Modern Navajo tribal government originated in 1923 solely to
approve oil leases. From that beginning, the responsibilities and
functions of tribal government expanded, fostering economic and
political changes that brought the Dine people into closer contact
with their Anglo neighbors. As tribal government undertook more
projects, the revenue from oil and natural gas leases became key
parts of the Navajo Nation's finances. This book is an ethnohistory
of the changes wrought by oil. The economic development spurred by
oil leases is a cautionary tale in the transition from a
subsistence to a capitalist economy. The federal stock reduction
program imposed in the 1930s and 1940s devastated the Navajo
agricultural economy and altered family structure. Women had owned
and cared for the sheep and goat herds which were now reduced in
number by hundreds of thousands. Oil did offer some wage work, but
only for men who dug trenches, laid pipe, or drove trucks.
Following the end of World War II as the millions of dollars
generated annually from oil and gas leases became available to the
impoverished Navajo Nation, inter-clan squabbles erupted over uses
for the money. Navajo was set against Navajo in disputes over
lifeways and identity of the Dine people. This book is also an
assessment of the price the land and culture of the Navajo
ultimately paid for oil. Sadly, greater involvement in Anglo
society meant less reverence for the land and sacred sites of the
Dine.
General
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