The Navajo people sought for job opportunities outside the reservation and adapted to the wage-based income pattern from 1948 to 1960. O’Neill disagreed with such opinions. He indicated that “The Navajos negotiated the encroaching world market selectively......but refusing to allow capitalist cultural and economic logic to significantly undermine the basic premises upon which they had shaped these new economic strategies (Nichols, 310). The Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) tried to stop the Navajos who have left the reservation coming back, thus providing the commercial growers with a year-round workforce. So they wanted to reduce the factors that caused them to come back, such as responsibility and home. They hoped Navajos would leave their
…show more content…
Besides, it offered unemployment benefits to Navajo workers in winter, which made sure a constant cash income (Nichols, 314). Agricultural work was also seasonal, but it always hired the whole family. So the BIA hoped the whole family left the reservation for good. However, the mining required a permanent labor force and some companies offered enormous incentives to married Navajo to make them settle down (Nichols, 320). Through earning money from working, they hoped to achieve independence form the employers and have more chances to manage their own migratory strategies. According to their working experiences as agricultural labor in their communities, the Natal Africans defined a fair day's work as beginning at sunup and ending at sundown, and kept track of their wages and work days on a lunar cycle (Nichols, 326). Raising sheep was the main way that the Navajo people made a living. Truck has replaced the horse and wagon, and became the main mean of transportation, which allowed the Navajo people to purchase goods in grocery in nearby regions (Nichols, 322). There was a high rate of absenteeism of Navajo people during the Gallup ceremonial. “They also missed a high percentage of shifts in April to return to the reservation to prepare their farm plots for spring planting” (Nichols, 321). The calender was made by agency officials to outline the important event for the Navajo people to educate the employers the type of commitments that could lure the Navajo workers back to the
Besides, it offered unemployment benefits to Navajo workers in winter, which made sure a constant cash income (Nichols, 314). Agricultural work was also seasonal, but it always hired the whole family. So the BIA hoped the whole family left the reservation for good. However, the mining required a permanent labor force and some companies offered enormous incentives to married Navajo to make them settle down (Nichols, 320). Through earning money from working, they hoped to achieve independence form the employers and have more chances to manage their own migratory strategies. According to their working experiences as agricultural labor in their communities, the Natal Africans defined a fair day's work as beginning at sunup and ending at sundown, and kept track of their wages and work days on a lunar cycle (Nichols, 326). Raising sheep was the main way that the Navajo people made a living. Truck has replaced the horse and wagon, and became the main mean of transportation, which allowed the Navajo people to purchase goods in grocery in nearby regions (Nichols, 322). There was a high rate of absenteeism of Navajo people during the Gallup ceremonial. “They also missed a high percentage of shifts in April to return to the reservation to prepare their farm plots for spring planting” (Nichols, 321). The calender was made by agency officials to outline the important event for the Navajo people to educate the employers the type of commitments that could lure the Navajo workers back to the