We Are On
Tongva Land
SCHOLARSHIP ...see below for new Indigenous Solidarity Study!
Indigenous Movements and Settler Colonialism
A main thrust of my scholarship (listed at bottom) examines Indigenous resistance to settler colonialism. The arc of this aspect of my scholarly career flows from my participation in Witnesses for Nonviolence, a grassroots effort that trained and organized non-Native individuals to support Native treaty rights in the upper Midwest in the early 1990s. Witnesses served as a buffer between angry, racist, colonialist protesters threatening violence at northwoods lakes on many evenings, the time of day when small groups of Anishinaabe would exercise treaty-based rights to fish spawning walleye. Years later, as a sociology grad student, I grappled with making sense of American Indian tribal leaders’ assertions of nationhood and sovereignty. I found that the operative sociological assumptions and models of American Indians and of their social change efforts were problematic, and inadequate, in terms of trying to conceptually understand these dynamics. As a result, I spent years developing a interdisciplinary analysis that was published in the American Journal of Sociology (2012), and which I believe introduced the term "settler colonialism" into a major sociological journal.
U.S. Settler Colonialism and American Society
Increasingly I work to understand the multidimensional consequences of the fact that the United States has been from its inception a settler colonial society. How has this affected all the many dimensions of US American society, not only in relation to dispossessing land from the original inhabitants? One thread of research arising from such questions examines settler colonialism in higher education, which has produced two articles to date, published in American Indian Culture and Research Journal and the Journal of Diversity in Higher Education (listed below).
U.S. Settler Colonialism and American Sociology
I argue that U.S. sociology must incorporate the understanding that the US is a settler colonial society into its foundational representations of American society, and into is core theoretical constructs. I make such arguments in a forthcoming (Sept 2021) article in Theory and Society titled, "Settler Colonialism and Sociological Knowledge: Insights and Directions Forward." In addition, I am working on a collaborative project to critique recent sociological theorizing about colonialism and empire, which continue to marginalize, tokenize, or exclude settler colonialism.
Fulbright Project: Impacts of the Kairos Blanket Exercise
I have been awarded a 2021-2022 Fulbright Award to conduct a study of the impacts of participation in the Kairos Blanket Exercise (KBE), a transformative popular education tool born in Canada and now also being conducted in the United States, Ecuador, Australia, and elsewhere (see more under Projects). In the U.S. the KBE is partnered with the National Indian Education Association. I explore this question through a framework of memory activism regarding settler colonialism.
Indigenous Movements and Non-Indigenous Allies: A Study!
I am (slow) launching a new study of the experiences, lessons, insights and transformations of non-Native people who have provided direct (in person) support to American Indian and Indigenous-led movements in the United States. How does such participation affect their understanding of Indigenous issues, the United States, themselves, the natural world, and other issues? What are the lessons that such allies learned “on the job” of doing solidarity work?
My hope is that through sharing the insights from many peoples’ experience, others might become better prepared to usefully function as allies or accomplices, if invited by American Indian people to join or support their struggles.
If you fit the description and are interested in participating in the study, please contact me! If you know others who might be interested, please tell them to email me at Erich_Steinman@Pitzer.edu or at IndigenousSolidarityStudy@gmail.com.
Publications
Crossing the lines: Sociology, Indigenous nations, and American Studies. In The Twain Shall Meet: Where Sociology Meets American and Ethnic Studies, edited by Nadia Kim and Pawan Dhingra. Forthcoming (2022).
Settler Colonialism and Sociological Knowledge: Insights and Directions Forward”, Theory and Society, pp. 1-32. Online first at: DOI 10.1007/s11186-021-09457-x. (2021).
(with Gabriel Kovats Sanchez) Magnifying and healing colonial trauma in higher education: Persistent settler colonial dynamics at the Indigenizing university. Journal of Diversity in Higher Education. Steinman, E., & Kovats Sánchez, G. (2021).
Unsettling as agency: Unsettling settler colonialism where you are. Settler Colonial Studies, 10(4), 558-575. (2020).
