This is in response to a post on the H-AMINDIAN discussion list, where I have lurked for many years because of a course I teach. I have only written to that list once or twice, but Paul Rosier of Villanova’s post was too deep in my wheelhouse to ignore. He wrote:

In a no doubt losing effort to stay current with my students, as well as to use a variety of sources in the classroom, I’m compiling a soundtrack for my Fall semester Native American history course. I welcome suggestions of songs written/performed by Native bands or songs in popular culture that can be analyzed in class. I play the songs to get the students going but also to illustrate how Native artists engage music as a medium. I’ll use a Johnny Cash song that deals with the Kinzua Dam crisis. I’d also use Buffy Sainte Marie’s song about Alcatraz to start a Red Power discussion. Widespread Panic has a song call Hatfield which talks about “Indians don’t like us much…” Robbie Robertson cut an album called Music for the Native Americans some time ago. Suggestions for bands/artists other than Indigenous or songs about American Indians?

Well, yes, I do have some. In fact as part of my obsessive thematic playlist-making, referenced here last week, I made myself exactly such a soundtrack several years ago. It was more for myself than to play in class, though every once in while I will burn a CD for a student who wants to do a term paper on “Native Americans in U.S. popular culture,” or some such topic. The current edition of the playlist appears below, with just a few notes for now. Readers should remember that though some of these numbers contain sharp satire or trenchant social commentary, this playlist is chiefly a study in white stereotypes and cultural tropes about American Indians, reflecting the ignorance and projections of the right and the left, East and West, then and now, the well-intentioned and the not so much. The management does not endorse many of the sentiments and images in these songs, but they do make a nice musical companion or extension to such works as Robert Berkhofer’s The White Man’s Indian (1979), Philip Deloria’s Playing Indian (1998), and Brian Dippie’s The Vanishing American: White Attitudes and U.S. Indian Policy (1982). We do not endorse the musical stylings of Cher either, though the song mentioned is inextricably linked with certain 1970s Midwestern childhoods that could be mentioned.

NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS IN U.S. ROCK, POP, AND COUNTRY MUSIC PLAYLIST

1. Waco Brothers – Geronimo (2:31)
2. Bob Wills – Cherokee Maiden (2:56) — introduces to this list the sexually-available “Indian maiden” theme and “tribal” drumming/chanting that recurs throughout this genre; the kids can dance to it!
3. BR5-49 – Cherokee Boogie (2:31)
4. The Dandy Warhols – Big Indian (3:34) – unclear what sort of Indian is referred to here, but I like the song
5. The Nazz – Christopher Columbus (3:23) – earlier, more awesome Todd Rundgren
6. Brad Jones – The Blunderbuss (3:13) – This song is only available on out-of-print & very hard-to-find CDs. I got it from the 1995 power pop compilation Yellow Pills, Volume 3. With apologies (and also compliments) to Mr. Jones, I have uploaded an mp3 of the song for the delectation and edification of that select set of people fascinated with those few occasions when indie pop-rock collides with American history.
7. Neil Young and Crazy Horse – Pocahontas (3:02)
8. Randy Newman – The Great Nations Of Europe (3:25)
9. Too Much Joy – Gramatan (5:28) – 90s alt-rock also-rans; we saw them give a crazed free show on the Esplanade in Boston back during grad school, when free was a crucial advantage for a band, as far as our seeing them was concerned; check out the video below
10. 1910 Fruitgum Co. – Indian Giver (2:42) – a bubble-gum chestnut, to be sure, but a remarkably apt introduction this European stereotype derived (I think) from early misunderstandings of native ideas and practices concerning land ownership; listen while reading the chapter in William Cronon’s Changes in the Land
11. Squirrel Nut Zippers – Indian Giver (3:37) – ditto, but also a Christmas song: “Oh, Santa, don’t tell me you’re an Indian giver, too?”
12. Raiders – Indian Reservation (2:52) – blew my mind in the 1st grade carpool
13. The Dillards – Lonesome Indian (1:48)
14. Johnny Preston – Running Bear (2:38)
15. The Black Lips – Navajo (2:38) — this is almost brand-new, but identical in sentiment to Johnny Preston or Bob Wills from the 1950s; it does include a whole list of tribal names besides Cherokee, so that may be some kind of advance
16. Dean Martin – Not Enough Indians (3:28) — so offensive on so many levels
17. Cher – Half-Breed (2:44) – flashbacks to 5th grade trips to the roller rink
18. Buffalo Springfield – Broken Arrow (6:14) – more Neil Young
19. Sufjan Stevens – The Black Hawk War, or, How to Demolish an Entire Civilization and Still Feel Good About Yourself In the Morning, or, We Apologize for the Inconvenience But You’re Going to Have to Leave Now, or, “I Have Fought the Big Knives…” (2:14)
20. Treat Her Right – Trail of Tears (3:41)
21. Widespread Panic – Blue Indian (4:54)
22. John Anderson – Seminole Wind (3:57)
23. John Hiatt – Seven Little Indians (4:08)
24. Last of the Mohicans soundtrack (Trevor Jones) – Main Title (1:44)
25. Cotton Mather – Last Of The Mohicans (2:14)
26. Neil Young – Cortez The Killer (7:30)
27. Buddy Miller – With God on Our Side (9:12) — a Bob Dylan song, of course

The sequence is based on what sounds best to this listener. Lyrics can usually be found by Googling the artist and song title and “lyrics,” but you takes your chances choosing which of the many squirrelly lyrics sites out there to use. The song times are given because that’s how WinAmp generates playlists. Sources will be provided on request in the comments.

I will add more links later, but for now, here’s Too Much Joy with one of their few semi-serious numbers, “Gramatan”: