Minnesota Modern Masters Interviews Committee Chair Gary Reetz with introduce excerpts from Minnesota Modern Masters video interviews with Mohammed Lawal and Quin Scott of LSE Architects, and James Garrett Jr. and Nathan Johnson of 4RM+ULA.
Resisting Assimilation: Lakota versus Settler Spatialities at Standing Rock, 1882-1890 Architecture historian Kate Solomonson will share her new research on the cultural landscape of the Standing Rock Agency in Dakota Territory during the 1880s, a time when the Lakota contended with intensifying pressure to assimilate to settler culture. Between 1882 and 1890, four different federal commissions traveled to Standing Rock with the aim of coercing them to move onto individual allotments, give up their way of life, and allow millions of acres of “surplus land” to be sold to non-Indigenous settlers—terms that became part of the Dawes Allotment Act. All four commissions failed in their mission. Kate will discuss how architectural and spatial strategies played a significant role in the Lakota's unified efforts to block implementation of the Dawes Act, even as they were resisting and adapting to changing conditions in diverse ways.
