Databases
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Artstor This link opens in a new window
Images from the world's leading museums, photo archives, scholars, and artists. Subjects include anthropology, archaeology, architecture, art history, fashion and costume, literature, religion, theater, world history, and more. All images are rights-cleared for educational use.
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Ethnic Diversity Source This link opens in a new window
Covering the culture, traditions, social treatment and lived experiences of different ethnic groups in America.
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JSTOR This link opens in a new windowFull-text articles on most academic topics, often spanning the entire run of academic journals.
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Project Muse This link opens in a new windowA leading provider of digital humanities and social science content. Offers full-text versions of scholarly journals and books from many of the world's leading university presses and scholarly societies.
Websites
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National Film Board of CanadaDocumentaries, animations, experimental films, fiction, and interactive works. We showcase films that take a stand on issues of global importance that matter to Canadians—stories about the environment, human rights, international conflict, the arts and more.
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Native Americans in Media: A Bibliography of MaterialsUC Berkeley Library has an excellent list of blogs, podcasts, and news about Native Americans.
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North American Ethnographic Collection – American Museum of Natural HistorySee images of textiles, ceramics, basketry, jewelry, and other objects created by Native Americans. You can search by keyword, region, or tribe.
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Edward S. Curtis's The North American Indian (1907-1930)The Library of Congress provides images (by subject or tribe) and contextual, critical essays to Edward S. Curtis's The Native American Indian, an early, controversial representation of traditional American Indian culture.
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Native Ways Federation - Native-Led Nonprofit ListA list of Native-led nonprofit organizations. Search by Focus Area to find nonprofits that support Arts, Culture and Language.
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Native American Heritage MonthThis Web portal is a collaborative project of the Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities, National Gallery of Art, National Park Service, Smithsonian Institution, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and U.S. National Archives and Records Administration.
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National Museum of the American Indian CollectionsHere you can search the collection for images of art made by Native American people.
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Institute of American Indian Arts Collections PageHere you can search the collections of the institute. Use the red "Advanced Search" button to search. Note that there are not images of all collection items.
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Heard MuseumA museum in Phoenix dedicated to Native American art.
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Indigenous Arts collection at Denver Art MuseumDenver has a collection of Indigenous Art of North America and publishes articles and books.
Finding Articles
When researching contemporary artists, try using news sites to find interviews and news about them. Here are some sites that might be useful:
- National Native News
- Indigenous Country News
- Indianz
- Native News Online
- Native Max Magazine: dedicated to Native American fashion, but also follows art
- American Indian Magazine: Magazine dedicated to American Indian art
Also, search the web sites of the tribe or community that the artist lives and works in.
Another place to find articles about artists is by looking for exhibitions featuring the artist. Sometimes they will have a show at a gallery or museum and there will usually be lots of information released in support of the show or exhibition.
Searching Google can be a useful place to start as long as you are careful. If you are searching Google Scholar, we have some tips, tricks, and suggestions for you on our Google Scholar page.
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University of Saskatchewan Indigenous Studies PortalHere you'll find links to thousands of articles on topics related primarily to First Nations in Canada, many of them Open Access (which means you can read them without requesting them through ILL)
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Ethnic Diversity Source This link opens in a new windowCovering the culture, traditions, social treatment and lived experiences of different ethnic groups in America. It includes Native American news sources and journals.
Print Reference Books
Search for books below by topic keyword or a tribe or location of interest. For example:
- Indians of North America art
- Navajo music
- Minnesota Indians culture
If you're looking for films, search by film title, or try Indians of North America then click on "Video Resources" in the Format box on the left. Also see the books below for overviews of topics and leads to more sources.
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Hearts of Our People
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Call Number: LC Circulating Oversized N6538.A4 H43 2019ISBN: 9780295745794Publication Date: 2019-06-01Hearts of Our People: Native Women Artists explores the artistic achievements of Native women and establishes their rightful place in the art world. This landmark book includes works of art from antiquity to the present, made in a variety of media from textiles and beadwork to video and digital arts. -
Dreaming in Indian
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Call Number: Juvenile Oversized Juv folio N6549.5 .A54 D74 2014ISBN: 9781554516872Publication Date: 2014-07-24A powerful and visually stunning anthology from some of the most groundbreaking Native artists working in North America today. Truly universal in its themes, Dreaming In Indian will shatter commonly held stereotypes and challenge readers to rethink their own place in the world. Divided into four sections, 'Roots,' 'Battles,' 'Medicines,' and 'Dreamcatchers,' this book offers readers a unique insight into a community often misunderstood and misrepresented by the mainstream media. -
Proud Raven, Panting Wolf
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ISBN: 0295743948Publication Date: 2018-11-20Among Southeast Alaska's best-known tourist attractions are its totem parks, showcases for monumental wood sculptures by Tlingit and Haida artists. Although the art form is centuries old, the parks date back only to the waning years of the Great Depression, when the US government reversed its policy of suppressing Native practices and began to pay Tlingit and Haida communities to restore older totem poles and move them from ancestral villages into parks designed for tourists. -
The encyclopedia of native music : more than a century of recordings from wax cylinder to the Internet
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Call Number: ML156.4.I5 W75 2005Publication Date: 2005The Encyclopedia of Native Music recognizes the multifaceted contributions made by Native recording artists by tracing the history of their commercially released music. It provides an overview of the surprising abundance of recorded Native music while underlining its historical value, organized by genre for quick reference. -
Alanis Obomsawin
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ISBN: 9780803280458Publication Date: 2006-05-01In more than twenty powerful films, Abenaki filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin has waged a brilliant battle against the ignorance and stereotypes that Native Americans have long endured in cinema and television. In this book, the first devoted to any Native filmmaker, Obomsawin receives her due as the central figure in the development of indigenous media in North America.
Art Books
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Starring Red Wing!
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Call Number: e-bookISBN: 9781496218117Publication Date: 2019-11-01The epic biography Starring Red Wing! brings the exciting career, dedicated activism, and noteworthy legacy of Ho-Chunk actress Lilian Margaret St. Cyr vividly to life. -
Shifting grounds : landscape in contemporary Native American art
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Call Number: e-bookISBN: 0295744820Publication Date: 2019Foregrounds the importance of landscape within twenty-first-century Indigenous artA distinctly Indigenous form of landscape representation is emerging among contemporary Indigenous artists from North America. For centuries, landscape painting in European art typically used representational strategies such as single-point perspective to lure viewers-and settlers-into the territories of the old and new worlds. -
Visualities
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Call Number: E98.A73 V57 2011ISBN: 9780870139994Publication Date: 2011-06-01In recent years, works by American Indian artists and filmmakers such as Jaune Quick-To-See Smith, Edgar Heap of Birds, Sherman Alexie, Shelley Niro, and Chris Eyre have illustrated the importance of visual culture as a means to mediate identity in contemporary Native America. This insightful collection of essays explores how identity is created and communicated through Native film-, video-, and art-making; what role these practices play in contemporary cultural revitalization; and how indigenous creators revisit media pasts and resignify dominant discourses through their work. -
North American Indian Art
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Call Number: LC Circulating Oversized E98.A7 F87 1982ISBN: 0847804615Publication Date: 1982-10-15Encompasses all major tribal areas: the Southwest, California, the Pacific Northwest, the Eskimos of Canada and Alaska, the Plains and the Eastern Woodlands. Numerous colour photographs. -
North American Indian Art
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Call Number: LC Circulating Collection E98.A7 P36 2004ISBN: 0500203776Publication Date: 2004-06-17A splendidly illustrated introduction to the rich history of Native American art, distinguished by its broad coverage and nuanced discussion.
