning tribes and settlers got along for a while. After a while the settlers began to try to urbanize the American Indian tribes. Then that led to conflicts and eventually war between the two. The federal government tried to make "peace" with the tribes by making treaties with them. After so many years Congress didnt want the responsibility of supervising Indians anymore (which was included in the treaties). So the federal government tried to propose other solutions for Indian problems. Some of their solutions only worked for them and not the Indian tribes. Even after all this reorganizing and re-planning that the federal government did, i still don't think American Indians got what they needed or deserved. So the federal government let the tribes create their own form of govenment that best fit their tribes interests. I think the federal government did that so they didnt have to have as much responsibility as they shoud have with American Indians.

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  6. In Chapter two i found it interesting about the government of being legitimate to control human behavior. Citizens have to give up their time to be part of whats being governed. But yet why? Usually it would be to obtain what the government can provide for everyone! Well I wonder if the government has enough power to enforce decsions so they can provide public good s and maintain order for everyone!!

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  7. In Chapter three the indigionous people had the right of sovereignty over the lands. The colonial power gained against other colonial powers and not with the other inginoious groups.
    Indian tribes confronted the americans settlers and their politicans. Yet the government could'nt afford to make war with the indians so they used treatys and they found it humane and it had an economical approch for dealing with indian tribes. Treaties in the U.S. enacted laws. One Treaty was the Indian Trade & Intercourse Act, it was to regulate settlers and protect tribes from the white fronteirsmen and businessmen.. So i think the federal indian policy was obtained to protect each other...

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  8. Chapter 2: In this Chapter I read that the leaders are the Naataanii before there was government and when government was created. They decided which ideas were best to solve issues they had come across, also who will do the hunting, or the planting. They were not only into keeping the peace they were also medicine men and helped people get well. The leaders can decide who can go to war also they have the power to send children to war. It is also up to the government if they would want to save the environment. If the Government says they want to protect the people then they would not want to make the decision of making children go to war or even to not try to save the environment after all we were all born on the same planet and this is our home we should protect it.
    Chapter 3: In this Chapter what really caught my attention was the General Allotment Act which was passed in 1887, it says this act authorized individuals allotment of reservation lands to tribal citizens and granted to the allotee upon the termination of the trust of the land. This act was mainly passed to absorb tribal people into american society. This is like trying to take away who a person is and who the person was because a persons land is part of who the person was. This act maybe did not let the people choose where to live and plant there crops. I believe that if one leader spoke out to the people and said maybe the american way would be a bit better for the native people then they would have probably listened and changed there ways such as today. If they would have spoken out earlier then we would have most likely had more progress years ago then we do today. These are my comments on the read for Wilkins chapters 2 + 3...

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  9. I totally agree with KimTrujillo. This chptr. basically revolves around the gov't. And like why we need it, also who has power in a gov't. This ch. discusses the Gov'ts functions,structures and the political party>democracy. And that is all i got out of the chapter...TO BE CONTINUED~

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  10. The main reason in having a governemnt is to maintain order, provide public goods, and to promote equality. Chapter 2 was an outlook of basic principles that government use to overview the Native society. Many of the structures that are put up for Native people in the constitution amazed me. I was also interested in how it defines the leader and gatherings of the Navajo government in the traditional perspective. I never knew that we actually had clan leaders, who were politically and ceremonially active.

    Although most of my fascination is in the structures of governments, I was also fascinated in how Westerners think political behavior is made by selfishness and greed.

    Some questions I have are:
    What is Disparate power?
    What is libertarianism?

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  11. Chapter 3 caught my attention. It mainly dicussed treaties betweent the Navajo Nation and the United States government. I was stunned by how the United States government tried to eliminate the American Indians, and take away there reservations. I felt sad knowing that the government tried to starve and torment my people in sucha way, to where we can't live in peace. I believe that the after effects of this unfair treaty has caused poverty among my people, creating a bad environment for Native youth. I believe that the government has created there own problems in the future.

    I was really interested in reading about the history of our independence as a sovereign nation within a nation. I really didnt like reading about the Allotment act of 1887.

    What made me really hate the text of the book was how the united States government relocated all American Indians to wastelands, so they can profit off of fertile soil.

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  12. Chapter 2:
    For the Chapter 2 reading in "The Navajo Political Experience" it was about Governmental Structure: Its Form and Function. It was mainly about what government is, why we need it, where the power is from, politics and other things. Out of the whole reading of chapter 2 the main part that caught my attention was how the power of the government is. It may say in the constitution, "We the People...", but it seems that there is not much for the people of the U.S. to stand for. The power of the government is the government, but the people do not seem to have much say for how the government is run, or what the people can do to change the government. One of the main things that the people have the power or the say in is who the government of the U.S. is. Also, we vote on laws and things such as that, but it is HOW the government is we have no say in. The people of the U.S. should have more say in it because we are the main essential power of the government, because without the people of the government, and without the people of the government there is no population, which makes it actually not be a government. One thing also though is that government is somewhat an essential thing to how things are run also, because without government it would be chaotic and out of order, but with it it somehow has a way to keep things in order. An addition to that, people are greedy and selfish, they do what is best for them, do what will let them have more power and money, they don't do what is the best for the people or their nation.

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  13. Ch.3
    This chapter was mainly about treaties and how these treaties affected Native American tribe across the United States. Several acts took place throughout the late 1400s to present day. People look at us and treat us Natives as though we don't even exist. But even from the beginning of times we "Diné" were observes as very delicate and sovereign people...indiginous people. And the United States government, to me, seemed to toss us up, around and off to unfamiliar lands. The book explains how they removed us from our land, and tried to relocate us elsewhere for their convenience and finally we had to settle for reservations....Gosh that makes me so mad!!!! gRRR. All these policies i think were made to destroy our religion, reduce their land base and end or dramatically diminish their sovereign power(s).

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  15. The continued....Ch.2 Saga
    This chapter introduces the varous types of Government we see with the naked eye. It's all around us from debates, voting and even health care. Our country is made up of politics and we see people go at it for a political position. This chapter fills us in on what we are missing,..so basically government is trying to make us the "it" country. It categorizes us as "having it altogether", but in reality..no! But the book entails that society does indeed need a government, so our nation can be a union and be under control. Yeah, leaders are here to lead...as a whole Country we should encourage better politicians or elect experience candidates into a high office. I think all 3 branches are capable of understanding how important having such a successful governing system like ours is.
    GOD BLESS AMERICA, land of the free!

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  16. In Chapter 2 I learned how our goverment should work and why all the chapters and agencies were established, to represent all Navajos. Chapeter meeting were where voices and opinions were heard. This chapeter discussed all different sorts of government that there were. The local government should go by what this book says and represent Navajos as a whole and not individualize them. I am starting to think maybe the reduction of the council delegates was a bad thing because of that not all Navajos will be represented. Then again maybe that is why there was a reduction, because they weren't doing their job correctly.

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  17. Chapter 3 was about treaties and how they affected the Navajos and deals that were made between the Uited States and the Navajo. How we as a Native American tribe were forced to live on reservations and had to give up our tradition and religion to comply with what the actual foreigners wanted. It doesn't make sense...Navajos or Native American Tribes should have dominated them because they knew more. Thus, the tribes didn't they fell into a catagory of doing what they wanted and because of all their policies and laws languages and tribes have become extinct.

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