MAMMOTH BOOK OF NATIVE AMERICANS

Native Americans make up less than one per cent of the total US population, but represent half the nation's languages and cultures. Here in one grand sweep is the full story of America's indigenous peoples, their society, culture and religion, everything from the land-based spirituality of their early creation myths, and the late rise of Indian Pride, to the 88 uses to which the Sioux put the flesh and bones of the buffalo, and the practice of berdache (men adopted as women). The book offers a chronological history of Native Americans and their emergence out of the now submerged continent of Beringia, the 'forgotten wars' of the 16th and 17th centuries which wiped many tribes from the East Coast. It finally describes to the last struggles of the Cheyenne and the Comanche. Celebrating these peoples' way of life rather than focusing on the manner of their genocide, it does not ignore uncomfortable facts of the Amerindian past including suspected cannibalism and their part in the decimation of North America's buffalo herds. Some remarkable success stories are now emerging. A compelling account of the truth, tragedy and magic of America's original inhabitants. 571pp in mammoth paperback.