Author Sherman Alexie's website

Author Sherman Alexie talks to Enrique Cerna about Spokane, Washington, living on the reservation, and about his life.

Learn more about the Spokane Tribe on their website. This website provides current and historical information about the Spokane.

A diverse and multifaceted cultural and educational enterprise, the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) is an active and visible component of the Smithsonian Institution, the world's largest museum complex.

Introductory essays, 2300 original photographs and 1500 pages of textual sources about the Northwest Coast and Plateau Indian cultures constitute an award-winning project developed for the Library of Congress' American Memory in partnership with the Museum of History and Industry and the Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture.

Topical essay from the University of Washington Libraries Digital Collection - American Indians of the Pacific Northwest

Native American cultural resources presented by the National Park Service

Holman Library created guide to resources on Native American and Indigenous Studies

Films on Demand: In this edition of Moyers & Company, Bill is joined by writer Sherman Alexie. Born on a Native American reservation, Alexie has been navigating the boundaries of American culture in lauded poetry, novels, short stories, screenplays, and even stand-up comedy for more than two decades. Alexie discusses the challenges of living in different cultures at the same time—“I know a lot more about being white than you know about being Indian,” he tells Bill—and shares his irreverent perspective on contemporary American life. Broadcast dates: April 12, 2013, and May 31, 2013. (43 minutes)

Films on Demand: For the nearly two million Native Americans, representing 500 Indian nations, life in the U.S. today is a frustrating struggle to retain their ancient ways while functioning in the modern world, to carve out an identity in an overwhelmingly non-Indian culture. This program examines the needs and problems of today’s Native Americans, both those who live on the reservation and those who have chosen the mainstream. The conclusion focuses on celebration and survival as reflected in the continuing tradition of the Powwow. (49 minutes)

Films of Demand: Proposing to “kill the Indian and save the man,” U.S. Army captain Richard H. Pratt envisioned an educational system that would erase Native American culture and “civilize” the continent’s indigenous people. His chosen method? Removing children from Pennsylvania’s tribal communities and confining them in barracks-style schools—initially the Carlisle Indian Industrial School, which Pratt founded in 1879. In myopic terms it was a remarkably effective strategy, and Carlisle became a cruel model for institutions all over the U.S. and Canada, including Michigan’s Mount Pleasant Indian School. Subjected to emotional, physical, and spiritual abuse, Mount Pleasant students were inevitably alienated from their families, native languages, and tribal religions. This film combines archival materials with present-day interviews to make clear just how inhumane the system was. Survivors from Tlingit, Chippewa, Choctaw, and Lakota communities describe in raw, unflinching terms the impact on First Nations across North America. Contains occasional profanity. (41 minutes)

Films on Demand: This compelling one hour documentary invites viewers into the lives of contemporary Native Americans. It dispels the myth that American Indians have disappeared from the American horizon, and reveals how they continue to persist, heal from the past, confront the challenges of today, keep their culture alive, and make significant contributions to society.

Many Americans who set out to change the West found the West changed them instead. This program explores a broad panorama of western experiences: those of Great Plains homesteaders and farmers, Chinese immigrants and Hispanic townspeople in California, Mormons in Utah, Buffalo Bill Cody, cowboys during the fall of the great ranching boom, African-American sharecroppers seeking a “promised land,” and Native Americans on the reservations.