Monday, October 26th 2026

Dr. Carrie Mott--Settler State Bureaucracy: Paper trails and land theft

This presentation looks to the lands of the Yakama Nation in the US state of Washington. Throughout the early 20th century, the Yakama Nation saw significant losses of their reservation land as it was sold off to non-Indigenous people. An often overlooked element of the settler state is the significance of ordinary bureaucratic processes and routine paperwork in the theft of lands. Relying on archival documents showing the systematic ways that lands were sold by the Bureau of Indian Affairs to non-Indigenous buyers, this presentation examines the process through which the Yakama lost significant tracts of land on their reservation. These losses were in direct contradiction to their 1855 treaty, which states that their reservation was for the Yakama’s “exclusive use and benefit”.