Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz and Dina Gilio-Whitaker, "All the Real Indians Died Off"

While campaigns to abolish “Columbus Day” have become widespread, perceptions of Europeans as “discoverers” of a “New World” persist. Calling out these and other colonial myths, Dunbar-Ortiz, a longtime activist for indigenous peoples worldwide, locates their origins in white settlers’ political and territorial goals. Showing how the acquisition of land and natural resources was predicated on erasing Native Americans, Dunbar-Ortiz continues the important work of her classic The Great Sioux Nation, which was the foundational text for the first international conference on Indigenous peoples of the Americas, and her definitive An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States, winner of the 2015 American Book Award.

Dunbar Ortiz is in conversation with co-author Dina Gilio-Whitaker, an award-winning journalist and columnist at Indian Country Today Media Network.

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Produced by Michael A. Kowaleski