Abstract
Following the brutal Long Walk and a four-year internment at Bosque Redondo, Navajo leaders and U.S. negotiators agreed in 1868 that the Diné (the Navajo people) should be allowed to return to a portion of their homeland. The right of return was an impressive achievement, allowing Diné to reclaim their territory and to reunite with tribal members who had escaped internment. Diné families quickly spread out, setting up home sites and raising their sheep and other livestock within the four sacred mountains of the tribe’s homeland but well beyond the confines of the 1868 reservation boundaries. Such growth was partially sanctioned by the federal government, which steadily increased the size of the reservation, such that the Navajo Nation today is roughly the size of West Virginia. But in 1882, 2.5 million acres were set aside as an executive order reservation for the Hopi and “such other Indians as the Secretary of the Interior may see fit to settle thereon.” The indeterminacy involved in this executive order establishing the Hopi reservation planted the seeds for the Navajo-Hopi land dispute.
There are a number of excellent books on the Navajo-Hopi Land Dispute. Among them are The Wind Won’t Know Me: A History of the Navajo-Hopi Dispute by Emily Benedek (University of Oklahoma Press, 1999) and David Brugge’s The Navajo-Hopi Land Dispute: An American Tragedy (University of New Mexico Press, 1999). Rhiannon Koehler’s Comics and Conquest: Political Cartoons and a Radical Retelling of the Navajo-Hopi Land Dispute contributes to the literature on the dispute and to Navajo history through its novel use of editorial cartoons and its characterization of the dispute as almost entirely the fault of the federal government. This review will tackle these two contributions in turn.
Pulling from cartoons published in both Hopi and Navajo newspapers, Koehler shows the value of mining the editorial cartoons from the 1960s to the present to better understand the Navajo-Hopi land dispute. Koehler’s close reading of those cartoons succeeds in showing the depths of the cartoons, the nuances contained in these popular artworks, and the many ways outsiders contributed to what might otherwise be considered nothing more than an inter-tribal dispute. Before beginning her analysis of the cartoons, Koehler provides a brief history of the tribes that should interest even those who have spent years reading and writing about that history. Chapters one and two contain great historical details—such as the early pleas of Hopi leaders that Navajos be ejected from the disputed territory—that do a wonderful job setting up the Navajo-Hopi land dispute presented in chapters three, four, and five.
Anyone who has spent time living on a reservation and reading tribal newspapers knows how powerful editorial cartoons can be in those communities. As Koehler notes, such cartoons build off the rich Native tradition of using humor to deal with everyday challenges as well as the challenges of colonialism. Jack Ahasteen, who is profiled by Koehler in the book’s appendix, is a celebrity on the Navajo reservation, and for good reason: his comics often capture the most recent controversies better than pages of news coverage ever could. And the same is true for other artists like Phillip Sekaquaptewa and Claire Thompson, who are also featured in Comics and Conquest. The reader is left impressed both by Koehler’s insight that such comics provide a valuable, and underexplored, lens through which to view the Navajo-Hopi land dispute and by the cleverness of the cartoons themselves.
For all its richness, Comics and Conquest is a cross between a history and a thesis-driven work. As such, it should not be the only book about the land dispute that one reads. As noted by Jerry Kramer, author of The Second Long Walk: The Navajo-Hopi Land Dispute, in his blurb printed on the dust jacket of Comics and Conquest, Koehler’s book is “polemical.” Koehler’s main argument is the federal government bares the blame—essentially all the blame—for the land dispute. According to Koehler, nearly everything is the fault of outsiders, especially the federal government. This is an attractive notion and even fairly accurate if one paints U.S. history with a broad brush. Certainly, the U.S. government should be faulted, for everything from creating the initial uncertainty regarding the boundary between the two tribes to engaging in heavy-handed efforts at moving Navajos and Hopis to the “right” side of the false lines created by Congress’s partition of the joint use area in 1974. And Comics and Conquest does a great job showing readers that interest in clearing the land, primarily of Navajo home sites, and finalizing the respective interests of each tribe was heavily driven by large corporations working to access Black Mesa coal. But—and there is a but—Koehler’s depiction of the dispute is not fully convincing. Like the comics Koehler relies upon, the argument is two-dimensional even though the problem is more complex. But it also flattens tribal sovereignty and denies the reality of tribal agency.
When Hopis, whether tribal politicians or editorial cartoonists, critique Navajos or vice versa, Koehler’s instinct is to say they are speaking on behalf of outside interests or not reflective of the views of the community. At times the evidence supports such a position, but at times it is more of a stretch. Koehler ends up celebrating tribal members and organizations representing Navajos and Hopis who do resist relocation and elevating their views. There is enough land for everyone and the dispute, Koehler seems to suggest, could have been resolved if only the federal government got out of the way. It is a nice vision. And perhaps the biggest contribution of Comics and Conquest is Koehler’s presentation of this perspective. But readers should read other works about the dispute as well so they can decide for themselves how convinced they are by Koehler’s account.
The final cartoon included in the book, titled “After the dust settle[s] . . .” depicts two Native figures, one labeled “Hopi Nation,” the other “Navajo Nation,” sitting bruised on opposite sides of a barbed wire fence. The Hopi asks, “had enough, yet?” The Navajo replies, “It’s all your fault!” Written just below the two bruised men are, among other things, the words “100 Yrs Land Dispute.” The cartoon highlights the losses associated with the dispute—“drought,” “relocation,” “jobs loss,” “loss revenue,” “livestock reduction,” and “religious desecration”—but it does not minimize or deflect from the identity of the antagonists. The U.S. government played a major role but it was not the only player in the dispute. Navajos and Hopis both had legitimate reasons, strongly felt, grounded on their identity and sense of justice, and often expressed through their elected representatives, for their conflicting land claims. The Navajo-Hopi land dispute was a complicated chapter in the history of both tribes.
Koehler’s full-throated critique of the federal government and outside corporate interests is worth taking seriously in part because not all readers will fully agree with her argument. This tightly woven story is full of insights tied to the great historical details brought out in the text. Comics and Conquest should be read both for its novel approach and for the way it challenges preconceptions of the Navajo-Hopi land dispute.