The 50-year-old Native American dioramas and their attendant overlay exhibit, “Native American Dioramas in Transition” at the University of Michigan Exhibit Museum are coming down this week after increasing concerns about the way they portray Native American cultures as stereotyped, oversimplified, small and extinct. However, that is hardly the end to learning about Native American cultures.

As part of the Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads, the Ann Arbor District Library will be hosting a talk by University of Michigan Professor Margaret Noori about Native Americans of Michigan, the Three Fires Confederacy.

From the library's calendar listing on the event:

Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads Event: Margaret Noori Discusses Native Americans of Michigan - The Three Fires Confederacy

"Wednesday January 6, 2010: 7:00 pm to 8:30 pm - Downtown Library: Multi-Purpose Room

A strong sense of social and environmental identity, and the ability to resist and accommodate change, has influenced Michigan Native Americans over the last two centuries. Some efforts by American and Canadian governments to completely reform the native economies, religion, education and government have succeeded and some have failed. What has been the case in our own state? Learn about the past and present history of the confederacy of Ojibwe, Odawa and Potawatomi nations with University of Michigan's Margaret Noori. She is Director of the Comprehensive Studies Program and teaches the Anishinaabe Language and American Indian Literature at the University of Michigan. This event will be held in conjunction with Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti Reads 2010, which, this year focuses on the subject of Michigan.

The Downtown Ann Arbor District Library is located at 343 South Fifth Ave,, Ann Arbor.

Frances Kai-Hwa Wang is a second-generation Chinese American from California who now divides her time between Ann Arbor and the Big Island of Hawaii. She is editor of IMDiversity.com Asian American Village, lead multicultural contributor for AnnArbor.com, and a contributor for New America Media's Ethnoblog. She is a popular speaker on Asian Pacific American and multicultural issues. Check out her website at franceskaihwawang.com, her blog at franceskaihwawang.blogspot.com, and she can be reached at fkwang888@gmail.com.