Angelique EagleWoman has posted “The Capitalization of ‘Tribal Nations’ and the Decolonization of Citation, Nomenclature, and Terminology in the United States,” recently published in the Mitchell Hamline Law Review, on SSRN. Here is the abstract:

Within the U.S. legal profession and field of law, words have consequences that are often detrimental to Native peoples in Native homelands. First, this Article will review the basics on the political status and proper understanding of Tribal Nations in the United States. This background will provide context for the analysis and examination of the colonizer language to follow. Next, this Article will examine the issues and consequences of the English language conventions of capitalization or terms referring to Tribal Nations in the United States. Specific issues with the legal style guides known as The AP Stylebook and The Chicago Manual of Style, and The Bluebook legal citation guide will be discussed for the perpetuation of language, citation, and nomenclature that casts Tribal Nations and peoples in an inferior status. Third, the Article will discuss the rationale for eliminating certain terms and phrases derogatory to Native peoples in the English language. Finally, the decolonization of legal terms, phrases, and citations will be connected to the larger issues of Tribal sovereignty, the Tribal Nations-U.S. relationship, and the self-determination of future generations of Native peoples of the Western Hemisphere.

Tribal Nations are nationalities and therefore, should be capitalized. Likewise, when the word “Tribes” relates to the Tribes in the United States, then the word is referring to nationalities and should be capitalized. Sister Tribal Nations in what is now known as Canada are referred to as the capitalized term, First Nations. There is no principled reason for the written standards in the United States to capitalize First Nations and not capitalize Tribal Nations and Tribes. The lack of capitalization in the United States for Tribal Nations, which have engaged in political diplomacy with the federal government, is a remnant of the colonizing disinformation from a bygone era.