In his keynote address to the Fifth Annual American Indian Studies Consortium in 2005 David Wilkins began by commenting on earlier attempts to formally organize such a gathering in ways that might help establish and accredit Indian studies programs. He said he had the sense that the thrust of earlier meetings "was really an opportunity for Native…

American Indian studies claimed a space to interrogate Western disciplinary epistemologies utilizing Indigenous ways of "knowing". This epistemological struggle has, not surprisingly, been that: a struggle. As the author writes in 2010, people understand that their continuing desire to bring Indigenous community-based ways of knowing into dialogue…

The relationship between American Indians and the U.S. federal government and state governments is complicated. It is a relationship that controls almost all aspects of tribal life and has resulted in American Indians being the most legislated people in the United States. For many years tribal people relied on non-Native attorneys to help navigate…

As a student at Whittier College, Robert Jacobo relished learning more about Native American culture through courses in history and anthropology. But it was a business management course that helped him make up his mind about what he wanted to do with the rest of his life. "The professor was also doing some consulting for an Indian tribe," says…

One of the most versatile and multi-faceted films that an educator can use to illustrate urban America in the 1930s is "Great Guy," a relatively obscure film from 1936 directed by John G. Blystone and starring James Cagney and Mae Clarke. There are some simple practical considerations that make the film such a good fit for an American history or…

The academic field of Native American/American Indian studies (NAS/AIS) has been and largely remains a product of political forces at the national level and now at the tribal level. The very recognition of American Indians as a unique group by the U.S. government is a political statement of survival. In this article, the author revisits the…

The espoused foundation of U.S. society, "E pluribus unum" (out of many, one), is based on the belief that this nation should simultaneously support pluralism and promote unity. The road to making this ideal a reality, however, has not always been smooth. The ever-widening achievement gap highlights how this discordance plays out in our…

This study describes how two 10th grade teachers designed a cross-disciplinary unit, using PBL instruction as a tool for helping students create a valid and convincing argument in their math class. The five week PBL unit focused around American Studies/English and geometry content. In order to measure the rigor and relevance of the unit, multiple…

In this article, the author describes how he co-teaches an interdisciplinary American Studies class that fosters inquiry and reflection on the complexity of an authentic telling of US history. With the help of his partner, a social studies teacher, the author designed an American Studies course that aims to reveal to students that America's…

In this paper, the author talks about some of the issues of the beginnings of Native and Indigenous studies and suggests that one looks more precisely at what people mean when they talk about those beginnings. The author is not a big fan of Native people emerging vaguely from the mists of time, but he is always tracing a history of Native studies…

Since its inception in 2000, Pan-Asian American Community House's (PAACH's) education mission has bridged Asian-American studies to student life. PAACH initiatives have helped spread Asian-American diaspora to thousands of students at the University of Pennsylvania. They have also helped students determine for themselves what it means to be a…

This qualitative study examines the writing and writing experiences of six bilingual (Spanish-English), immigrant university students. Immigrant students are a growing segment of university populations, but explicit/implicit language policies often overlook their unique characteristics and needs. The study draws on the continua of biliteracy model…

In this article, the author discusses how she uses film and new media to "teach students to comprehend the complex historical, social, political, and cultural dimensions of the African American experience." The author uses D.W. Griffith's 1915 "Birth of a Nation," a number of "Blaxploitation" films, YouTube videos,…

In this article, the author shares his comments on the past, present, and future of the American Indian Studies Center (AISC). He discusses how AISC was established and describes how American Indian studies have come a long way from the neglect and disparagement of Native Americans in the way American history is written and taught. He also…

This article reports on the popularity of golf, which grew in Seoul after it held the 1988 Olympics, and the emergence and competitiveness of Korean golfers in which U.S. college coaches are now witnessing. According to Dr. Kyeyoung Park, an associate professor of anthropology and Asian American studies at the University of California, Los…