Declared Defective
Native Americans, Eugenics, and the Myth of Nam Hollow
Published on 1. May 2026
Book
Paperback/Softback
260 pages
978-1-4962-4653-0 (ISBN)
Description
Declared Defective is the anthropological history of an outcast community and a critical reevaluation of The Nam Family, written in 1912 by Arthur Estabrook and Charles Davenport, leaders of the early twentieth-century eugenics movement. Based on their investigations of an obscure rural enclave in upstate New York, the biologists were repulsed by the poverty and behavior of the people in Nam Hollow. They claimed that their alleged indolence, feeble-mindedness, licentiousness, alcoholism, and criminality were biologically inherited.
Declared Defective reveals that Nam Hollow was actually a community of marginalized, mixed-race Native Americans, the Van Guilders, adapting to scarce resources during an era of tumultuous political and economic change. Their Mohican ancestors had lost lands and been displaced from the frontiers of colonial expansion in western Massachusetts in the late eighteenth century. Estabrook and Davenport's portrait of innate degeneracy was a grotesque mischaracterization based on class prejudice and ignorance of the history and subculture of the people of Guilder Hollow. By bringing historical experience, agency, and cultural process to the forefront of analysis, Robert Jarvenpa illuminates the real lives and struggles of the Mohican Van Guilders, exposing the pseudoscientific zealotry and fearmongering of Progressive Era eugenics while exploring the contradictions of race and class in America.
Declared Defective reveals that Nam Hollow was actually a community of marginalized, mixed-race Native Americans, the Van Guilders, adapting to scarce resources during an era of tumultuous political and economic change. Their Mohican ancestors had lost lands and been displaced from the frontiers of colonial expansion in western Massachusetts in the late eighteenth century. Estabrook and Davenport's portrait of innate degeneracy was a grotesque mischaracterization based on class prejudice and ignorance of the history and subculture of the people of Guilder Hollow. By bringing historical experience, agency, and cultural process to the forefront of analysis, Robert Jarvenpa illuminates the real lives and struggles of the Mohican Van Guilders, exposing the pseudoscientific zealotry and fearmongering of Progressive Era eugenics while exploring the contradictions of race and class in America.
Reviews / Votes
"There is much to recommend this book. Drawing on a wealth of sources, Jarvenpa reconstructs this fascinating, if enigmatic, community's history."-Boyd Cothran, Journal of American History"Declared Defective will be of interest to scholars of Native North America, the Progressive Era, the history of science, and race and ethnicity."-Mikaela M. Adams, Journal of American Ethnic History "This powerful story of colonial dispossession, race relations, and rural impoverishment is as relevant as ever in a world where once again many are inclined to naturalize socioeconomic inequality."-Paul Nadasdy, associate professor of anthropology at Cornell University
"A well-researched, fast-paced, compact, and gracefully written examination of Progressive Era eugenics and the complex origins, historical development, and significance of a mixed-race, outcast community. Declared Defective is an important contribution to the history of anthropology, science, racial thought, and Native Americans."-John David Smith, Charles H. Stone Distinguished Professor of American History at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte
"Declared Defective will contribute considerably to histories and discussions of race in America, which is normally geared to a conversation around issues of black and white-literally and metaphorically. Connecting the colonial past with the scientific racism of the twentieth century is a unique contribution."-Brenda Macdougall, chair of Metis research and associate professor of geography, environment, and geomatics at the University of Ottawa
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Lincoln
United States
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Illustrations
9 photographs, 1 illustration, 3 maps, 2 tables, 8 charts, index
Dimensions
Height: 227 mm
Width: 152 mm
Thickness: 18 mm
Weight
402 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-4962-4653-0 (9781496246530)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Robert Jarvenpa is professor emeritus of anthropology at the University at Albany, State University of New York. He is the author or editor of numerous books, including Before the Roads, Before the Mines: Denesuline Memories, Narratives, and the Legacy of a Northern Hunting Society (Nebraska, 2024) and Circumpolar Lives and Livelihood: A Comparative Ethnoarchaeology of Gender and Subsistence (with Hetty Jo Brumbach) (Nebraska, 2006).
Content
List of Illustrations
List of Tables
Series Editors' Introduction
Acknowledgments
Introduction: The Menace in the Hollow
1. Native Americans and Eugenics
2. Border Wars and the Origins of the Van Guilders
3. A "New" Homeland and the Cradle of Guilder Hollow
4. From Pioneers to Outcastes
5. The Eugenicists Arrive
6. Deconstructing the Nam and the Hidden Native Americans
7. Demonizing the Marginalized Poor
Conclusion: The Myth Unravels
Notes
Bibliography
Index
List of Tables
Series Editors' Introduction
Acknowledgments
Introduction: The Menace in the Hollow
1. Native Americans and Eugenics
2. Border Wars and the Origins of the Van Guilders
3. A "New" Homeland and the Cradle of Guilder Hollow
4. From Pioneers to Outcastes
5. The Eugenicists Arrive
6. Deconstructing the Nam and the Hidden Native Americans
7. Demonizing the Marginalized Poor
Conclusion: The Myth Unravels
Notes
Bibliography
Index