Includes bibliographical references and index.

Reading the Sioux. Basic Sioux history. Problems with modern history and ethnography. The Sioux as historical relic, exotica, subject, and text. Re-orienting the Reader. An overview of the text -- The prehistory of the Sioux, 9500 B.C.-A.D. 1650. The received view of Sioux prehistory. The anthropology and archaeology of identity. The archaeological record. Skeletal biology. Historical linguistics. A model of Sioux prehistory -- The French and English fur trade, 1650-1803. The French and English fur trade period. Sioux culture. De-scribing historic documents. Reading maps. The archaeology of historic sioux culture. Entangled objects. Imperfect translations. Women's roles/women's voices -- The early American period, 1803-1850. The early American period. Explaining Sioux warfare. Engendered objects and spaces. Kinship and social organization -- Fighting for survival, 1850-1889. The fight for survival. Looking through pictures. Custer's last stand? Men's clubs (associations). Traditional religion -- Assimilation and allotment, 1889-1934. Reservation dependency. Storytelling. Prophetic movements. Colonizing time. Language and colonial power -- Restoration and reorganization, 1934-1975. The re-emergence of Sioux culture. Health and disease. Sioux households. Formal education. The Dakota language -- The Sioux today : self-determination, 1975-2000. A new independence. Sioux humor. The stereotypes we know them by.