Rating: 
Summary: Revelation to some, old history to others...
Review: ...thought provoking to all. Marvelously well written, with a sense of humor. Vine Deloria Jr. examines a world where science has become a secular religion. He reveals many flaws, and cover ups in the world of science relating to the history of early man, while bringing up intriguing questions about popular theories, such as the Bering Strait theory. He discusses the Western view of science and how it has become stagnant, locked on old theories and ideas. Also, he sites western science as too quick to dismiss non-western views. Deloria brings new viewpoints to those that embrace old outmoded ideas, and it is a welcome breath of fresh air. To everyone, skeptics included, give this book a chance....you just might learn something! *rs*
Rating: 
Summary: The myth of Native American mysticism
Review: As a years-long student of prehistory, Mr. Deloria's book was a breath of fresh air. As other reviews here have mentioned, the science here is hardly flawless, but Mr. Deloria does a valuable service in pointing out (among other things) where modern scholarship itself ranges from flawed to unsatisfying to ridiculous. Perhaps the best example he offers is the mass extinctions blamed on the Native American population; for many of us who have studied this matter in depth via geological strata and other methods, climactic change (which Deloria favors) is a far, far better explanation than claiming the Native Americans hunted them into the grave. I highly recommend this book for that reason, as well as the examples he points out of what amounts to racist scholarship--or at best, neglect. While I don't always agree with his work and often wished that he had provided us with more detail in several areas where both the folklore and scientific arguments were concerned, I generally agree with his conclusions, and consider this book a necessary read for anyone wanting to gain a broad understanding of American prehistory.
Rating:
Summary: This is bullsh--
Review: He should stick to American Indian history, sociology, current affairs, etc.
If Deloria were a Christian fundamentalist spewing his ignorance as a "native alternative" to science (not Western science, but science), he'd be slapped silly by everybody in academe and beyond, except at a few fundamentalist schools.
BUUTTT... because he's the "great Vine Deloria," along with white liberal guilt, etc., this attack on scientific thinking gets treated with kid gloves at the least and put on a pedestal at the worst.
Deloria, don't go to a "Western" hospital for "Western" scientific medicine next time you get sick.
Rating: 
Summary: Different, refreshing perspective
Review: I enjoyed Deloria's style and humor. He explains a cultural Native American perspective on the long debated hypothesis of evolution (not a theory until it's been proven - as long as there is this much arguement, it can't be proven. Nor will it be as long as no one remembers how it started). He doesn't give the answers, just his research using another view...a view I think could be valuable if considered by scholars. Knowing how scholars try to conceptualize the world in their knowledge, they tend to leave out or discount information if it doesn't fit into their premise. I think Deloria is trying to elicit an evaluation of those restrictions through his writing.
Rating:
Summary: Different, refreshing perspective
Review: I enjoyed Deloria's style and humor. He explains a cultural Native American perspective on the long debated hypothesis of evolution (not a theory until it's been proven - as long as there is this much arguement, it can't be proven. Nor will it be as long as no one remembers how it started). He doesn't give the answers, just his research using another view...a view I think could be valuable if considered by scholars. Knowing how scholars try to conceptualize the world in their knowledge, they tend to leave out or discount information if it doesn't fit into their premise. I think Deloria is trying to elicit an evaluation of those restrictions through his writing.
Rating:
Summary: I'd recommend this
Review: I have always despised anthropologists. They think they know more about Indians than real Indians do, and, as the recent Kennewick man case proves, anthropologists oftentimes end up having to retract previous statements due to frauds. Even today, many academics assume that Chatters' retraction doesn't prove there WEREN'T Caucasians here before Indians. Quite absurd, since Kennewick man was the only evidence favoring such a claim.Today, anthropologists will refer to the Bering Strait theory, as if it were already proven. But the fact is, if you use one theory to support another theory, you must prove both theories, something they aren't prepared to do.
Rating:
Summary: Evolution, Indian origins, and other tall tales
Review: I'll start this off with a disclaimer. When I was in graduate school at the University of Colorado, Vine Deloria jr. was my favorite professor. He was funny, cynical, iconoclastic, and thought-provoking. This book is Vine Deloria in print. Vine challenges your assumptions. Do you believe in evolution or the idea that the ancestors of the American Indians came from Asia on the Bering Strait land bridge? You do? For gosh sakes, why???
