West of the Thirties: Discoveries Among the Navajo and Hopi [Paperback]

Edward T. Hall (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1995

From 1933 to 1937, the great American  anthropologist Edward T. Hall lived and worked on  reservations in the Southwest, a frontier where four  cultures--Navajo, Hopi, Hispanic, and Anglo--clashed.  Re-creating that stark and haunting landscape, Hall  pieces together a firsthand account of two proud  worlds--the frugal, Pueblo-dwelling Hopi with their  isolated villages high on the mesa tops and their  deeply felt religious faith and the Navajos, whose  rhythm and ceremonious forms of respect Hall  learned as he worked with them. In these early  experiences, as Hall discovered the deeply human logic of  these tribes, he began to recognize how culture  itself, not only theirs but his own, was at work in  each person's behavior. The respect he felt and  diplayed won him a friendly Navajo nickname--Chiz  Chili, meaning Slim Curly Hair--and a mentor, the  great Indian trader, Lorenzo Hubbell. Set under the  vast arch of sky in a place of unforgettable  beauty, West Of The Thirties is  about the Navajos and Hopis as one receptive young  white man perceived them, but it is also about the  core of being human, which Hall would later develop  into a theory of implicit culture. In these  pages, we see theory in the flesh, taking a hundred  different human forms and engaging us in a lost  world, the West of the  thirties.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

From 1933 to 1937, noted anthropologist Hall ( The Hidden Dimension Beyond ) worked as a camp manager for the Indian equivalent of the Civilian Conservation Corps at Navajo and Hopi reservations in Arizona. The job entailed blasting rocks, building earthen dams and repairing vestigial roads. Young and inquisitive, he became attuned to the distinct Hopi and Navajo ways of life. Hall came under the tutelage of the legendary trader Lorenzo Hubbell, who was equally at home in Hopi, Navajo, Hispanic and Anglo cultures. At that time, the traders and representatives of the federal government were the only outside contacts for the Indians. Hall became convinced that the Hopi and Navajo were the products of complex, sophisticated rational cultures. He gives an engaging picture of the period.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Library Journal

Hall spent four years living on the remote Navajo and Hopi reservations while working for the Indian equivalent of the Civilian Conservation Corps. Only 19 when he arrived in 1933, and not yet an anthropologist, he became fascinated with the differences between the Hopi, Navajo, and white cultures and how these differences were reflected is language and logic. In this work of both anthropology and autobiography, Hall is a most perceptive observer; he not only describes his own interactions with the Indians but also how the Hopi and the Navajo viewed their contacts with whites throughout history. Recommended for Southwestern and anthropology collections.
- Judy R. Reis, Cochise Cty. Lib. Dist., Bisbee, Ariz.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Anchor; 1st Anchor Books ed edition (January 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0385424221
• ISBN-13: 978-0385424226
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,008,821 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A beautiful reminiscence of life in New Mexico, December 31, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: West of the Thirties: Discoveries Among the Navajo and Hopi (Paperback)

This captivating memoir vividly describes life in Santa Fe and the surrounding territory before all the changes that came with World War II. The author, a well-known anthropologist, had a fascinating childhood growing up on Canyon Road and attending Los Alamos Boys School before it became the site of the Manhattan Project. Reading about his adventures on the Hopi and Navajo reservations made me wish I could turn back the clock and visit those lands when they were still so remote and untouched. A beautiful, moving book by a man fully engaged with life.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Serendipitious memoir by a kind & sage anthropologist, November 6, 2006

By 

R. D'Alessandro III "rudydale" (Washington, DC) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: West of the Thirties: Discoveries Among the Navajo and Hopi (Paperback)

This book is another serendipitious gem that I purchased for a song - one dollar - in a book sale, mistaking the title for a fictional novel about the urban West Thirties of Manhattan, rather than the historical account of life in the desert southwest of the 1930's that it actually is. Call me shallow - somehow the colorful cover art depicting a native American trading post caught my eye without my realizing the true nature, and value, of the book. That is, until I happily read it. I'm thankful to the universe for placing it in my hands.

West of the Thirties is a moving, albeit too brief, memoir of American anthropologist Edward T. Hall's youthful years working with the Navajo and Hopi in the four corners region of Arizona & New Mexico north of Winslow, Arizona during the difficult days of the Great Depression. His recollections are evocative of a past that is now gone, so it's a window into a people, place, culture and time that has been overrun and swallowed up by modernity. What's more, this memoir proves worthy of a slow, meditative read for the compassionate sagacity with which Hall recalls the Navajo & Hopi, as well as the traders and the Federal administrators of New Deal programs that didn't always have wisdom or heart behind their rationales, and the nuggets of common sense with which Hall evidently lived and lives his life.

This is a book that I dog-eared for the sagacious passages that stuck in my heart and mind as subtle rejoinders for how I can be a better person. Some of those nuggets were:

From the Introduction, page xxix: "The Navajo and the Hopis also had stories to tell, their own personal stories...In telling me their stories, people were explaining themselves as products of their past."

From page 54: "...if you worked with, instead of against, nature, things simply went better."

From page 70: "It had been taken for granted not only that our system was the best and the most sensible one in the world, but that we had a right to impose it on anyone in our power. I now know...that it isn't just my own culture, but all cultures that act in these ways."

From page 85: "...white society certainly had failed to use what was there before us, just waiting...to be applied. Identifying the talents of the unusual...has never been the strong point of American culture."

From page 98: "When there is harmony, things go right; in its absence, things go wrong."

From page 103: "For a Navajo, the world is of a piece. Nothing can be seen as unconnected. ...we of European descent...are only dimly edging toward an understanding of our part in the whole. To a Navajo, such an understanding is second nature, and we see it in their approach to the land."

From page 166: "In our journey through life, one of the first pieces of baggage to get rid of is being judgemental of others, to say nothing of putting them down."

From page 173: "...it should be clear that the human species would be well advised to assign only those who are wise and kind to conduct the difficult and sensitive business of intercultural relations, particularly when dealing with people who are less powerful, politically.

I would have liked the book to be longer - I eagerly wanted more of Hall's easy prose and warm recollections. The book also seems to provide more insight into the Navajo than the Hopi, and it seems to finish up in too much of a hurry, tying up stories without a more complete summation. But it's a book that fills in gaps which we don't see in wayside exhibits, popular films, or geotourism destination maps. This is a book that I'll want to return to again and again for reminders that there is dignity in all of us, the greatest of all being treating others with dignity.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars West of the Thirties and the Sixties, March 26, 2009

By 

Don L. Peterson "donawapa" (Manti, Ut USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: West of the Thirties: Discoveries Among the Navajo and Hopi (Paperback)

I stumbled upon this book quite a number of years ago as I was writing my autobiography. I was impressed so by the book that I began a connection with Mr. Hall via mail. It was a very exciting time and very interesting. He knew little of me but I consider him a great friend, though I never met the man. I was sad when he died as I was hoping for another book, additional insights. I heard from his assistant that his home or office was trashed and much was stolen from him. Too bad the thieves wasted insights that were better than they.

I experienced living on the Hopi/Navajo res in the Sixties. As I read West of the Thirties, I could have retitled the book West of the Sixties with only a few changes.

I would recommend the book as a good read for all budding anthropologists and any one interested in the world of the 4-corners region, and they will come to lover that desolate and isolated land as I did, as Edward Hall did and as many others have.