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Description
This project examines the decision of American policymakers to deny the Amerasians of Vietnam--the offspring of American fathers and Vietnamese mothers born as a result of the Vietnam War--American citizenship in the 1982 Amerasian Immigration Act and the 1987 Amerasian Homecoming Act. It investigates why policymakers deemed a population unfit

This project examines the decision of American policymakers to deny the Amerasians of Vietnam--the offspring of American fathers and Vietnamese mothers born as a result of the Vietnam War--American citizenship in the 1982 Amerasian Immigration Act and the 1987 Amerasian Homecoming Act. It investigates why policymakers deemed a population unfit for the responsibilities of American society, despite the fact that they had American fathers.

The examination draws upon numerous archival collections of the key policymakers, humanitarians and non-governmental organizations involved in each piece of legislation. Additionally, archival and published documents from the U.S. government and military, popular media, and veteran's organizations, are important. Since many of those involved in the legislation are still living, oral history interviews are also a critical piece of the methodology.

The dissertation argues that the exclusion of citizenship was a component of bigger issues: international relationships in a Cold War era, America's defeat in the Vietnam War, and a history in the United States of racialized exclusionary immigration and citizenship policies against people of Asian descent. It exposes the contradictory approach of policymakers unable to reconcile the Amerasian mixture of race and nation with US law. Consequently, policymakers simultaneously employed an inclusionary discourse that deemed the Amerasians worthy of American attention, guidance and humanitarian aid, and implemented exclusionary policies that designated them unfit for the responsibilities of American citizenship.
ContributorsThomas, Sabrina (Author) / Longley, Rodney (Thesis advisor) / Fixico, Donald (Committee member) / Anderson, Carol (Committee member) / O'Donnell, Catherine (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
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Description
This thesis explores the story behind the long effort to achieve Native American suffrage in Arizona. It focuses on two Arizona Supreme Court cases, in which American Indians attempted, and were denied the right to register to vote. The first trial occurred in 1928, four years after the Indian Citizenshi

This thesis explores the story behind the long effort to achieve Native American suffrage in Arizona. It focuses on two Arizona Supreme Court cases, in which American Indians attempted, and were denied the right to register to vote. The first trial occurred in 1928, four years after the Indian Citizenship Act granted citizenship to all Native Americans born or naturalized in the United States. The Arizona Supreme Court rejected the Native American plaintiff's appeal to register for the electorate, and subsequently disenfranchised Native Americans residing on reservations for the next twenty years. In 1948, a new generation of Arizona Supreme Court Justices overturned the court's previous ruling and finally awarded voting rights to all qualified Native Americans in the state. However, voting rights during the Civil Rights era did not necessarily mean equal voting rights. Therefore, this thesis also investigates how the Voting Rights Act of 1965 greatly reduced the detrimental effects of voter discrimination. This study examines how national events, like world war and the Great Depression influenced the two trials. In particular, this thesis focuses on the construction of political and social power in Arizona as it related to Native American voting rights. In addition, it discusses the evolution of native citizenship in the United States at large and for the most part within Arizona. The thesis also considers how the goal of native assimilation into American society affected American Indian citizenship, and how a paternalistic and conservative American Indian policy of the 1920s greatly influenced the outcome of the first trial. Another thread of this story is the development of mainstream white views of Native Americans. Lastly, this thesis identifies the major players of this story, especially the American Indian activists and their supporters whose courage and perseverance led to an outcome that positively changed the legal rights of generations of Native Americans in Arizona for years to come.
ContributorsBassett, Jenna (Author) / Fixico, Donald (Thesis advisor) / Osburn, Katherine (Committee member) / Sturgeon, Melanie (Committee member) / Warren-Findley, Jannelle (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
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Description
This dissertation examines the conception, planning, creation, and management of Fort Union National Monument (FOUN) in northeastern New Mexico. Over approximately the last eighty-five years, writers, bureaucrats, boosters, and the National Park Service (NPS) have all been engaged in several different kinds of place-making at FOUN: the development of a

This dissertation examines the conception, planning, creation, and management of Fort Union National Monument (FOUN) in northeastern New Mexico. Over approximately the last eighty-five years, writers, bureaucrats, boosters, and the National Park Service (NPS) have all been engaged in several different kinds of place-making at FOUN: the development of a written historical narrative about what kind of place Fort Union was (and is); the construction of a physical site; and the accompanying interpretive guidance for experiencing it.

All of these place-making efforts make claims about why Fort Union is a place worthy of commemoration, its historical significance, and its relationship to local, regional, national and international contexts. The creation and evolution of Fort Union National Monument as a memorial landscape and a place for communion with an imagined past—in short, a site of memory and public history—is only the latest chapter in a long history of migration, conflict, shifting ownership, and land use at that site. I examine the evolution of a sense of place at Fort Union in two broad time periods: the twenty-five years leading up to the monument’s establishment, and the seven decades of NPS management after it was created.

