Adajns] SHONTO I ROLE OF NAVAHO TRADER 13 



almost entirely within the store building, in observing and recording 

 the behavior of my successor. I was able to use for this purpose the 

 trader's desk behind the counter (see lig. 3, p. 1G2), in such a way 

 that my note taking was fairly unobtrusive. When convenient, I in- 

 terrupted my observations for such small services as delivering mail 

 and making small cash sales, hoping thereby to perpetuate as much 

 as possible my status as trader and to distract attention from my 

 anthropological activities. 



My covert status as investigator was never at any time acknowl- 

 edged to the Navaho community. Fortunately, I had since my earliest 

 association with Shonto Trading Post shown a lively curiosity about 

 Navaho society and culture, and had bombarded the customers and 

 particularly the Navaho hired helper with a steady though unsyste- 

 matic series of questions about them. I had thus acquired a general 

 reputation as being considerably more interested in native life and 

 lore than were my employers, therefore was allowed some leeway in 

 my covert investigations. My employers, as well as my successor, 

 were, of course, informed that I was "studying the store," but they 

 never showed any particular interest in the nature of my investiga- 

 tions, and never looked over my material. They were un- 

 aware that their own behavior was being examined and recorded. 



At the beginning of 1956 I was persuaded to interrupt my Shonto 

 study long enough to undertake a field survey of Navaho health condi- 

 tions on behalf of the Bureau of Ethnic Eesearch at the University of 

 Arizona. This enterprise kept me away from Shonto throughout Jan- 

 uary and February of 1956. However, it had been decided that some of 

 my Shonto data might appropriately be employed in the health study, 

 and therefore Dr. William H. Kelly, the director of the Bureau of 

 Ethnic Eesearch, kindly made arrangements for me to return to Shonto 

 and continue my investigations in such a way as to benefit both the 

 health survey and my own project. I therefore spent a good part of 

 March 1956 at Shonto in assembling and systematizing the income data 

 which I had already gathered, and which appears on pages 94-148 of 

 the present study. I was also enabled to pull together a great deal of 

 my material on social organization and to add significantly to it (see 

 "Social Structure," pp. 54-65 ) . Both of these activities I had intended 

 to jjostpone until after my return to Tucson ; the fact that I was enabled 

 to complete them in the field allowed me to fill many gaps which other- 

 wise would have gone unrectified. Participation in the health survey 

 also gave me the opportunity, not originally contemplated, of investi- 

 gating the relations of Shonto people with the Tuba City Hospital as 

 revealed in the latter's admission records. 



At the conclusion of the health survey on the first of April, I re- 

 sumed the duties of trader at Shonto for the third and last time. I 



