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Sebastian Braun

Iowa State University, Anthropology and American Indian Studies, Faculty Member

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Anthropologist, PhD and M.A. from Indiana University, Lic.phil.I from Universitaet Basel (Switzerland). Early influences from Oceania and Indonesia, then trained as a North American anthropologist and ethnohistorian, with interests in pre- and protohistory. I expanded my field research on contemporary ecology and economy on the Great Plains into projects on indigenous nationalism, (self-)representation and the disconnection between communities and their representation.

My interests lie somewhere between economic development, symbolic structuralism, critical political philosophy, theoretical foundations, intercultural relations and ecological systems.

My current research focuses on a collaborative project on the social and cultural impact of the energy extraction boom in North Dakota and map making for the communities.

On a more applied level, I have also been writing the contributions on the United States for the IWGIA yearbook (a great resource for anybody interested in indigenous affairs): http://www.iwgia.org

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Carla Fredericks

Danielle Delaney

Queen's University at Kingston

Fulda University of Applied Science

South Dakota State University

University of Connecticut School of Law

Malcolm McDermond

Zuzanna Kruk-Buchowska

Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań

University of Minnesota

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Books by Sebastian Braun

Transforming Ethnohistories: Narrative, Meaning, and Community

Contributions by David Miller, Kellie Hogue, Sarah Quick, Jason Jackson, David Dinwoodie, Patrick... more

Buffalo Inc. American Indians and Economic Development

An ethnography of the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation, centering on the tribal buffalo ranch - t... more

Native American Studies: An Interdisciplinary Introduction

This is a thoroughly revised / newly written edition of the textbook - complete with three DVDs (... more

Native Peoples of the Northern Plains: An Interdisciplinary Introduction to Native American Studies

Papers by Sebastian Braun

The United States of America

The indigenous population in the United States of America is estimated between 2.5 and 6 million ... more The indigenous population in the United States of America is estimated between 2.5 and 6 million people,1 of which 23% live in American Indian areas or Alaska Native villages. Indigenous peoples in the United States are more commonly referred to as Native groups. The state with the largest Native population is California; the place with the largest Native population is New York City. 573 Native American tribal entities were recognized as American Indian or Alaska Native tribes by the United States in July 2018, and most of these have recognized national homelands. While socioeconomic indicators vary widely across different regions, the poverty rate for those who identify as American Indian or Alaska Native is around 27%. The United States announced in 2010 that it would support the UNDRIP as moral guidance after voting against it in 2007. The United States has not ratified ILO Convention No. 169. Federally recognized Native nations are sovereign but legally wards of the state. The f...

United States of America

Approximately 6.6 million people in the U.S., or 2% of the total population, identify as Native A... more Approximately 6.6 million people in the U.S., or 2% of the total population, identify as Native American or Alaska Native, either alone or in combination with another ethnic identity. Around 2.5 million, or 0.8% of the population, identify as American Indian or Alaska Native alone. 567 tribal entities were federally recognized in May 2016, and most of these have recognized national homelands. 23% of the Native population lives in American Indian areas or Alaska Native villages. The state with the largest Native population is California; the place with the largest Native population is New York City. While socioeconomic indicators vary widely across different regions, the poverty rate for those who identify as American Indian or Alaska Native alone is around 27%. The United States announced in 2010 that it would support the UNDRIP as moral guidance after voting against it in 2007. The United States has not ratified ILO Convention No. 169. Recognized Native nations are sovereign but wa...

Introduction: An Ethnohistory of Listening

Leg dein Ohr auf die Schiene der Geschichte. (Put your ear to the rail of history.) Freudeskreis ... more Leg dein Ohr auf die Schiene der Geschichte. (Put your ear to the rail of history.) Freudeskreis 1996 I hear them all, I hear them all, I hear them all. Old Crow Medicine Show 2006 Good ethnohistory, for lack of a different metaphor, might look somewhat like a reservation dog: the product of indefinite sources and directions, compromises and fights, a bricolage at its best; and for all that, interesting and beatiful, ready to be a loyal companion but independent enough to assert its survival, and fostering many children that lal look different, yet again. Here might be the time, then, to remember one of the best storiesthat-might-have-occurred (Pirsig 1992:465): He remember it had been spring then, which is a wonderful time in Montana, and the breeze blowing down from the pine trees carried a fresh smell of melting snow and thawing earth, and they were all walking down the road, four abreast, when one of those raggedy non-descript dogs that call Indian reservations home came onto th...