Vine, with exquisite detail, relentless logic, and taunting satire, reveals the utter absurdities of these theories until you wonder with embarrassment how anyone, scientist or layman, could ever have believed such tall tales. Likewise Vine demolishes the myth of carbon-dating, tears apart the racist doctrine that early American Indian hunters hunted the wooly mammoth and other megafauna to extintion, and makes a strong case (even stronger in some of his other books) for the works of Immanuel Velikovsky, whose works were banned, boycotted, and ridiculed -- but never disproven -- by mainline "scientists." I started with a disclaimer, I'll end with a caveat. Just because Vine rips to shreds the myth of evolution, don't assume that he is taking a fundamentalist Christian position. He most assuredly is not. Vine believes the truth of human origins is to be found in the stories of American Indians and of other native peoples around the world. The assault on the glass house of evolution is NOT a science-vs.-fundamentalism thing, it is a bad-science-vs.-truth thing. But it took Vine Deloria to get many of us to realize that just because the theory of evolution is badly flawed and propped up only by the dogmatic religious assertions of the priests of the cult of science, that the creation-stories of the Hebrew Bible are not the only possible alternative. This book deserves to be read by everyone: white or Indian, Christian or antichrist. Even people who fancy themselves scientific should read this book; if they are brave enough to explore Vine's premises, maybe there will be a little less bad science in the world.
Rating:
Summary: Evolution, Indian origins, and other tall tales
Review: I'll start this off with a disclaimer. When I was in graduate school at the University of Colorado, Vine Deloria jr. was my favorite professor. He was funny, cynical, iconoclastic, and thought-provoking. This book is Vine Deloria in print. Vine challenges your assumptions. Do you believe in evolution or the idea that the ancestors of the American Indians came from Asia on the Bering Strait land bridge? You do? For gosh sakes, why???
Vine, with exquisite detail, relentless logic, and taunting satire, reveals the utter absurdities of these theories until you wonder with embarrassment how anyone, scientist or layman, could ever have believed such tall tales. Likewise Vine demolishes the myth of carbon-dating, tears apart the racist doctrine that early American Indian hunters hunted the wooly mammoth and other megafauna to extintion, and makes a strong case (even stronger in some of his other books) for the works of Immanuel Velikovsky, whose works were banned, boycotted, and ridiculed -- but never disproven -- by mainline "scientists." I started with a disclaimer, I'll end with a caveat. Just because Vine rips to shreds the myth of evolution, don't assume that he is taking a fundamentalist Christian position. He most assuredly is not. Vine believes the truth of human origins is to be found in the stories of American Indians and of other native peoples around the world. The assault on the glass house of evolution is NOT a science-vs.-fundamentalism thing, it is a bad-science-vs.-truth thing. But it took Vine Deloria to get many of us to realize that just because the theory of evolution is badly flawed and propped up only by the dogmatic religious assertions of the priests of the cult of science, that the creation-stories of the Hebrew Bible are not the only possible alternative. This book deserves to be read by everyone: white or Indian, Christian or antichrist. Even people who fancy themselves scientific should read this book; if they are brave enough to explore Vine's premises, maybe there will be a little less bad science in the world.
Rating:
Summary: Provocative and illuminating
Review: If "science" is defined as a technique for gaining an understanding of the world around us, many "scientific" disciplines are in fact profoundly unscientific. In "Red Earth, White Lies," Vine Deloria, Jr. clearly demonstrates how conjecture can attain the status of fact, even in the face of overwhelming contradictory evidence. Perhaps even more condemning is Deloria's depiction of how alternative ideas, most notably indigenous traditions, are frequently (typically) cast aside without any investigation whatsoever, simply because they conflict with currently accepted norms. "Red Earth, White Lies" is a wonderfully provocative indictment of how historical sciences, such as anthropology, geology, and ecology (my own field) frequently fail in practice. Nevertheless, perhaps without realizing it, Deloria relies on the very hallmarks of modern science; alternative hypotheses, critical analysis, and crucial evidence, to make his case. Here, unfortunately, is where "Red Earth, White Lies" loses much of its power. While Deloria succeeds in casting doubt on many beliefs cherished by entrenched academics, he typically does not subject his own hypotheses to the same treatment. Even more unfortunate, Deloria himself employs some of the techniques he most violently condemns in academics, including the selective use of information (the most obvious example is on page 58) and summary dismissal of entire world-views on the basis of a superficial understanding (his entire discussion of evolutionary biology, for example). Even though "Red Earth, White Lies" occasionally stumbles, Deloria has done all of us a great service, by proving that scientists are only human and that many scientific "facts" are in reality little more than conjectures. If you identify yourself as a "scientist," you will be (and should be) challenged! If you are not a scientist, then perhaps you will see those who are in a whole new light. "Red Earth, White Lies" is a fascinating read, no matter who you are.
Rating:
Summary: Amazing!
Review: The best book i've ever read! I'm buying several copies and giving them out. This is the most important book of TRUE american history and so-called science EVER written. Each truth is clearly "cited" to scholarly journals. It is quite surprising, but very predictable...and dotted with bits of humor. Must read for ALL Native and non-native alike.
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