Edward S. Curtis and the North American Indian Project in the Field

Peter Schenzel (Univ. Halle) 4972 2002 Dec 03 11:16:08

Description

In Edward S. Curtis and the North American Indian Project in the Field, Mick Gidley provides an intimate and informative glimpse of Edward S. Curtis (1868–1952) and his associates as they undertook their work in the early decades of the twentieth century. Photographer Curtis embarked on an epic quest to document through word and picture the traditional cultures of Native Americans in the western United States—cultures that he believed were inevitably doomed. Curtis’s project became the largest anthropological enterprise undertaken in this country and yielded the monumental work The North American Indian (1907–30). Its publication was a watershed in the anthropological study of Native Americans and inspired the first full-length documentary film, popular magazine articles, books for young readers, lectures, and photography exhibitions. Housing a wealth of ethnographic information yet steeped in nostalgia and predicated upon the assumption that Native Americans were a “vanishing race,” Curtis’s work has been both influential and controversial, and its vision of Native Americans must still be reckoned with today.

 

Gidley draws on a wide array of unpublished or uncollected reminiscences, reports, letters, field notes, and magazine and newspaper articles. The reports and reflections by Curtis and the project’s ethnological assistants, memoirs by Curtis family members, and eyewitness accounts by newspaper reporters afford an unprecedented look at the process of anthropological fieldwork as it was commonly practiced during this period. This book also sheds light on the views of Curtis and his contemporaries concerning their enterprise and the Native peoples they worked with and provides a clearer sense of how both Native Americans and the mainstream American public perceived their efforts.

Sujets

• USA
• Indigenous peoples
• Anthropology
• États-Unis

Informations

• Publié par: Nebraska
• Date de parution: 01 septembre 2003
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780803203488
• Langue: English

Extrait

Edward S. Curtis and the North American Indian Project in the Field

Edward S. Curtis and the North American Indian Project in the Field

Edited and with an introduction by Mick Gidley

university of nebraska press lincoln and london

©2003by Mick Gidley All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America

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“Entering Apache Lands,” by Harold P. Curtis, c.1948; an excerpt from “Traveling the Route of Lewis and Clark—One Hundred Years Later,” by Edward S. Curtis, n.d.; an excerpt of a reminiscence by Edward S. Curtis; an excerpt of a memoir by Florence Curtis Graybill; an excerpt of Beth Curtis Magnuson’s Log of Her Alaskan Voyage,1927; an excerpt from “A Rambling Log of the Field Season of the Summer of1927,” by Edward S. Curtis, 1927; and an excerpt from “Indian Religion,” a lecture by Edward S. Curtis,1911, are reprinted courtesy of James Graybill. Excerpts from “The Gods Forbid,” “Among the Tewas,” and “With the Cheyennes” by W. W. Phillips are reprinted courtesy of the late W. S. Phillips. “Apache Religious Beliefs,” by Edward S. Curtis, c.1911; Field Notes on the Willapas by W. E. Myers,1910; and A Reminiscence of George Hunt, by Edward S. Curtis, c. 1930s, are reprinted courtesy of the Seaver Center for Western History Research, Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History. The Hodge Papers letters by W. E. Myers to Frederick Webb Hodge,1908; by Edward S. Curtis to Frederick Webb Hodge,1909; and by Stewart C. Eastwood to Frederick Webb Hodge,1927, are reprinted courtesy of the Southwest Museum, Los Angelesca. The Edmond S. Meany Papers letters by Edwin J. Dalby to Edmond S. Meany,1908, and by Edwin S. Curtis to Edmond S. Meany,1922, are reprinted courtesy of Special Collections, University Archives, University of Washington Libraries. The excerpt from “Among the Blackfoot Indians of Montana,” by A. C. Haddon, c.1914, is reprinted courtesy of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library. Unless otherwise indicated, all photographs in this book were made by Edward S. Curtis; the reproductions come from negatives or prints in the Curtis copyright files of the Prints and Photographs Division of the U.S. Library of Congress. Titles are as given in those files, though dates are either those of the year in which it is known they were made or, failing that, the year they were copyrighted. The number given in the caption is the Library of Congress (lc) lot number followed by the Curtis negative number or, where it exists, thelcnegative number (such asusz62 followed by a number). Further information on a photograph’s contents and relevance is given in its caption.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Edward S. Curtis and the North American Indian project in the field / edited and with an introduction by Mick Gidley. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 0-8032-2193-2(cloth: alk. paper) 1. Curtis, Edward S.,1868–1952.2. Curtis, Edward S., 1868–1952. North American Indian.3. Indians of North America—Portraits.4. Indians of North America—Pictorial works. I. Gidley, M. (Mick) e77.5.e39 2003 970.004'97—dc21 2002043037

In Memory Doris Florence Gidley & Bernice and Myron Gordon

List of Illustrations Preface Acknowledgments Explanatory Notes 1Introduction 2In the Southwest 3On the Plains 4In the Northwest 5Up and Down the West Coast 6Generally Speaking Notes References Cited Index

Contents

viii ix xi xiii 1 30 57 82 108 131 149 163 171

Illustrations

following page84 1. Author’s Camp among the Spokan 2. Edward S. Curtis 3. Camp Curtis 4. Red Cloud, Edmond S. Meany, and others 5. The Talk 6. The Village Herald 7. The Offering 8. Hopi Snake Priest 9. Apache Still Life 10. Women at Camp Fire 11. San Ildefonso Tablita Dance 12. Bear Black 13. Hunka Ceremony 14. Tearing Lodge and his Wife 15. Indian Maiden 16. Stormy Day 17. On Quamichan Lake 18.KominakaDancer 19. A Chief—Chukchansi 20. Eskimos at Plover Bay 21.Kenowun 22. On the River’s Edge 23. A Swap 24. Modern Chemehuevi Home 25. One Blue Bead

Preface

The bookThe North American Indian(1907–1930), credited to Edward S. Curtis, is becoming ever better known. In recent years, for example, almost all of its photographic images have been reproduced in one (admittedly very thick) paper- bound volume, and Anne Makepeace’s documentary filmComing to Light(2000), which celebrates Curtis’s achievements, has been widely screened. In addition, the photogravures fromThe North American Indianhave been made freely available in digitized form on the World Wide Web, and there are plans to do the same with the extensive written material to be found in the original volumes (hitherto only accessible either in a reprint edition that is no longer available or in an abbreviated form between the covers of anthologies, such as my ownThe Vanishing Race[1976]). The present book is an effort to make available materials that are not yet in the public domain. Publications have appeared that purport to be collections of unpublished data. The most significant isPrayer to the Great Mystery: The Uncollected Writings and Photography of Edward S. Curtis(1995), edited by Gerald Hausman and Bob Kapoun, a book that does indeed include among its illustrations many previously unpublished photographs. All of the verbal text in Hausman and Kapoun’s book, 1 however, is taken from the published volumes ofThe North American Indian. By contrast, the emphasis ofEdward S. Curtis and the North American Indian Project in the Fieldis on written documents, most of which have never been published—or, if they had been previously published they languished uncollected in journals and the like for some ninety years. (I give information in headnotes and endnotes on the few cases where they have been reprinted—usually only in part—more recently.) In addition, almost all the images in the present book were not reproduced or exhibited during Curtis’s lifetime and have not been published since. The introduction explains the rationale of my selections. I hope you will enjoy reading the encounters presented here.

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