Developing the Great Plains: A Look Back at Lincoln

Sustainability, Resiliance, and Dependency: The Great Plains Model

Over the past 400 to 500 years, the Great Plains have seen a rapid succession of ecological regim... more Over the past 400 to 500 years, the Great Plains have seen a rapid succession of ecological regimes. The ecological historian Dan Flores has written that plains ecological history "centers around a series of ecological crashes and simplifications."1 This text attempts to give an overview of these successive ecological systems and to provide an analysis of the lessons in sustainability, resilience, and ideology offered by plains ecological history of the past few centuries. The plains, a semi-arid ecosystem, have "fewer of the safeguards built into more diverse systems."2 Because natural resources "in semi-arid countries are often set in a hair-trigger equilibrium,"3 the plains can serve as a good model for issues of sustainability and resilience elsewhere. Many historical and ethnographic studies have looked at human-bison interactions, hunter-gatherer lifeways, and Native agriculture on the plains. Agricultural, wildlife management, and grasslands rese...

Book Review: Encounter on the Great Plains: Scandinavian Settlers and the Dispossession of Dakota Indians, 1890-1930 by Karen V. Hansen

In Encounter on the Great Plains, Karen Hansen investigates Scandinavian immigrants and settlers ... more In Encounter on the Great Plains, Karen Hansen investigates Scandinavian immigrants and settlers who came to live on the post-allotment Spirit Lake Reservation in North Dakota. She does so through examining stories by Scandinavian as well as Dakota residents. As the subtitle indicates, Hansen is interested in the question of dispossession: Did the Scandinavians, among whom were her ancestors, contribute to the dispossession of the Dakotas? As she writes, "[w]hat does it mean when one group's acquisition of land is predicated on the dispossession of the other?" (3). Her answer is multifaceted and reveals the complexities of lives and narratives in a situation of rapid social, economic, and political change. Disciplines

Extraction, Roots, Energy, and the Plains

People in exile are experts on roots and energy. They know how much energy is needed to extract r... more People in exile are experts on roots and energy. They know how much energy is needed to extract roots, how much energy is needed to stay uprooted, and, because a state of uprootedness is unsustainable over the long run, how much to sink roots deep into the ground again. I remember standing in North Dakota and looking toward the horizon. One can actually see Earth as a globe-the slight curve of the horizon, where the winds come from that bend the grass and the few trees, and where the clouds gather that sweep overhead, only to disappear again and make way for the blue sky. Sometimes, looking toward the horizon, I would feel an overwhelming joy, seeing mountains in the distance. It was usually a short emotion, as I realized that my mind had played tricks. Those were not mountains, could not be mountains. They were clouds that had swept me away toward home, mirroring a more familiar landscape.

Revisited Frontiers: The Bakken, the Plains, Potential Futures, and Real Pasts

During the Bakken oil boom beginning in 2008, people from all over the United States would once a... more During the Bakken oil boom beginning in 2008, people from all over the United States would once again flock to North Dakota, lured by economic possibilities. In this boom, however, images of monotonous doom have had no place. In the curious historical frame of post-terror insecurities and anger, of rising, if reluctant, acknowledgment that climate change has real consequences, of post-Iraq realizations that it might not be possible to truly control oil abroad, and of living through an economic depression that wiped away jobs (yet left wealth intact), messages about the Bakken have been very clear. The oil boom, while a temporary inconvenience, has helped North Dakota stay out of economic trouble, has brought a population increase, has revitalized the state, and has put the state on the map.

THE INDIGENOUS WORLD 2019 - United States

by International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA) and Sebastian Braun

Indigenous World, 2019

This article provides an update for 2019. The indigenous population in the United States of Amer... more This article provides an update for 2019.

The indigenous population in the United States of America is estimated between 2.5 and 6 million people, of which 23% live in American Indian areas or Alaska Native villages. Indigenous peoples in the United States are more commonly referred to as Native groups. The state with the largest Native population is California; the place with the largest Native population is New York City.

573 Native American tribal entities were recognized as American Indian or Alaska Native tribes by the United States in July 2018, and most of these have recognized national homelands. While socioeconomic indicators vary widely across different regions, the poverty rate for those who identify as American Indian or Alaska Native is around 27%.

The United States announced in 2010 that it would support the UNDRIP as moral guidance after voting against it in 2007. The United States has not ratified ILO Convention No. 169. Federally recognized Native nations are sovereign but legally wards of the state. The federal government mandates tribal consultation on many issues but has plenary power over indigenous nations. While American Indians in the United States are generally American citizens, they are also citizens of their own nations.

