Formal Education in an American Indian Community: Peer Society and the Failure of Minority Education;

This study was a powerful breakthrough in a field of inquiry fraught with frustration and misunderstanding. During a period in which scholars became aware of the inadequacies in the education of American Indian children, this book, in its sensitive portrayal of the education process on the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, revealed to the nation some of the causes for this failure. Regarded as one of the best short studies in the field, the book leaves readers with a variety of powerful messages concerning the struggle between the factions of mixed and full bloods, the lack of understanding of Indian culture among the teachers of Indian children, the terrible social distance between Indian parents and non-Indian teachers, the geographic isolation and alienation of white teachers from the community, and the total lack of relevance of a "white-oriented" curriculum for the Indian children.