In June 1972, a flood tore through Rapid City, South Dakota and the surrounding Black Hills, killing at least 238 people, a disproportionate number of them Native people. Many whose lives and homes were destroyed lived in neighborhoods perilously close to the banks of Rapid Creek, including the vestiges of a Native neighborhood known as Osh Kosh Camp. This article asks why those people lived in that place at that time. I argue that White Americans racialized certain spaces, including urban spaces, under the conceptual framework of Indian Country as part of the process of settler colonialism. As a result, the American project of racializing western spaces attempted to erase Native people from Rapid City and its history. Despite this, Native people continued to live and work in the city throughout the twentieth century. After the flood, Native people had less access to recovery funding despite bearing a disproportionate cost from the disaster, and city officials did not take the needs of the city’s Native community into account when planning for Rapid City’s recovery. Despite the goals of White settlers, the attempt at erasing Indian Country failed. The Flood and its aftermath helped galvaniized Native protest and resistance in the Black Hills.

中文翻译：

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抹去印度国家：城市原生空间和 1972 年的快速城市洪水

1972 年 6 月，一场洪水席卷了南达科他州拉皮德城和周边的布莱克山，造成至少 238 人死亡，其中不成比例的土著人。许多生活和家园被毁的人居住在靠近拉皮德克里克河岸的危险社区，包括被称为奥什科什营地的土著社区的遗迹。这篇文章问为什么那些人当时住在那个地方。我认为，作为定居者殖民主义过程的一部分，在印第安国家的概念框架下，美国白人将某些空间（包括城市空间）种族化。结果，美国将西方空间种族化的项目试图从拉皮德城及其历史中抹去原住民。尽管如此，整个 20 世纪，原住民仍继续在这座城市生活和工作。洪水过后，尽管从灾难中承担了不成比例的成本，但原住民获得恢复资金的机会较少，而且市政府官员在规划拉皮德城的恢复时没有考虑到该市原住民社区的需求。尽管白人定居者有目标，但抹去印第安国家的尝试失败了。洪水及其后果在布莱克山激起了土著人的抗议和抵抗。