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American Studies ETDs

Theses/Dissertations

Indigeneity

Publication Year

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Full-Text Articles in American Studies

Technologies Of Territoriality: Indigeneity, Surveillance, And The State, Elspeth Iralu Jun 2022

Technologies Of Territoriality: Indigeneity, Surveillance, And The State, Elspeth Iralu

American Studies ETDs

This dissertation examines the global spatial surveillance of Indigenous peoples, nations, and territories in the twenty-first century through a multi-site relational analysis of colonial surveillance and Indigenous cartography in the United States, India, and Palestine. Analyzing Indigenous graphic novels, video games, virtual reality, performance protests, and visual art, I demonstrate how air and the aerial perspective actively shape what happens on and below the ground. I argue that Indigenous experiences of and responses to colonial and counterinsurgent surveillance are not limited by the geographic and legal bounds of nation-states but are rather linked through global histories of militarization and colonialism. …


Danzantes Aztecas Y Promotoras Tradicionales: The Ritual Performances And Identity Politics Of A Mexican American Danzantes Aztecas Y Promotoras Tradicionales: The Ritual Performances And Identity Politics Of A Mexican American Ceremonial Community, Dina K. Barajas Jul 2020

Danzantes Aztecas Y Promotoras Tradicionales: The Ritual Performances And Identity Politics Of A Mexican American Danzantes Aztecas Y Promotoras Tradicionales: The Ritual Performances And Identity Politics Of A Mexican American Ceremonial Community, Dina K. Barajas

American Studies ETDs

This dissertation is an ethnographic study which examined the ritual performances of an interconnected Mexican American and Mexican immigrant danza Azteca and curanderismo ceremonial community located in central and northern New Mexico, and central México. This project also explored if and how these rituals recognize the practitioners’ indigeneity. As a Mexican American and Native scholar and ceremonial participant of this community, I provided an “insider’s” understanding of the epistemologies and ontologies that inform these ceremonies. My positionality and methodology acted as a lens to critically examine danzantes’ and promotoras tradicionales’ claims of indigeneity. Importantly, this work provides a fluid conceptualization …


(SīˈTĭng) Detroit: Vision And Dispossession In A Midwest Bordertown, Matthew J. Irwin Jun 2020

(SīˈTĭng) Detroit: Vision And Dispossession In A Midwest Bordertown, Matthew J. Irwin

American Studies ETDs

This dissertation examines the relationality of dispossession, racialization, and migration in Detroit, connecting the neoliberal rationality of (re)development to its foundations in Indigenous dispossession and racialized labor. “(Sīˈtĭng) Detroit” understands Detroit as a bordertown, where “the border” is the organizing structure and condition for the operation of settler colonialism in Detroit. From the international boundary to the county line, the border is the on-the-ground, everyday method for controlling space, disciplining populations, and limiting mobility for racialized subjects. To examine possession and belonging in a Black city on an international border, this dissertation introduces a “(sīˈtĭng)” — a methodology for locating …