Introduction

In the process of soliciting articles for this volume in native women’s history, I had an interesting conversation with one potential contributor. After I described the project to him—a collection of original research articles, each on some aspect of Indian women’s history, covering the experience of women from different tribal groups, and spanning the period from the seventeenth century to the twentieth—he asked, “But why do we need a book in Indian women’s history? There already is one.” ¹ His assumption that one book, or a more accurate tally of seven or eight books, would be enough to say everything there was to say surprised me but reveals much about the state of scholarly research in this area. It is at such an early stage of development that we have yet to realize its full potential. I imagine that twenty or so years ago, when women’s history in general began intruding on more traditional ways of researching and writing about the past, many scholars responded in just the same way, unable to understand that women’s lives have been just as rich and varied as men’s.