Building on Native Sovereignty. From Ethnic Membership to National Citizenship

An argument to go beyond membership in tribes, and to instead build sovereign nations through cit... more

Sustainability, Resilience, and Dependency. The Great Plains Model

A discussion of the concepts at the example of the Great Plains. From: Viewing the Future in the ... more

Revisited Frontiers: The Bakken, the Plains, Potential Futures, and Real Pasts

Impacts of the Bakken Oil Boom on the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation

by Sebastian Braun and Ann Reed

Traffic volume on the reservation has increased tremendously. Apart from the main highways, many ... more

Historical Context of the Oil Boom on the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation

by Sebastian Braun and Ann Reed

The Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara (MHA) Nation has had a long and problematic involvement with glo... more

Boom! The Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara People and Sustainability in the Face of Bakken Oil

American Indian Policy Documents Collection

Transforming Ethnohistories: Narrative, Meaning, and Community

Contributions by David Miller, Kellie Hogue, Sarah Quick, Jason Jackson, David Dinwoodie, Patrick... more

Buffalo Inc. American Indians and Economic Development

An ethnography of the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation, centering on the tribal buffalo ranch - t... more

Native American Studies: An Interdisciplinary Introduction

This is a thoroughly revised / newly written edition of the textbook - complete with three DVDs (... more

Native Peoples of the Northern Plains: An Interdisciplinary Introduction to Native American Studies

The United States of America

The indigenous population in the United States of America is estimated between 2.5 and 6 million ... more The indigenous population in the United States of America is estimated between 2.5 and 6 million people,1 of which 23% live in American Indian areas or Alaska Native villages. Indigenous peoples in the United States are more commonly referred to as Native groups. The state with the largest Native population is California; the place with the largest Native population is New York City. 573 Native American tribal entities were recognized as American Indian or Alaska Native tribes by the United States in July 2018, and most of these have recognized national homelands. While socioeconomic indicators vary widely across different regions, the poverty rate for those who identify as American Indian or Alaska Native is around 27%. The United States announced in 2010 that it would support the UNDRIP as moral guidance after voting against it in 2007. The United States has not ratified ILO Convention No. 169. Federally recognized Native nations are sovereign but legally wards of the state. The f...

United States of America

Approximately 6.6 million people in the U.S., or 2% of the total population, identify as Native A... more Approximately 6.6 million people in the U.S., or 2% of the total population, identify as Native American or Alaska Native, either alone or in combination with another ethnic identity. Around 2.5 million, or 0.8% of the population, identify as American Indian or Alaska Native alone. 567 tribal entities were federally recognized in May 2016, and most of these have recognized national homelands. 23% of the Native population lives in American Indian areas or Alaska Native villages. The state with the largest Native population is California; the place with the largest Native population is New York City. While socioeconomic indicators vary widely across different regions, the poverty rate for those who identify as American Indian or Alaska Native alone is around 27%. The United States announced in 2010 that it would support the UNDRIP as moral guidance after voting against it in 2007. The United States has not ratified ILO Convention No. 169. Recognized Native nations are sovereign but wa...

Introduction: An Ethnohistory of Listening

Leg dein Ohr auf die Schiene der Geschichte. (Put your ear to the rail of history.) Freudeskreis ... more Leg dein Ohr auf die Schiene der Geschichte. (Put your ear to the rail of history.) Freudeskreis 1996 I hear them all, I hear them all, I hear them all. Old Crow Medicine Show 2006 Good ethnohistory, for lack of a different metaphor, might look somewhat like a reservation dog: the product of indefinite sources and directions, compromises and fights, a bricolage at its best; and for all that, interesting and beatiful, ready to be a loyal companion but independent enough to assert its survival, and fostering many children that lal look different, yet again. Here might be the time, then, to remember one of the best storiesthat-might-have-occurred (Pirsig 1992:465): He remember it had been spring then, which is a wonderful time in Montana, and the breeze blowing down from the pine trees carried a fresh smell of melting snow and thawing earth, and they were all walking down the road, four abreast, when one of those raggedy non-descript dogs that call Indian reservations home came onto th...

Developing the Great Plains: A Look Back at Lincoln

Sustainability, Resiliance, and Dependency: The Great Plains Model

Over the past 400 to 500 years, the Great Plains have seen a rapid succession of ecological regim... more Over the past 400 to 500 years, the Great Plains have seen a rapid succession of ecological regimes. The ecological historian Dan Flores has written that plains ecological history "centers around a series of ecological crashes and simplifications."1 This text attempts to give an overview of these successive ecological systems and to provide an analysis of the lessons in sustainability, resilience, and ideology offered by plains ecological history of the past few centuries. The plains, a semi-arid ecosystem, have "fewer of the safeguards built into more diverse systems."2 Because natural resources "in semi-arid countries are often set in a hair-trigger equilibrium,"3 the plains can serve as a good model for issues of sustainability and resilience elsewhere. Many historical and ethnographic studies have looked at human-bison interactions, hunter-gatherer lifeways, and Native agriculture on the plains. Agricultural, wildlife management, and grasslands rese...

