Below is my abstract for a presentation at this year's Community Development Society annual meeting in Boise, Idaho. If you recall, my last presentation was an ethnohistorical approach to the community capitals in Chaco Canyon. I was able to detect a loss in a major capital, natural, through the major episodes of drought. This drought ultimately led to the diminishment in the other capitals eventually leading to abandonment in the canyon. Please take a minute and look my abstract over and give me some feedback or recommendations to research.
The seven Community Capitals as identified by Flora and Flora (Natural, Built, Social, Human, Financial, Cultural and Political) play a key role in the health and vitality of not only contemporary communities but can be used as a lens to examine historic social structures. Past research by the author has demonstrated that the capitals are interdependent and when one is removed, the others follow suit. This removal could have been done naturally such as a drought, or through national policies used to justify the diminishment of a culture.
This paper will look at how the United States removed various capitals from American Indians in order to achieve Manifest Destiny through the history of federal policy in Indian Country and will include an examination of Removal and Relocation, Treaty Making, Allotment and Assimilation, Reform and Reorganization and Termination and Relocation. This paper will also explore how through self-determination and building a path to sovereignty, American Indians are leveraging the community capitals to persevere in a new century.
