Tree That Never Dies; Oral History of the Michigan Indians (Native American Oral History Project) [Paperback]

Pamela J. Dobson (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: 1950

Material taken from taped interviews with Chippewa, ottawa and Potawatomi Indians of Michigan. Includes information on Crafts, Hunting, Trapping, Fishing, Diet, ZOccupations, Housing, Lumbering, Farming, Education, Beliefs and Stories, Medicine, Appendix, Index, Suggested Readings. Date unknown. Book is typewritten. large format softcover.

Product Details

• Paperback: 169 pages
• Publisher: Grand Rapids Public Library (1950)
• Language: English
• ASIN: B000HAOAPE
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #9,415,293 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars American Indian Oral History Preserved, October 18, 2008

By 

Sunny Sewing Honeybee - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Tree That Never Dies: Oral history of the Michigan Indians (Paperback)

The Tree That Never Dies: Oral History of the Michigan Indians has a homemade feel, with typeset pages and poor binding (my copy was printed with most pages either upside down or out of order, and fell apart to the touch--I rebound it), published by the Grand Rapids Public Library. There are, included, several detailed drawings of such things as a log sled, log house, and drum. Sections include: crafts (not a how to, unfortunately, but descriptions), hunting, diet, housing, education, medicine beliefs, death, pow-wows, and storytelling.

Writing down oral history is a difficult process, because you have to be faithful to what was said, and the direction stories take may be hampered by the original interviewer or interviewees. When people have passed on or are not available for follow-up questions, sometimes entire stories are not present, and you feel like you're just getting a sample of the really good stuff. That was some of the frustration I felt when reading The Tree That Never Dies. I wished I could ask the interviewees follow up questions to learn more about what they had said and better flesh out the stories. Much of the book is summaries rather than direct quotes. Another fault of the book is that it does not list most dates of when events took place, instead using no terms at all, or vague terms like "years ago" (41). The reader will be confused about whether the events are from the '70s (when the book was compiled) or much earlier, something important to know especially for those reading the book for a scholarly purpose. Additionally, names are not used, so it's not clear who is who.

That being said, it's still an interesting book by an anthropologist who did us all a favor by compiling tapes into a text and preserving a bit of regional history. For the amount of time and effort that likely went into the project by all involved, it deserves four stars.