Book Review: Encounter on the Great Plains: Scandinavian Settlers and the Dispossession of Dakota Indians, 1890-1930 by Karen V. Hansen

In Encounter on the Great Plains, Karen Hansen investigates Scandinavian immigrants and settlers ... more In Encounter on the Great Plains, Karen Hansen investigates Scandinavian immigrants and settlers who came to live on the post-allotment Spirit Lake Reservation in North Dakota. She does so through examining stories by Scandinavian as well as Dakota residents. As the subtitle indicates, Hansen is interested in the question of dispossession: Did the Scandinavians, among whom were her ancestors, contribute to the dispossession of the Dakotas? As she writes, "[w]hat does it mean when one group's acquisition of land is predicated on the dispossession of the other?" (3). Her answer is multifaceted and reveals the complexities of lives and narratives in a situation of rapid social, economic, and political change. Disciplines

Extraction, Roots, Energy, and the Plains

People in exile are experts on roots and energy. They know how much energy is needed to extract r... more People in exile are experts on roots and energy. They know how much energy is needed to extract roots, how much energy is needed to stay uprooted, and, because a state of uprootedness is unsustainable over the long run, how much to sink roots deep into the ground again. I remember standing in North Dakota and looking toward the horizon. One can actually see Earth as a globe-the slight curve of the horizon, where the winds come from that bend the grass and the few trees, and where the clouds gather that sweep overhead, only to disappear again and make way for the blue sky. Sometimes, looking toward the horizon, I would feel an overwhelming joy, seeing mountains in the distance. It was usually a short emotion, as I realized that my mind had played tricks. Those were not mountains, could not be mountains. They were clouds that had swept me away toward home, mirroring a more familiar landscape.

Revisited Frontiers: The Bakken, the Plains, Potential Futures, and Real Pasts

During the Bakken oil boom beginning in 2008, people from all over the United States would once a... more During the Bakken oil boom beginning in 2008, people from all over the United States would once again flock to North Dakota, lured by economic possibilities. In this boom, however, images of monotonous doom have had no place. In the curious historical frame of post-terror insecurities and anger, of rising, if reluctant, acknowledgment that climate change has real consequences, of post-Iraq realizations that it might not be possible to truly control oil abroad, and of living through an economic depression that wiped away jobs (yet left wealth intact), messages about the Bakken have been very clear. The oil boom, while a temporary inconvenience, has helped North Dakota stay out of economic trouble, has brought a population increase, has revitalized the state, and has put the state on the map.

THE INDIGENOUS WORLD 2019 - United States

by International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA) and Sebastian Braun

Indigenous World, 2019

This article provides an update for 2019. The indigenous population in the United States of Amer... more This article provides an update for 2019.

The indigenous population in the United States of America is estimated between 2.5 and 6 million people, of which 23% live in American Indian areas or Alaska Native villages. Indigenous peoples in the United States are more commonly referred to as Native groups. The state with the largest Native population is California; the place with the largest Native population is New York City.

573 Native American tribal entities were recognized as American Indian or Alaska Native tribes by the United States in July 2018, and most of these have recognized national homelands. While socioeconomic indicators vary widely across different regions, the poverty rate for those who identify as American Indian or Alaska Native is around 27%.

The United States announced in 2010 that it would support the UNDRIP as moral guidance after voting against it in 2007. The United States has not ratified ILO Convention No. 169. Federally recognized Native nations are sovereign but legally wards of the state. The federal government mandates tribal consultation on many issues but has plenary power over indigenous nations. While American Indians in the United States are generally American citizens, they are also citizens of their own nations.

Building on Native Sovereignty. From Ethnic Membership to National Citizenship

An argument to go beyond membership in tribes, and to instead build sovereign nations through cit... more

Sustainability, Resilience, and Dependency. The Great Plains Model

A discussion of the concepts at the example of the Great Plains. From: Viewing the Future in the ... more

Revisited Frontiers: The Bakken, the Plains, Potential Futures, and Real Pasts

Impacts of the Bakken Oil Boom on the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation

by Sebastian Braun and Ann Reed

Traffic volume on the reservation has increased tremendously. Apart from the main highways, many ... more

Historical Context of the Oil Boom on the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation

by Sebastian Braun and Ann Reed

The Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara (MHA) Nation has had a long and problematic involvement with glo... more

Boom! The Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara People and Sustainability in the Face of Bakken Oil

American Indian Policy Documents Collection

Satellite images of Bakken oil boom

Imagining (Un)Imagined Communities: The Politics of Indigenous Nationalism

Ethnographic Novels: American Indians in Francophone Comics

Ecological and Un-ecological Indians