The Last Archive: The Word for Man is Ishi: The amazing story of Ishi, only member of his Native American community to survive genocide, who was discovered in a small town in northern California in 1911.
Celebrated during his life as “the last wild Indian,” Ishi moved in to the new Anthropology Department at the University of California, Berkeley, where he became a living exhibit. But he also took control of his own life, moving around the community, attending vaudeville shows, and giving newspaper interviews.
Ishi’s life is a microcosm of American imperialism, and how white America celebrated, romanticized, and mourned Native American culture, after first subjugating that culture, committing genocide against it, and sidelining actual, living Native Americans who were—and are—still here.
Anthropologist Alfred Kroeber worked with Ishi and became Ishi’s friend, though Kroeber eventually betrayed Ishi. Ishi died in 1916.
Thirteen years later, Kroeber had a child, who grew up to become one of the most famous and well-respected science fiction writers of the century, writing again and again about imperialism and its victims.