Abstract
On the Navajo Reservation today, family maladjustment is characterized by marital discord, weak support networks, breaks in affiliation and interaction between family members and kinsmen, alcohol abuse and child neglect. The existence of such families is not unique to the Navajo Reservation, but the context within which child abuse and neglect occurs is culturally specific.
Difficulties multiply during periods of rapid social and cultural change, for then the old customary relationships and ways of doing things no longer are appropriate and yet are not replaced... And everywhere under new conditions parents are unprepared how to care for their children and the old support system, the back-up system for poor parenting, has broken down. (Mead 1978)
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Aberle, David, 1966 The Peyote Religion Among the Navajo. Chicago: Aldine Press.
Bergman, Robert, 1967 ‘Boarding School and the Psychological Problems of Indian Children.’ unpub. report to the Committee on Indian Health of the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Broudy, D.W. and P.A. May, 1983 ‘Demographic and Epidemiologic Transition Among the Navajo Indians.’ Social Biology 30(1): 1–16.
Callaway, Don, 1977 ‘The Impact of Industrialization on Navajo Household Organization.’ unpublished manuscript.
Chisholm, James, 1981 ‘Social and Economic Change Among the Navajo: Residence Patterns and the Pickup Truck.’ Journal of Anthropological Research 37: 148–57.
Goodman, James, 1982 The Navajo Atlas. Norman: The University of Oklahoma Press.
Harvey, Elinor, 1983 ‘The Abused, the Abuser, the Helper; a Proposal for Understanding the Needs of All Three.’ in Hauswald, L. and Fifield, B. (eds.), Early Intervention and Mediation in Child Abuse and Neglect Among the Navajos. Tsaile, Arizona: Dine Center for Human Development.
Hauswald, Lizabeth, 1984 The Navajo Way: Continuity and Discontinuity in Contemporary Society. Doctoral Dissertation, Department of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley.
Kluckhohn, Clyde and Dorothea Leighton, 1946 The Navajo. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Korbin, Jill, 1981 Child Abuse and Child Neglect: Cross-Cultural Perspectives. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Kunitz, Stephen, 1973 ‘Demographic Change Among the Hopi and Navajo Indians.’ Lake Powell Research Project Bulletin No. 2.
Lamphere, Louise, 1977 To Run After Them. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.
Leighton, Dorothea and Clyde Kluckhohn, 1947 Children of the People. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Levy, Jerrold, 1964 ‘The Fate of Navajo Twins.’ American Anthropologist 66: 883–6.
Levy, Jerrold and Stephen Kunitz, 1971 ‘Indian Reservations, Anomie, and Social Pathologies.’ Southwestern Journal of Anthropology 27: 97–128.
Mead, Margaret, 1978 ‘Child Abuse.’ Presented at the National Conference on Child Abuse and Neglect, Statler Hilton Hotel, New York, New York. April 16–1.9.
Metcalf, Ann, 1975 ‘The Effects of Boarding School on Navajo Self-image and Maternal Behavior.’ Doctoral Dissertation, Stanford University.
Metcalf, Ann, 1976 ‘From Schoolgirl to Mother.’ Social Problems 23: 535–544.
Shomaker, Dianne, 1984 Fosterage as a Form of Exchange Among the Navajo. Doctoral Dissertation, Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico.
Topper, Martin, 1985 ‘Navajo “Alcoholism”: Drinking, Alcohol Abuse, and Treatment in a Changing Cultural Environment.’ in Bennett, L. and Ames, G. (eds.), The American Experience with Alcohol: Contrasting Cultural Perspectives. New York: Plenum Press.
Topper, Martin and Jackie Curtis, 1984 ‘Extended Family Therapy: A Clinical Approach to the Treatment of Synergistic Bipolar Anomic Depression among Navajo Agency Town Adolescents.’ unpublished manuscript, Navajo Area Indian Health Service, Window Rock, Ariz.
Werner, Elizabeth Emmy, 1979 Cross-Cultural Child Development: A View from the Planet Earth. Monterey, California: Brooks/Cole Publishing.
White, Roger, 1977 ‘Navajo Child Abuse and Child Neglect Study.’ Presented before the Epidemiology Section, American Public Health Association Annual Meeting, Washington, D.C.
Witherspoon, Gary, 1975 Navajo Kinship and Marriage. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1987 D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht, Holland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Hauswald, L. (1987). External Pressure/Internal Change: Child Neglect on the Navajo Reservation. In: Scheper-Hughes, N. (eds) Child Survival. Culture, Illness and Healing, vol 11. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-3393-4_8
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-3393-4_8
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-1-55608-029-6
Online ISBN: 978-94-009-3393-4
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive