Indigenous Historical Practices

This is the introduction for a new History Workshop series on Indigenous Historical Practices.

Indigenous peoples have always produced histories. Long before the development of formal academic disciplines, Indigenous nations sustained complex systems of historical knowledge: transmitted through oral tradition, embodied practice, material culture, and land-based relationships. These were not informal or incomplete forms of history, but dynamic and rigorous systems, often governed by protocols of care, consent, and responsibility. They were rooted in specific cosmologies and political orders, and oriented not only to the past but to the future. Among the Lakota, for example, winter counts (waníyetu wówapi), a pictorial calendar, recorded communal memory through symbolic images painted on animal hide, with each image marking a significant event from the year. These visual calendars were passed down through generations, preserving history as a living guide to the future. Artist Sheldon Raymore (Cheyenne River Sioux) created a winter count to record the history of the HIV/AIDS crisis among Native Americans.

Yet within settler-colonial societies, these forms of historical production were systematically denied legitimacy. Colonial authorities dismissed Indigenous oral traditions as myth, ritual, or folklore. For example, the elders of the Picuris Pueblo of New Mexico have passed down a history which ties their origin to Chaco Canyon. This “claim” was widely dismissed by academics, with archaeologists claiming the site and region had been abandoned by Indigenous peoples, who themselves were lost to history. That is, until a 2025 genomic study published in Nature confirmed the Indigenous history to be correct by comparing the DNA of current tribal members with that collected from burials at the site. This is only one such example of how Indigenous history has been repeatedly categorised as culture (to be studied by Western anthropologists) rather than history. This positions written European records as the only credible sources of the past. Academic historiography on Indigenous peoples developed alongside these exclusions, relying on archives, claims of objectivity, and disciplinary rules that often ignored or distorted Indigenous perspectives.

Indigenous historical practice

It was not until the late twentieth century that Indigenous historiography began to gain wider scholarly recognition as a distinct and vital field. Much of this work was driven by Indigenous scholars, elders, and knowledge holders who insisted on the validity of their own historical frameworks and methodologies. In North America, this included figures such as Vine Deloria Jr. (Standing Rock Sioux), whose book, Custer Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto (1969), became extremely important to the American Indian Movement. In Australia, the 1970s saw a revival in Indigenous historiography and the questioning of imperial and nationalist interpretations of Australian history. This, in part, led to what was known as the “history wars”, or the debate about the recognition of the genocidal impact of European colonisation on Aboriginal Australian and Torres Strait Islander peoples. And in the last decade, historians have argued that the colonialisation, occupation, and genocide in Palestine should be understood through Native Studies, recognis in Palestine the centuries of suffering and grief they have also faced.

Across diverse contexts, Indigenous historiography has worked to unsettle colonial narratives, reclaim Indigenous presence, and reconnect historical knowledge to community authority. Some scholars have focused on reinterpreting colonial documents, reading them against the grain to recover Indigenous voices and refusals. Others have prioritised oral histories, land-based storytelling, and ceremonial knowledge as legitimate and often superior sources. Still others have turned to creative forms – such as literature, performance, and visual art – as modes of historical expression. For example, Mohawk artist Skawennati’s web-based paper-doll and time travel journal, ‘Imagining Indians in the 25^th Century’, offers the “player” the chance to explore Indigenous history from the pre-contact era to the future. Indigenous histories become Indigenous futures.

Of course, doing Indigenous history as a non-Indigenous scholar requires more than interest or expertise; it requires a deep commitment to accountability, humility, and relational ethics. As Māori scholar Linda Tuhiwai Smith argues in Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous People, research on Indigenous peoples has often served colonial ends, even when conducted with good intentions. Non-Indigenous scholars must recognise the histories of extraction embedded in their disciplines, and work to build relationships based on consent, reciprocity, and respect. Métis scholar Zoe Todd has written about the need to cite Indigenous thinkers, centre Indigenous law, and respect Indigenous governance not as gestures of inclusion, but as structural shifts in knowledge production. This means listening more than speaking, asking what work history is doing, and recognising that some knowledge is not meant to be accessed or shared. Above all, it means approaching Indigenous history not as a field to be studied, but as a relationship to be honoured.

Rewriting the archive

The archive has long been treated as the foundation of historical scholarship. Yet for many Indigenous communities, it has functioned not as a neutral source of knowledge but as a tool of power to be wielded against them. To engage with Indigenous histories is therefore not only to reexamine the archive but to question the very conditions of its existence.

Faced with the many lacunae of the so-called official record, scholars of Indigenous histories have developed critical methods for engaging with colonial archives on their own terms. These methods treat colonial documents not as transparent accounts but as sites of contradiction, negotiation, and struggle. They locate Indigenous presence in traces, gaps, and refusals, and reposition those fragments within broader Indigenous frameworks of knowledge, memory, and meaning. Non-Indigenous historian, Caroline Dodds Pennock’s On Savage Shores: How Indigenous Americans Discovered Europe offers a compelling example. Using European archives, she reconstructs the experiences of Indigenous individuals (including diplomats, merchants, and enslaved people) who travelled to Europe in the early modern period. Her work demonstrates how even the most partial and colonial records can be read to illuminate Indigenous agency, mobility, and global entanglement.

Beyond the reframing of existing records, Indigenous scholars and communities are creating new archives. These may be oral, digital, land-based, or ceremonial. One important example is the Plateau Peoples’ Web Portal, developed through collaboration between tribal nations of the Columbia Plateau and Washington State University. Co-directed by tribal cultural authorities, the portal houses digitised materials originally held in settler institutions. These are now reframed and contextualised by the communities they represent. Items are accompanied by tribal commentary, language, and access protocols that reflect Indigenous values and responsibilities. This is not simply a digital archive. It is a sovereign space for Indigenous memory, built to support cultural renewal, education, and the right to narrate history on Indigenous terms.

Relational histories

Historical authority does not reside only in archives, books, or academic institutions. For many Indigenous nations, communities themselves are the primary holders and makers of Indigenous knowledge. Among the Haudenosaunee Confederacy (the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cauyuga, Seneca, and Tuscarora), for instance, wampum belts were used for legal, political, and religious purposes. Wampum belts use beads carved from clam shells and which are then strung into particular forms or patterns. These are then read and interpreted by those with recognised community authority, often during public gatherings or diplomatic meetings. The meaning of each belt is not static but maintained through storytelling and use.

When non-Indigenous institutions seek to work with Indigenous histories, acknowledging this community authority is essential. The recent collaboration between Manchester Museum and the Warnindilyakwa people of Australia offers a significant example. Following the repatriation of 174 cultural heritage items, the Warnindilyakwa were not simply consulted about how to display the objects. They co-curated the exhibition (Anindilyakwa Arts: Stories from our Country), leading decisions about interpretation, language, and storytelling. Community members shaped the historical framing, selected the materials, and determined the protocols governing their display. This approach affirmed that the community itself was the authoritative source of historical knowledge. The museum did not “give voice” to the Warnindilyakwa but listened to and supported the authority they already held. The process also foregrounded the importance of long-term relationships and trust. Years of dialogue, visits, and shared planning preceded the exhibition’s opening. The result was not only an exhibition but a shift in institutional practice: a movement away from extraction and toward collaboration grounded in respect and accountability.

Projects like this demonstrate that Indigenous communities are not passive subjects of history but active producers of it. Their knowledge systems are not simply cultural resources to be mined, but living frameworks through which history is told, taught, and carried forward. For historians and institutions engaging with Indigenous material, this demands a willingness to follow community leadership, adapt research methods, and accept limits around access or interpretation. Not all knowledge can or should be made public. Some histories are held within community for good reason.

This new History Workshop series aims to bring together scholars, artists, educators, and community leaders working to challenge colonial narratives and sustain Indigenous ways of knowing. It explores diverse times and spaces: from the medieval Sámi people, to Nahuatl cartography, to Choctaw and Irish mutual aid. The work of Indigenous historiography today is not only to recover what was erased, but to reassert the authority of Indigenous ways of knowing, remembering, and world-making. It involves creating new archives, honouring community protocols, and unsettling the disciplinary assumptions of history itself. This is not a turn to the past for its own sake. It is a practice oriented toward justice, resurgence, and the future. This series brings together contributions that ask what it means to do Indigenous history today, and how we might do it better – more carefully, more collaboratively, and with greater accountability to the communities and sovereignties from which these histories come.