“WHEN IS AN INDIAN NOT AN INDIAN? THE ‘FRIENDS OF THE INDIAN’ AND THE PROBLEMS OF INDIAN IDENTITY”
by Alexandra Harmon
Although they called themselves Friends of the Indian, the people gathered at Lake Mohonk Resort in 1889 did not take offense when the Reverend H.L. Wayland told them, “It seems to me that we should forget the word Indian. Let us spell Indian M-A-N: then we shall get over a good deal of the way in ‘solving the Indian problem.’” Wayland’s listeners agreed that the Indian problem would be solved only when Indians ceased to be Indians. They had united in a campaign to render Indians indistinguishable from other Americans.
As Wayland sensed, such a campaign highlighted the fact that Indian is neither a necessary nor a static concept. Like all racial or ethnic classifications, the identification of some people as Indians is the product of historical developments. Since Columbus first applied it to Caribbean islanders, the term Indian has been used in a wide variety of circumstances to designate people of many cultures, antecedents, and physical features. In the United States, whether a person has identified himself or been identified by others as an Indian has varied with the historical period, the social and political setting, and the purpose of the identification. According to William T. Hagan, the question of who is an Indian “has been a problem for individuals, tribes, and government administrators since the birth of this nation.”
The Friends of the Indian played a crucial role in the formation of twentieth-century ideas about who is an Indian. Their goals, particularly that of eliminating the characteristics which set Indians apart, were the basis for federal Indian policy from 1880 to at least 1920. Yet the criteria of Indian identity were more clearly fixed in law and administrative practice at the end of the period than at the beginning. For this the Friends of the Indian were in large part responsible. Hoping to render Indians indistinguishable from other Americans, they endorsed policies and practices which required that people first be identified as Indians. Although some were aware of this paradox, they were unable to resolve it. Both practical considerations and their own ideas about race and culture hindered them.
Author Note:
Alexandra Harmon is at The University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195.
Publication:
Journal of Ethnic Studies 18:2