ANGRY WOMEN ARE BUILDING , sympathy and billions of dollars in aid from federal and in the form of food to the hungry, medicine to the sick, ulation goes hun- 8 Angy Women are Building: Issues and Struggles Facing American Indian Women Today PaulaGunn Allen* jcentury US government removal o! Indians to ‘Nor do many even notice the parallel or fight South japartheid by demanding an end to its counterpart within the the United e Ame people are in a ‘The central isue hat confronts American Indian women throughou the hemisphere i survival, literal survival, both on a cultural and is figure, which is disputed by: American Indian, is probably 2 fair estimate, and and 10 Wve been serilized in the U every fro 4, our value systems and our way of lifé) The past 500 years ‘our skill at waging this struggle: forall the varied weapons of [pointed at our heads, we endure, ‘Wuvive war and conquest; we survive col percent of Indian men rate continues at well above national all segments of ‘abandonment, neglect, death of ‘our homes, our past and our future. We ‘nul we do more than just survive. We bond, we cate, we fight, bear, we feed, we earn, we laugh, we love, we there, no matter what. lise, some, many of us, just give up. Many are alcoholics, ‘ue addicts, Many abandon the children, the old ones. Many suicide. Many become violent, go insane. Many go ‘white’ and seen or heard from again. But enough hold on to their even after 500 brutal years, we songs and poems, make paintings and removal and assimilation along with. th destruction ‘of wilderness, reservation land and its resources, and severe curtailment of hunting, fishing, timber harvesting and water use rights—then existing tribes are facing the threat of exti which for several hundred tribal groups has already become fact past 500 years. In this nation of more than 200 million, the Indian people cor tute less than one-half of 1 percent of the population, In a nation thal. * From Paula Guna Alle, ‘Angry Women ae Bai «an fadian Women Today’ in The Sacral Hoop by Paula ily our struggles are on two fronts: physical survival and aTo scvive culturally, American Indian women must often fight the Black Women in White America Gerda Lermer* ‘no intention of disappearing, of acquiesing in our extinction. 1. Ist, say some researchers, that fetal alcohol syndrome ( Natie American Stade, Dartmouth College, has done extensive research into the syndrome in he United Stats wel ain New Zealand) 2 Phyls Olt Dog Gros, Semal Abuse, a New Threat tothe Native American ‘Was: An Overview stenng Post rs odin Hel Series 8, (Apel 1982), 18. ical ofthe Menual Heath Pro cist society cannot be hat different sense by 3 enhancing self-respect and provid- shom black peaple can identify. timate past and have been profoundly affected by having to see the world through male eyes. Secing only in subordinate and inferior positions throughout seldom, if ever, earning about female heroines or women i, American girls are conditioned to li i own life ‘esteem. Black women have been doubly victimized by «ct and racist assumptions. Belonging as they do to two have traditionally been treated as inferiors by American and woren—they have been doubly invisible. Their read, infrequently noticed and even more seldom 45