Empire's Tracks: Indigenous Nations, Chinese Workers, and the Transcontinental RailroadEmpire’s Tracks boldly reframes the history of the transcontinental railroad from the perspectives of the Cheyenne, Lakota, and Pawnee Native American tribes, and the Chinese migrants who toiled on its path. In this meticulously researched book, Manu Karuka situates the railroad within the violent global histories of colonialism and capitalism. Through an examination of legislative, military, and business records, Karuka deftly explains the imperial foundations of U.S. political economy. Tracing the shared paths of Indigenous and Asian American histories, this multisited interdisciplinary study connects military occupation to exclusionary border policies, a linked chain spanning the heart of U.S. imperialism. This highly original and beautifully wrought book unveils how the transcontinental railroad laid the tracks of the U.S. Empire. |
Contents
The Prose of Countersovereignty | 1 |
5 | 80 |
6 | 94 |
Cheyenne | 128 |
Shareholder Whiteness | 149 |
Continental Imperialism | 168 |
The Significance of Decolonization | 185 |
Acknowledgments | 201 |
| 255 | |
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Common terms and phrases
Africa American annuity Black British buffalo California Central Pacific Railroad Charles Crocker Cheyenne China Chinese labor Chinese workers claims Collis Huntington colonialist Company continental imperialism core corporation countersovereignty Creek Crocker to Collis decolonization Deloria Dog Soldiers Duke University Duke University Press economy Ella Deloria Empire expansion finance capital frontier gendered global Grenville Dodge History horses Huntington Papers imperialist Indian Affairs Indigenous Indigenous lands Indigenous modes Indigenous nations industrial infrastructure LaDuke Lakota Laramie Lenin Lushbaugh modes of relationship NARA Record Group Nebraska Press Nevada North America occupation ongoing Paiute Pawnee Pawnee Agency Pawnee women Plains Platte River political Race racial rail railroad colonialism railroad construction Railway relations Report rumor Samir Amin scouts settler shareholders Sioux social South sovereignty struggle territory tion trade transcontinental railroad treaty Turner U. S. military Union Pacific Railroad United violence wages war-finance nexus Winnemucca Winona LaDuke York