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Chapter 16 | Overview Twenty-First-Century Oklahoma

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Key Terms

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Oklahoma! OKPOP 9/11 Warriors’ Circle of Honor State Question 780 State Question 781 Hydraulic Fracturing Teacher Walkout COVID-19 Pandemic McGirt v. Oklahoma

Chapter Objectives

Learning Outcomes:

The learner will be able to…

  • Describe the changing perceptions of Oklahoma in popular culture.
  • Identify the role that Oklahomans played in 9/11 and the War on Terror.
  • Identify causes and consequences of the teacher walkout in 2018.
  • Explain the impact of criminal justice reform efforts, including State Questions 780 and 781.

  • Explain the importance of the 2020 McGirt decision.

  • Explain how state and tribal governments responded to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Compelling Question:

  • What aspects of Oklahoma’s past remain important in the twenty-first century?

Chapter Overview

In this chapter, students will learn that Oklahomans, like people all across the country and the world, witnessed and experienced the 9/11 terrorist attack in 2001 and the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. At the same time, learners will be able to read how art, culture, and tourism continued to expand. High incarceration rates and a teacher walkout led to meaningful changes and reforms. The historic US Supreme Court ruling in McGirt v. Oklahoma (2020) marked a major victory for tribal sovereignty.

Oklahomans experienced both new and old challenges in the first few decades of the twenty-first century. In this final chapter, we discuss the worst terrorist attack in the history of the United States and a global pandemic of epic proportions. We learn about divisions over public health, criminal justice reform, and education in Oklahoma. Throughout the book we have examined the interesting and complicated histories that have shaped Oklahoma. We want you to make connections and contributions to your state. We hope you will keep exploring the past, present, and future of Native nations, because, as we have seen in so many ways, Native history is deeply woven into the history of Oklahoma. In addition, we encourage you to be an active and engaged citizen. We hope you will register to vote when you are eligible. We encourage you to be involved in your community. Oklahomans are, after all, at the very center of the making of Oklahoma history.