An Archaeology of Survivance: Investigating Settler Colonial Narratives with the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde Community of Oregon

Summary

Native nations in the 19th and early 20th century were subjected to increasing pressure from American settlers and the U.S. government, which resulted in their forced removal, resettlement, and the creation of policies that were directed at terminating tribal identities and reservations. Despite this history of colonial oppression and dispossession tribes such as the Grand Ronde Community of Oregon (CTGR) did not just survive settler colonialism, but created anew their social worlds and sense of community. Gerald Vizenor refers to this creative resilience as survivance, a term he uses to reject narrative tropes of tragedy and victimry. Using the tools of archaeology Field Methods in Indigenous Archaeology, a community-based collaborative partnership between the CTGR and the University of Washington, is documenting Grand Ronde’s histories of. This paper provides an overview of preliminary results from the project’s investigations of daily life, childhood, and education on the tribe’s reservation in northwestern Oregon.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2018   •
• Reservation Archaeology: Culture Change, Historical Trauma, and Community Resilience in Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Native North America

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Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 458