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Apache Tribe Origins: A Search for Identity
How origin accounts, scholarship and community membership each shape Apache identity, and why the Apache peoples are distinct nations rather than one tribe.
Origins and Identity
Origins and Belonging
How Apache peoples understand origin, identity and belonging, then and now.
Apache Apache Apache Identity: A Study of the Tribe's Early Self-Perception
How matrilineal clans, extended families and local groups shaped early Apache senses of self, and how this differed between Western Apache and other Apache nations.
Apache Identity: A Study of the Tribe's Self-Perception
A comparison of outside stereotypes of the Apache with how Apache communities describe themselves, from film images to family, language and place.
Apache Tribe Origins: A Search for Identity and Belonging
How Apache nations set their own membership and enrollment rules, why those rules differ between nations, and why belonging is decided by each nation.
Apache Tribe Origins: A Search for Identity and Belonging in the 21st Century
How Apache people living on reservations, in nearby towns and in cities express identity today, through family, language, ceremony, work and community ties.
Apache Tribe Origins: A Search for Identity and Belonging in the Face of Adversity and Change
How forced removal, imprisonment and boarding schools disrupted Apache belonging, and how families, clans and communities held identity together.
Apache Tribe Origins: A Search for Identity and Belonging in the Modern Era
Why consumer DNA and ancestry tests cannot establish Apache identity or tribal membership, what they can and cannot show, and what Apache nations rely on instead.
The Apache Nation: A Brief Overview
A short primer on the Apache peoples: the main groups, where their nations are today, and the Southern Athabaskan language family they share.
Related topics
More in origins and identity
Apache Origins What scholarship and oral tradition say about Apache beginnings. Migration and Homelands How Apachean peoples came to the Southwest and Plains. Culture and Traditions Shared and distinct ways of life across Apache groups. Heritage Celebrations Powwows, night ceremonies and the many ways Apache communities describe and celebrate their heritage. Early History and Archaeology What evidence says about Apache life before written records. Diversity and Unity The many distinct Apache nations and the ties between them and their neighbours. Migration Stories Southward migration, settlement and the myths that surround Apache beginnings. Apache Identity Belonging, self-names and media images of Apache people. Southwest Migration The movement of Apachean ancestors into the Southwest and southern Plains. Western Apache Peoples The White Mountain, San Carlos, Cibecue and Tonto Apache and their homelands in what is now Arizona. Mescalero, Jicarilla, Lipan and Plains Apache The Apache peoples east of the Western Apache, from New Mexico to Texas and Oklahoma. Common Myths and Corrections Widespread mistakes about Apache peoples, and the documented facts.