Navajo Mothers and Daughters: Schools, Jobs, and the Family

Abstract

Navajo women's historically problematic relation to public schools might be best understood by considering the role that matrilineal networks play in giving Navajo women a place of respect as mothers and daughters—a life course to which schools contribute little. Navajo women's commitment to cooperative family relations is sharply at odds with contemporary educational practice and much educational thought, which assumes the desirability of an individualistic lifestyle and is devoted to helping students adopt a middle‐class orientation.