Title: Native Americans | Minority Rights Group
Headings: Native Americans
Native Americans
Profile
Historical context
Socio-economic, political, legal and cultural issues
Self-determination, land resources
Current issues
< United States of America

Content: The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA), part of the Department of Interior is the federal body charged with dealing with more than 326 reservations in mainland US. A typical source of defining Native American status is often based on blood ancestry, although Native Americans also emphasise the importance of language, culture and heritage. In the past three decades, while the US government has restored limited recognition of Native American sovereignty, government-Native American relations are perhaps best described as those of internal neo-colonialism. Historical context
From conquest to ‘extermination’ to self-determination, Native American nations were established in the present-day United States for thousands of years before European colonization. Estimates of the pre-contact population range between 3 million and 12 million people, living in over 600 different societies. Each region had nations with distinct cultures, languages and lifestyles – from nomadic hunting bands in arid regions to large agricultural settlements on the coasts. Common elements included complex social structures based on ceremonial and subsistence roles, communal stewardship of resources, collective decision-making (one of the models for US democracy) and visionary spiritual traditions that emphasized history, ancestry and reverence for the land. The first European conquerors were the Spanish, who invaded Mexico and the south-west in the late sixteenth century and for a time enslaved indigenous people there. The French and Dutch arrived in the seventeenth century, followed by the British. In most cases, initial relations were friendly, but with increased immigration and self-sufficiency by the 1630s, colonists began to covet and invade Native land, and attempt to impose European religion and culture on Native Americans.