Taken as a case study, the story of FOUN raises a number of questions about the basic mission and meaning of NPS as a cultural institution and educational organization; how the agency conceptualizes and “talks about” Native Americans and the Indian Wars; the history and practice of public history; and how best to address sites like Fort Union that seek to historicize America’s imperial past.
ContributorsMedley, Evan (Author) / Fixico, Donald (Thesis advisor) / Pitcaithley, Dwight T. (Committee member) / Thompson, Victoria (Committee member) / Dallett, Nancy (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2016
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Description
This dissertation explores how historical changes in education shaped Diné collective identity and community by examining the interconnections between Navajo students, their people, and Diné Bikéyah (Navajo lands). Farina King investigates the ongoing influence of various schools as colonial institutions among the Navajo from the 1930s to 1990 in the

This dissertation explores how historical changes in education shaped Diné collective identity and community by examining the interconnections between Navajo students, their people, and Diné Bikéyah (Navajo lands). Farina King investigates the ongoing influence of various schools as colonial institutions among the Navajo from the 1930s to 1990 in the southwestern United States. The question that guides this research is how institutional schools, whether far, near, or on the reservation, affected Navajo students’ sense of home and relationships with their Indigenous community during the twentieth century.

The study relies on a Diné historical framework that centers on a Navajo mapping of the world and earth memory compass. The four directions of their sacred mountains orient the Diné towards hózhǫ́, the ideal of society, a desirable state of being that most translate as beauty, harmony, or happiness. Their sacred mountains mark Diné Bikéyah and provide an earth memory compass in Navajo life journeys that direct them from East, to South, to West, and to North. These four directions and the symbols associated with them guide this overarching narrative of Navajo educational experiences from the beginning of Diné learning in their home communities, to the adolescent stages of their institutionalized schooling, to the recent maturity of hybrid Navajo-American educational systems. After addressing the Diné ancestral teachings of the East, King focuses on the student experiences of interwar Crownpoint Boarding School to the South, the postwar Tuba City Boarding School and Leupp Boarding School to the West, and self-determination in Monument Valley to the North.

This study primarily analyzes oral histories and cultural historical methodologies to feature Diné perspectives, which reveal how the land and the mountains serve as focal points of Navajo worldviews. The land defines Diné identity, although many Navajos have adapted to different life pathways. Therefore, land, environment, and nature constituted integral parts and embeddedness of Diné knowledge and epistemology that external educational systems, such as federal schools, failed to overcome in the twentieth century.
ContributorsKing, Farina (Author) / Fixico, Donald (Thesis advisor) / Lomawaima, K. Tsianina (Committee member) / Iverson, Peter (Committee member) / Osburn, Katherine M.B. (Committee member) / Tohe, Laura (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2016
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Description
This study examines history museums in Arizona and New Mexico to determine whether New Western History themes are prevalent, twenty years after the term was conceived. Patricia Limerick is credited with using the expression in the 1980s, but she had to promote the concept frequently and for many years. There

This study examines history museums in Arizona and New Mexico to determine whether New Western History themes are prevalent, twenty years after the term was conceived. Patricia Limerick is credited with using the expression in the 1980s, but she had to promote the concept frequently and for many years. There was resistance to changing from the Frederick Jackson Turner thesis of looking at the frontier as an expansion from the East, even while others were already writing more current historiography.

Limerick’s four “Cs”—continuity, convergence, conquest, and complexity—took a view of the West from the West, worthy of a separate perspective. These themes also allowed historians to reflect on what was happening locally, how and why various people were interacting, how there was less of a benevolent imbuing of European culture on Native Americans than there was a conquest of indigenous people, and how resource extraction created complex situations for all living things. While scholarly works were changing to provide relevant material based on these themes, museums were receiving thousands of visitors every year and may have been providing the Anglo-centric view of events or creating more inclusive displays. Label texts could have been either clarifying or confusing to a history loving audience.

Three types of museums were visited to determine whether there was a difference in display based on governing body. National Park Service sites, state sponsored institutions, and local city-based museums served as the study material. The age of the existing long-term exhibits ranged from brand new to fifty-one years extant. As important to the use of New Western History themes as the term of the current exhibit was the type of governing body.

