Framing the Forgotten: Portrayals of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe in Media Narratives

Historical media provides a new opportunity to identify and examine colonial methods of marginalization against Indigenous groups in the Bay Area. We analyzed 111 historical documents from 1850-1935 and 1965-2000, ranging from newspapers and cartoons to government documents. The documents were based within various cities in the San Francisco Bay Area, with the goal of compiling a thorough record of the Muwekma Ohlone Tribe’s continued existence. We then extrapolated four core themes and multiple subthemes observed from a close reading and categorization of each document, anchoring their concepts in the existing literature base.