Authors: National Urban Indian Family Coalition

Publication Year: 2009

Last Updated: 2010-10-04 16:08:11

Journal: National Urban Indian Family Coalition

Keywords: socio-economic issues, funding, appropriations, health disparities, needs assessment, poverty, disability, urban natives, nuifc, National Urban Indian Family Coalition

Short Abstract:

Native people face some of the most dire socio-economic conditions of any group in America. Within this population, urban Indians face unique challenges. Federal funding does not always directly address their needs, and their location in America’s cities mean that part of the safety net available to Native children and families living on reservations or tribal territories are unavailable to them. There is also a lack of sufficient data to determine whether and how well the “urban safety net” meets the needs of urban Indian families. The magnitude of this problem is significant, as urban Indians make up almost half of the Native population overall. Even so, there is a critical lack of research on the issues facing Native families residing in urban areas and virtually no research focused directly on understanding and alleviating the many social ills this population currently suffers, such as disparities in rates of poverty, disability status, educational attainment, employment, and single-parent status.2 Certainly, a number of reports about urban Natives have been produced over the years, including a special edition of the American Indian Culture and Research Journal in 1998 addressing the status and wellbeing of urban Indian families. While valuable, these reports tend to aggregate data nationally and/or statewide and, in so doing, ignore potentially important differences between Indian communities in different metropolitan areas and between urban Indians and Indians residing on tribal lands. As a result, there is a need for more data to address the unique and common concerns that Native people in America’s cities share with each other and with their reservation-based relatives.

Abstract:

Native people face some of the most dire socio-economic conditions of any group in America. Within this population, urban Indians face unique challenges. Federal funding does not always directly address their needs, and their location in America’s cities mean that part of the safety net available to Native children and families living on reservations or tribal territories are unavailable to them. There is also a lack of sufficient data to determine whether and how well the “urban safety net” meets the needs of urban Indian families. The magnitude of this problem is significant, as urban Indians make up almost half of the Native population overall. Even so, there is a critical lack of research on the issues facing Native families residing in urban areas and virtually no research focused directly on understanding and alleviating the many social ills this population currently suffers, such as disparities in rates of poverty, disability status, educational attainment, employment, and single-parent status.2 Certainly, a number of reports about urban Natives have been produced over the years, including a special edition of the American Indian Culture and Research Journal in 1998 addressing the status and wellbeing of urban Indian families. While valuable, these reports tend to aggregate data nationally and/or statewide and, in so doing, ignore potentially important differences between Indian communities in different metropolitan areas and between urban Indians and Indians residing on tribal lands. As a result, there is a need for more data to address the unique and common concerns that Native people in America’s cities share with each other and with their reservation-based relatives.

Source: Link to Original Article.

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