STUDY QUESTIONS
CALIFORNIA: AN INTERPRETIVE HISTORY (8th Ed.)
CHAPTER 2 - THE ORIGINAL CALIFORNIANS
- What is the anthropological theory for the aboriginal settlement of
California?
- California Indians represented a survival of the "Stone Age." Why?
- Why do we see charges of racial inferiority and Indian backwardness made
by white settlers?
- Why is the dichotomy of categorizing Native Americans in California as
either "hunter-gatherers" or "agriculturalists"
problematic for contemporary scholars?
- What was the most important food staple that California Indians relied on,
and how and what was it processed into?
- Why was pottery making hardly necessary outside of the Southern region of
California?
- How were tasks separated by gender within Indian communities?
- Why were Native Americans called "Diggers?" Why is this a
misnomer?
- How many Indians were there estimated to be in the present boundaries of
the state in 1769?
- How was the sweathouse a distinctive institution? Was it segregated
by gender?
- What factors determined the location of Indian communities and the number
of people in those communities? Were different tribes in contact with
each other?
- What can we learn from the diversity of languages spoken by the Native
American population in the state?
- What type of political organization did California Indians have?
- What are the six major, geographically distinct culture areas of the
state's Native American population?
- Was there much conflict between California tribes?
- What was the most important social institution for California Indians?
- What role did women play in Indian culture?
- How important was religion?
- What place did nature have in native American culture?
- Why do historians refer to the Indians of California as prehistoric?
Key Names, Terms, and Concepts