Tonto’s Revenge: Reflections on American Indian Culture and Policy

How do Native Americans maintain their identity and culture in a hostile society, and to what end? Tonto’s Revenge is a passionate attempt by a leading Native American scholar to reassess the Indian world view and its importance to all Americans. His deeply felt essays project a vision of how Native Americans can recapture the power of their cultural legacies. “What we have witnessed over the last five hundred years,” states Rennard Strickland, “is the domination of an ideologically superior world view (that of the Native Americans) by a technologically advanced but spiritually bankrupt civilization (that of the discoverers).” He proposes a reversal of this pattern, arguing that “values must prevail over technology,” especially if people are to attain balance and peace with themselves and their surroundings. He delineates the enduring cultural heritage of Indians in essays on law, literature, history, art, film, and culture.