Border towns are white-dominated towns and cities that operate according to the same political and spatial logics as all other American towns and cities. To this day, the US settler state continues to wage violence on Native life and land in these spaces out of desperation to eliminate the threat of Native presence and complete its vision of national consolidation “from sea to shining sea.” This explains why some of the most important Native-led rebellions in US history originated in border towns and why they are zones of ongoing confrontation between Native nations and their colonial occupier, the United States. Red Nation Rising marks the first effort to tell these entangled histories and inspire a new generation of Native freedom fighters to return to border towns as key front lines in the long struggle for Native liberation from US colonial control.

Brandon Benallie is a long-time activist and member of The Red Nation. Radmilla Cody is a Grammy Nominee and multiple Native American Music Awards winner. David Correia is Associate Professor of American Studies at the University of New Mexico. Jennifer Nez Denetdale (Diné) is a professor of American Studies at the University of New Mexico. Nick Estes (Kul Wicasa) is assistant professor of American Studies at the University of New Mexico. Melanie K. Yazzie (Diné) is an assistant professor of Native American Studies and American Studies at the University of New Mexico.