Page 9 - zaglauer1995

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were invisible and unknown, and to many non-Indian locals,

perhaps they were. It isn't that they were entirely

unknown, they were just not being remembered as active and

interesting participants in the history of the region.

Those who were depicting the original inhabitants were,

perhaps, engaged in showing the pre-contact way of life as a

backdrop to the history of American pioneers, rather than

acknowledging that Kawaiisu people worked for and lived

side-by-side with the American settlers and continue to do

so today.
Although few in numbers today (approximately 150 as

estimated by Kawaiisu informants), Kawaiisu people still

exist. They possess a unique identity that is revealed by

stories telling of a heritage that is their own. By
focusing on the material aspects of traditional (pre-

contact) Kawaiisu culture, scholars and other observers have
overlooked the very essence of what it means to be Kawaiisu

and how this meaning has changed over time and continues to
change. By looking for only the most obvious ways in which

Kawaiisu individuals differ from whites in such things as
language, skin color, religious practices, and dietary

preferences, scholars and others have neglected to see what
is distinct about Kawaiisu reality in both the recent past,

since the arrival of Americans to their homeland, and the
present.