THE SUCCESS OF THE NAVAJO ARTS AND CRAFTS ENTERPRISE

In the new Success series, a history of the Navajo Arts and Crafts Enterprise (NACE), a tribal cooperative founded in 1975 to encourage Navajo silversmiths, weavers, and other craftsmen. Trahant intersperses the story of the cooperative's growth with biographical sketches and interviews of the Native Americans who work in the business: craftsmen, buyers, store managers, accountants, sales clerks, and publicists. Although these are interesting pieces, they interrupt the flow of the historical narrative, which often resembles an annual report. The book achieves its modest goal of showing positive role models for others of Native American ancestry, a goal which Roessel sets out in the introductory comments: ``I am tired of outsiders stepping into my community and supposedly telling `our story.' It is time that Navajos tell their own story.'' Add this to the shelves on contemporary Native American culture; it may also be of limited use in the business section. (b&w photos, index, not seen, appendix, glossary) (Nonfiction. 12-14)