Indian basketball was born of hard times and hard places, its evolution traceable back to the boarding schools, or “Indian schools”, of the  early twentieth century. Davies describes the ways in which the sport, plied as a tool of social control and cultural integration, was adopted and transformed by Native students for their own purposes,  ultimately becoming the “Rez ball” that embodies Native American experience, identity, and community.  Native Hoops travels the continent, from Alaska to North Carolina, tying the rise of basketball, and Native sports history, to sweeping educational, economic, social, and demographic trends through the course of the twentieth century.  Along the way, the book highlights the toils and triumphs of Native athletes, including Jim Thorpe and the 1904 Fort Shaw girls’ team.

Published by University Press of Kansas