articles and book chapters
Being Native in the Midwestern City. Chapter 32 in Oxford History of the Midwest. Jon Lauck, ed. Oxford University Press, 2025.
Human Waste.....and Much More. Letter to the Editor and Response in Anthropology News, December 7, 2022. https://www.anthropology-news.org/articles/human-waste-and-much-more/
A Perfect Storm: Embodied Workers, Emplaced Corporations, and Delayed Reflexivity in a Canadian 'Risk Society.' Journal of Political Ecology, Vol. 27, 2020. https://journals.uair.arizona.edu/index.php/JPE/article/view/23138/0
Scents of Place: The Dysplacement of a First Nations Community in Canada. American Anthropologist 13(4): 606-618, December 2011.
Canadian History Through the Senses. Review essay on Joy Parr's Sensing Changes: Technologies, Environment, and Everyday Life 1953-2003 (UBC Press). The Senses and Society 6(2): 225-228. July 2011.
Shelter-in-Place: A First Nation Community in Canada's 'Chemical Valley.' Interdisciplinary Environmental Review, 11(4): 249-262, 2010.
Urban Native Americans. In The American Midwest: An Interpretive Encyclopedia. Sisson, Zachler, and Cayton (eds). Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 2006.
'A Place Where I Can Let My Hair Down': From Social Club to Cultural Center in an Urban American Indian Community. City & Society XIII(1): 31-55, 2001.
'This Hole in our Heart': The Second Generation and the Legacy of Silence. Chapter 12 in American Indians and the Urban Experience, Susan Lobo and Kurt Peters, eds. Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press. 2000.
Not Traditional, Not Assimilated: Elderly American Indians and the Notion of 'Cohort' (co-authored with Elizabeth E. Chapleski). Journal of Cross-Cultural Gerontology 15(3): 229-259, 2000.
Statement for the Hearing before the Committee on Resources, House of Representatives, One Hundred Fifth Congress Second Hearing on HR 2822,:"To Reaffirm and Clarify the Federal Relationship of the Swan Creek Black River Confederated Ojibwa Tribes as a Distinct Federally Recognized Indian Tribe," pp. 48-53, October 7, 1998.
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-105hhrg51984/pdf/CHRG-105hhrg51984.pdf
Book
Our Elders Lived It: American Indian Identity in the City
DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2002.
Jackson profiles the Indigenous residents in the city of Riverton (an alias) and its surrounding area with the result of an impressive exploration of urban Anishinaabe identity. Jackson provides a detailed historical context that helps the reader understand the complexity of an urban Indigenous identity and convincingly argues that identity is rooted in community and kinship. I was frequently struck by the parallels between the experiences of the profiled interviewees and my own family who live on the northern side of the Great Lakes. Miigwech, Dr. Jackson! [Brock Pitawanakwat, Assoc. Professor of Indigenous Studies, York University.]
* * * * *
More than half of all Native Americans live in cities, yet urban Indians have not received the same attention as "traditional" Indians who dwell on reservations. This groundbreaking anthropological investigation shatters stereotypes of what it means to be an Indian in America, arguing that the transition to the urban lifestyle requires a reshaping and reconceptualizing of self-identity.
One of the most pressing concerns facing urban Native Americans today is the question of what constitutes a legitimate claim to Native identity. The importance of identity emerges in such practical matters as participation in tribal functions, entitlement to community aid, and political representation. The appropriation of Indian symbols and lifeways by non-Indians has further blurred notions of identity.
Explaining that ethnic identity is constructed and maintained through social interaction, Jackson demonstrates the importance of community in Indian culture. Our Elders Lived It is the result of extensive fieldwork in an Upper Great Lakes mid-sized city where life has been complicated by economic misfortune and social deprivation. Informed but not dominated by identity theory, Jackson's sensitive interviews and personal narrative allow the Indian community to speak for itself and to present its own vision of the challenges facing urban Native Americans.
[From back cover.]
