Waging Sovereignty: Native Americans and the Transformation of Work in the Twentieth Century

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Colleen O’Neill

Waging Sovereignty

Name: Waging Sovereignty
Price: 229 AUD
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ISBN: 9781469693279

Native Americans and the Transformation of Work in the Twentieth Century

Colleen O’Neill

$229

Hardback

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English

The University of North Carolina Press
24 February 2026

Ethnic minorities & multicultural studies; First Nations; Trade unions; Industrial arbitration & negotiation

Wage work was supposed to “kill the Indian and save the man,” or so thought Richard Pratt and other late nineteenth-century policymakers. Nevertheless, even as American Indians entered the workforce, they remained connected to their lands and cultures. In this powerful history of resilience and transformation, Colleen O'Neill uncovers the creative strategies Native workers employed to subvert assimilation and fight for justice in the workplace, their collective strength expanding the very meaning of sovereignty.

Drawing on federal archives, Native memoirs, oral histories, and field research, O'Neill traces a sweeping story that stretches from the era of boarding schools to the contemporary world of high-stakes gaming. For more than a century, federal policymakers tried to reshape Native lives through labor. In some cases, children were sent to pick crops and scrub settlers' homes. In others, families were relocated to distant cities for permanent year-round jobs that were designed to replace traditional seasonal labor and lifestyle patterns. But Native workers persevered. They rebuilt their communities, fought to reclaim control of the reservation workplace, and developed distinctive institutions to defend their cultural, political, and economic sovereignty. As Waging Sovereignty illuminates, wage work was a focal point of assimilationist efforts and, in turn, labor became a key factor in Native workers’ anti-colonial struggle.

By: Colleen O’Neill
Imprint: The University of North Carolina Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 235mm, Width: 25mm, Spine: 155mm
ISBN: 9781469693279
ISBN 10: 1469693275
Pages: 240
Publication Date: 24 February 2026
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Colleen O'Neill is associate professor of history at Utah State University.

Reviews for Waging Sovereignty: Native Americans and the Transformation of Work in the Twentieth Century

""A powerful and much-needed contribution to the scholarship on Indigenous labor.""--Chantal Norrgard, author of Seasons of Change: Labor, Treaty Rights, and Ojibwe Nationhood ""O'Neill skillfully demonstrates how tribes and Native workers rejected the language of rights-based liberalism, instead firmly rooting their rights as workers and managers within the more durable protections of tribal sovereignty.""--Kevin Whalen, author of Native Students at Work: American Indian Labor and Sherman Institute's Outing Program, 1900-1945