Adams] SHONTO : ROLE OF NAVAHO TRADER 25 



BIASES 



Five important agencies of White contact with Navaho life are 

 traders, Government officials, missionaries, residents of off-reservation 

 towns, and anthropologists. At one time or another in the past 10 

 years, I have found myself in, or closely associated with, all but one 

 of these. I grew up in an Indian Service family, and in addition 

 worked on behalf of the Bureau on my economic survey in 1950 (to 

 the extent of sporting that ubiquitous status symbol, the Government 

 car) . I traded at Shonto off and on from 1953 to 1956, and lived in 

 Flagstaff for a time in 1949. Also, during all this time, I was striving 

 for acceptance as an anthropologist. 



It is my hope, therefore, that the biases which are inherent in each 

 of the statuses with respect to all the others have to some extent 

 canceled each other out. I do not feel, for example, that I have the 

 common trader's prejudice against the Government (cf. Schmedding, 

 1951), nor the predisposition of the average Flagstaff resident against 

 the anthropologist. To the best of my ability, I have tried to main- 

 tain some sort of balance in dealing with each of these in the pages 

 which follow. 



On the other hand, I have never been closely associated with mis- 

 sionaries. I am conscious, moreover, that I share in the general 

 prejudice against them that is harbored by all of the other func- 

 tionaries whom I have named, and particularly by many anthropolo- 

 gists (e.g., Kluckhohn and Leighton, 1946; pp. 82-85; Keichard, 

 1949). Among all the contact agencies whose activities are chroni- 

 cled herein, therefore, it is probable that the Shonto missionary has 

 fared worst at my hands. 



I also hold to some extent the prejudice of Government officials 

 and especially traders toward the Navaho tribal organization (cf. 

 "Intracultural Relations at the Contact Level," pp. 253-256) , although 

 I like and admire its present chairman. My general antipathy arises 

 out of a personal dislike and disapproval of a good many councilmen 

 of my acquaintaince, at Shonto and elsewhere. 



I am conscious of a vague sense of liking Navahos collectively, as 

 neighbors and as a people, perhaps somewhat better than White 

 Americans as a whole. I do not, however, admire them for possessing 

 any special virtues or qualities not found in White people, and it is 

 more than probable that my liking for them stems from a sense of 

 my own superiority rather than theirs. My personal relations with 

 Navaho individuals, insofar as my status as trader allowed me to 

 have any, run the gamut from friendship to hostility and are about 

 evenly divided in either direction. However, probably because of my 

 institutionalized role as trader, there are no extremes in this range 



