A Necessary Balance Gender And Power Among Indians Of The Columbia Plateau The Civilisation Of The American Indian Series Vol 246 Lillian A Ackerman by Lillian A. Ackerman 9780806134857, 9780806180762, 0806134852, 0806180765 instant download after payment.

Ackerman analyzes tribal cultures over three historical periods lasting more than a century--the traditional past, the farming phase when Indians were forced onto the reservation, and the twentieth-century industrial present. Ackerman examines gender equality in terms of power, authority, and autonomy in four social spheres: economic, domestic, political, and religious.

Although early explorers and anthropologists noted isolated instances of gender equality among Plateau Indians, ''A Necessary Balance'' is the first book-length examination of a culture that has practiced such equality from its early days of hunting and gathering to the present day. Ackerman’s findings also relate to an examination of European and American cultures, calling into question the current assumption that gender equality ceases to be possible with the advent of industrialization.