For our third and final book drop this November, Write Brain TV’s month-long celebration of Indigenous Arts and Cinema, we have a controversial and groundbreaking non-fiction polemic that became a pivotal text during the height of the Red Power movement of the 1960’s and 70’s.

Standing Rock Sioux tribal member Vine Deloria Jr.’s Custer Died for Your Sins, published in at the tail end of the Civil Rights movement in 1969, commanded national acclaim upon its release with its unique blend of satirical wit and scathing social commentary that put the long-avoided issue of Native American Rights at the feet of the embattled Nixon administration. Deloria Jr. confronts head-on a number of hot-button topics, including US treaty hypocrisy, the government’s termination policy towards Natives, US-sponsored Indian air organizations, the ills of cultural anthropology, as well as a chapter dedicated to the nuance and functionality of humor in Indigenous societies.

Born in Oglala Lakota territory, Deloria Jr. was raised on a South Dakota reservation before going off to college at Iowa State, then joining the Marines in 1954, and eventually becoming a lawyer specializing in Native American affairs, notably providing key testimony during the Wounded Knee trials. Straddling his tribal past with his Western academic career, Deloria Jr. is able to expertly navigate the political divide between his people and White America despite his often contentious approach and embittered rhetoric.

Write Brain TV is proud to add this Red Power cornerstone text to our ever-expanding Radical Library!