Monographs, essays, and museum exhibits are all important to the dissemination of history. How they relate and how current they are to each other creates an opportunity for both academic and museum professional historians to reflect on the delivery systems used to enlighten a history-loving public.
ContributorsWalsh, Thomas Kevin (Author) / Pagan, Eduardo (Thesis advisor) / Toon, Richard (Thesis advisor) / Fixico, Donald (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
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Description
Twentieth century California Indians have received muted attention from scholars. The sheer size and diversity of California Indians can be overwhelming. Geographically, California is the third largest state and home to one hundred and ten federally recognized tribes. California Indians created alliances across the state among diverse tribal groups. Indian

Twentieth century California Indians have received muted attention from scholars. The sheer size and diversity of California Indians can be overwhelming. Geographically, California is the third largest state and home to one hundred and ten federally recognized tribes. California Indians created alliances across the state among diverse tribal groups. Indian advocacy and activism of the twentieth century has been a limited discussion focused on four major events: Alcatraz occupation of 1969; Trail of Broken Treaties and subsequent occupation of the Bureau of Indian Affairs building of 1972; Wounded Knee of 1973; and the "Longest Walk" in 1978. These four major developments should not be ignored. However, the discussion should be broader and include diverse forms of advocacy and activism. In 1964 Rupert Costo, Cahuilla, his wife Jeannette Henry-Costo, Eastern Cherokee, and thirteen Indians from diverse tribes, largely from California, founded the American Indian Historical Society (AIHS). Costo served as president of the organization until its dissolution in 1986. The San Francisco based group sought to improve education, communication, and cultural development among Indians. Members of this activist organization challenged textbooks, testified at congressional hearings, created an Indian controlled publishing house, coordinated community meetings, and lobbied for protection of burial grounds. It also circulated, Wassaja, one of the first national Indian newspapers with original content. Through its publications, the AIHS sought to inform and promote mutual understanding between Indians and non-Indians. The AIHS' philosophy centered on the belief that Indians could, through their own initiative and innovation, lead the fight in Indian affairs. Through the years, the AIHS supported Indian issues and efforts of individual tribes to preserve their rights. Thus, the AIHS defended tribal self-determination and rejected pan-indianism. The federal government policy of relocation encouraged non-California Indians to move into California. Relocation caused friction as the focus by many in the mainstream media turned its attention to relocated Indians which increasingly rendered California Indians invisible. However, with conscientious effort the AIHS worked towards informing and educating Indians and non-Indians.
ContributorsSoza War Soldier, Rose Delia (Author) / Iverson, Peter (Thesis advisor) / Fixico, Donald (Thesis advisor) / Reed, Annette (Committee member) / Riding In, James (Committee member) / Whitaker, Matthew (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
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Description
This dissertation seeks to understand two universal experiences that have pervaded human society since man first climbed out of the trees: violence and trauma. Using theories gleaned from the Holocaust and other twentieth century atrocities, this work explores narratives of violent action and traumatic reaction as they occurred among peoples

This dissertation seeks to understand two universal experiences that have pervaded human society since man first climbed out of the trees: violence and trauma. Using theories gleaned from the Holocaust and other twentieth century atrocities, this work explores narratives of violent action and traumatic reaction as they occurred among peoples of the nineteenth-century American Southwest. By examining the stories of individuals and groups of Apaches, Ethnic Mexicans, Euro-Americans, and other diverse peoples within the lens of trauma studies, a new narrative emerges within US-Mexico borderlands history. This narrative reveals inter-generational legacies of violence among cultural groups that have lived through trauma and caused trauma within others. For both victims and perpetrators alike, trauma and violence can transform into tools of cultural construction and adaptation.

Part I of this work establishes the concept of ethnotrauma-- a layered experience of collective trauma among minority populations under racial persecution. By following stories of Mescalero, Chiricahua, and Warm Springs Apaches in the nineteenth-century Southwest, this dissertation reveals how Apaches grappled with ethnotrauma through generations during times of war, imprisonment, and exile. These narratives also reveal how Apaches overcame these legacies of pain through communal solidarity and cultural continuity. Part II explores the concept of perpetrator trauma. By following stories of Mexican norteños, Mexican-Americans on the US-Mexico border, and American settlers, the impact of trauma on violators also comes to light. The concept perpetrator trauma in this context denotes the long-term cultural impacts of committing violence among perpetrating communities. For perpetrating groups, violence became a method of affirming and, in some cases, reconstructing group identity through opposition to other groups. Finally, at the heart of this work stands two critical symbols-- Geronimo, victim and villain, and the land itself, hostile and healing-- that reveal how cycles of violence entangled ethnotrauma and perpetrator trauma within individuals struggling to survive and thrive in a savage land.
ContributorsWatkinson, Margery Hunt (Author) / Fixico, Donald (Thesis advisor) / Cichopek-Gajraj, Anna (Committee member) / Meeks, Eric (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2020