Peter M. Whiteley argues that joining structured Hopi perspectives on their culture, history, and politics to aspects of social theory can result in a more powerful transcultural understanding than conventional ethnography allows. In six essays he analyzes the dynamucs of clanship and polity, the import of personal names, Hopi engagement with the environment in the face of mining-company water depletion, and a historical instance of deliberate, individual action (the 1992 burning of an alter) that precipitated cultural change.