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"With more than twenty books published about the Navajo people, Robert S. McPherson is one of the most prolific contemporary writers concerning their history and culture. Scouting for the Bluecoats addresses a little-known and, until now, undocumented story of an estimated five hundred Navajos employed by the United States Army, primarily in the campaigns against the Apaches between 1873 and 1886. The author takes us with these scouts as they guide U.S. soldiers into the deserts, canyons, and mountains of New Mexico, Arizona, and Northern Mexico; he also provides a solid context about the origin of the Navajos and Apaches, their intertribal conflicts, and their elements of shared culture. Once again McPherson demonstrates his skill as a master historian, his understanding of these people, and a meaningful context for this long-neglected story of warrior-soldiers whose fieldcraft and dedication proved critical in shaping relations between the military and two Indian tribes in the Southwest." -Kent Powell, Senior historian at Utah Division of State History and editor of Utah State Historical Quarterly (retired) "Scouting for the Bluecoats examines the important role that Navajos played in military operations during the last quarter of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries. Unlike the famous Navajo code talkers of World War II, little has been written about these men who served in some of the most challenging and noteworthy struggles against the Apaches. Until now, their story has been forgotten. Navajo skills in understanding and tracking a wily foe across an inhospitable landscape proved to be essential elements in ending the Apache wars. For those interested in the recruitment and deployment of the scouts, measures taken to counter enemy tactics, and the challenge of obtaining recognition for their service, this book is an invaluable source and a must-read for any serious scholar of Navajo history." -Ronald P. Maldonado, Tribal historic preservation officer (retired), Navajo Nation

"If we are always at war, is all poetry then war poetry? Adrian Lèurssen's Human Is to wander is a book of dislocation, migration, and witness at a time of war-but whose war, fought where, and at what costs to whom? Born and raised in apartheid-era South Africa, Lèurssen migrated to the U.S. as a teen in order to avoid military service at a time when the country's authoritarian regime engaged in a protracted, largely unknown war in Angola. Years later, as a father of young children in his adopted country, echoes of everything his family thought they had left behind has returned: endless bloody conflicts on the horizon; an alarming rise of authoritarianism and nationalistic fervor; pervasive racism, inequality, and daily violence in a country whose mythic promise was once held as freedom, equality, opportunity. In Human Is to wander, Lèurssen explores these echoes of his personal history within a landscape that is familiar and unfamiliar all at once. Neither the brutally oppressive South Africa of his childhood nor the precarious United States of today, Lèurssen's landscape emerges in the broken rhyme between "troop" and "troupe" where "our captions / are picture less" and "the plan to explain is absolute, but only an entrance." His is an inner landscape as song no longer sung in a mother tongue, in which the human cost of war, climate crisis, and forced migration is "all part of the explanation." Lèurssen uses collage, constrained cut-up, Oulipean procedures, abecedarian, and other generative play to allow poems to emerge that respond to the turmoil and dislocation of this violent century, attempting to witness if not understand his-and our-place in it"--

"McPherson, through this oral history of Navajo Women living in Monument Valley, provides a unique story of cultural understanding specific to the area. From personal experience and a shared heritage, these women explain their early struggles in life, religious beliefs and sacred teachings, daily activities of a traditional family, and later, battling against cultural loss. Today's rapidly changing world challenges these elders while enticing the young to forget what it means to be Diné. Here, these women share what they want the youth to know. I highly recommend this book to those who wish to learn about the past, understand the present, and consider the future." --Ronald P. Maldonado, Navajo Nation Cultural Resource Supervisor "The teachings and stories presented here are fascinating and important. When reading them, I heard my granmother's and aunt's voices, connecting me to the past while strengthening my understanding of Navajo culture. It is the women who are the heard and soul of preserving this information as they guide youth into the future. Here that wisdom becomes real. Those interested in a balanced presentation of the difficult, yet rewarding live of Navajo elders will be highly rewarded by learning from this book" --Charlotte Nez Lacy, Heritage Language Educator/Translator