Thomas Biolsi
Professor
Comparative Ethnic Studies, Native American Studies
Governmentality, Indian Law & Policy, Race-Making
PhD, Anthropology, Columbia University, 1987
BA, Anthropology, Hofstra University, 1975
Office:
578 Social Sciences
Tu 10-11:00 am, 578 Social Sciences
Wed 12-1:00 pm, Zoom
Contact:
e: biolsit@berkeley.edu
More Info:
Zoom address for Wednesday Office Hours https://berkeley.zoom.us/j/96711466099
Bio & Research Interests
I received my PhD in Anthropology, and most of my research has been conducted on Rosebud Reservation, South Dakota, home of the Sicangu Lakota or Rosebud Sioux. In February 2023, I began collaborative research on the Hoopa Valley Tribe in northern California, which has been in a 7 decade struggle to address the loss of fish in the Trinity River whose water has been diverted to irrigate farms in the Central Valley.
Courses Taught
FALL 2023 Ethnic Studies 303 (Professional Writing)
SPRING 2024 Native American Studies 102 (Critical Native American Legal and Policy Studies)
Ethnic Studies/Native American Studies 173 (Indigenous Peoples in Global Inequality)
Books
Select publications
2021 “Tribal Sovereignty and the Treaty Imaginary in South Dakota.” American Indian Quarterly 45(3) Summer.
2019 “Racism, Popular Culture and the Everyday on Rosebud Reservation.” NAIS 6(1):77-110.
2018 Power and Progress on the Prairie: Governing People on Rosebud Reservation. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Excerpt: https://drive.google.com/file/d/11OtsriUcCyFnrYc7GdmBTiYpPXglZ3rK/view
2017 “Settler Colonialism and the Treaty Imaginary.” Red Ink 19(1):173-178.
2015 “Indigenous Self-Determination and Territory in the United States.” Border Crossing June, 18:16-18.
2014 “New Deal Visions v. Local Political Culture: The Agony of the South Dakota State Planning Board, 1934-1939. In The Plains Political Tradition: Essays on South Dakota Political Culture, Vol. 2, ed. by Jon K. Lauck, John E. Miller, and Donald C. Sims., Jr. Pierre, South Dakota Historical Society Press, 77-102.
2010 “Even if they Have their Own States…: The Immiseration of Indigenous Peoples in the US.” Journal of Contemporary Thought Winter:69-89.
2007/2001 Deadliest Enemies: Law and Race Relations on and off Rosebud Reservation. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
2005 “Imagined Geographies: Sovereignty, Indigenous Space, and American Indian Struggle.” American Ethnologist 32(2):239-59.
2004 “Race Technologies.” In Companion to the Anthropology of Politics, edited by David Nugent and Joan Vincent. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 400-17.
2004 “Political and Legal Status (‘Lower 48’ States).” In Companion to the Anthropology of American Indians, edited by Thomas Biolsi. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 231-47.
2002 (with Rose Cordier, Marvine Douville Two Eagle, and Melinda Weil) “Welfare Reform on Rosebud Reservation: Challenges for Tribal Policy.” Wicazo Sa Review 17(1):131-58.
1997 (Edited with Larry W. Zimmerman) Indians and Anthropologists: Vine Deloria, Jr., and the Critique of Anthropology. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.
1995 “The Birth of the Reservation: Making the Modern Individual among the Lakota.” American Ethnologist 22(1):28-53.
1995 “Bringing the Law Back In: Legal Rights and the Regulation of Indian-White Relations on Rosebud Reservation.” Current Anthropology 36(4):543-71.
1992 Organizing the Lakota: The Political Economy of the New Deal on Pine Ridge and Rosebud Reservations. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.
Awards & Honors
Visiting Fellow, Research Institute for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity, Stanford University, 2003-4