(with Scott Scoggins) Cautionary Stories of University Indigenization: Institutional Dynamics, Accountability Struggles, and Resilient Settler Colonial Power. American Indian Culture and Research Journal, 44(1), 73-96. 2020
“Why Was Standing Rock So Historic? Factors Affecting American Indian Participation in Social Movement Coalitions.” Ethnic and Racial Studies 42, no. 7 (2019): 1070–1090.
“Decolonization Not Inclusion: Indigenous Resistance to American Settler Colonialism” Sociology of Race and Ethnicity 2(2):219-236. 2016
“Unsettling Engagements: Collaborations with Indigenous Nations, Communities and Individuals,” co-authored with Scott Scoggins. Journal of Metropolitan Universities 25(3):99-110. 2015
“Settler Colonial Power and the American Indian Sovereignty Movement: Forms of Domination, Strategies of Transformation”, American Journal of Sociology 117(4): 173-1130. 2012.
‘Making Space’: Lessons from Collaborations with Tribal Nations”, Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, 18 (Fall):5-18. 2011.
"Sovereigns and Citizens? The Contested Status of American Indian Tribal Nations and their Members." Citizenship Studies, 15 (1), 57-74, 2011.
“Obama Administration Policy Toward American Indians and Tribal Nations,” Journal of Race and Policy. Volume 6(1), 2010:45-61.
“Explaining Contemporary Federal Indian Policy” (review essay), Indigenous Policy, Volume 19, Fall 2008.
Review of Native Voice, in Mobilizations, Volume 12, 3, Fall 2007.
“The Contemporary Revival and Diffusion of Indigenous Sovereignty Discourse”, in a special joint issue of American Studies and Journal of Indigenous Nations Studies, Volume 47, 2006.
“Perceptions of Tribal Nations’ Status: Implications for Indian Gaming”, in American Behavioral Scientist, 2006.
“Indigenous Nationhood Claims and Contemporary Federalism in Canada and the United States”, Policy and Society¸Volume 24(1), 2005.
“Legitimizing American Indian Sovereignty: Mobilizing the Constitutive Power of Law through Institutional Entrepreneurship”, Law & Society Review, Volume 39(4), December 2005.
“American Federalism and Intergovernmental Innovation in Contemporary State-Tribal Relations”, Publius: The Journal of Federalism, Volume 34 (2), Spring 2004.
“Achievements and Prospects of Living Wage Campaigns”, authored with David Olson, in Welfare, the Working Poor and Labor, Louis Simmons, ed., M.E. Sharpe, 2004.
“The Living Wage Movement”, authored with Margaret Levi and David Olson, Encyclopedia of American Social Movements, Immanuel Ness, ed., M.E. Sharpe, 2003.
“Living-Wage Campaigns and Laws”, authored with Margaret Levi and David Olson, in Working USA: The Journal of Labor and Society, Volume 6(3), Winter 2002-3.
“Interpreting the Invisibility of Male Bisexuality: Theories, Interactions, Politics”, in Bisexuality in the Lives of Men: Facts and Fictions, Beemyn and Steinman, eds. Haworth Press. 2000.
“Introduction”, (first author, with Brett Beemyn), in Bisexuality in the Lives of Men: Facts and Fictions, Beemyn and Steinman, eds. Haworth Press. 2000.
“Bisexuality: Sociology”, in Reader’s Guide to Gay and Lesbian Studies, Fitzroy Dearborn, April 2000.
“Together and Unequal: Nonlinear and Interaction Effects of Occupational Sex Composition on Men’s and Women’s Wages.” Working Paper No. 99-7, Seattle Population Research Center.
Selected Manuscripts Under Development or Significant Revision
"Identifying an Indigenous Movement of the Americas"
"International Indigenous Educational Partnerships: Learning Across Colonial Contexts"
Professional Reviewing
American Journal of Sociology, American Sociological Review, Social Problems, Latino Studies, Environmental Sociology, Political Science and Politics, Sage Publications, Theory and Society, Cultural Sociology, Michigan Journal of Service Learning, Publius, Comparative Studies in Society & History, Human Organization, Journal of Higher Education, Fourth World Journal, Rural Sociology, Sociology Compass, Sage Publications, Palgrave Press, others.