[3] Spanish mostly replaced the indigenous language in the early 1900s, and today, English is increasingly gaining ground in the community.

[6] For almost 40 years, the Pueblo has owned and operated tribal businesses that provide employment for its members and the El Paso community.

[3] The Speaking Rock Entertainment Center in El Paso features live concerts, a restaurant, a café, and bars.

[8] The Ysleta del Sur Pueblo is a U.S. federally recognized Native American tribe and sovereign nation.

Lacking a well-bounded and defined federal Indian reservation, the Tiguas intermarried extensively with Mexican Americans and assimilated many cultural and material traits of their Hispanic neighbors.

[10] Important for their later federal tribal recognition, in 1901 noted anthropologist Jesse Walter Fewkes (later famous for his excavations of Mesa Verde) visited Ysleta del Sur as part of a trip to study the New Mexico Pueblos.

While noting their assimilation or "Mexicanization," Fewkes published a short ethnographic article detailing the Tiguas' surviving Pueblo customs and traditions.

Having lost their valuable tribal lands, most members lived in poverty near the old mission church while others moved to other parts of El Paso for better economic opportunities.

As part of the Tiguas' outreach for assistance, the University of Arizona Anthropology Department sent a graduate student to study the group in 1966.

Diamond, a vocal supporter of the liberal agenda of Democratic Presidents John F. Kennedy and his successor Lyndon Johnson, agreed to aid the group.

Under Diamond, the Tiguas pursued a significant lands claims case through the post-war Indian Claims Commission, an effort that generated considerable documentation on the tribal survival of the Tiguas, as well as the consequences that stemmed from the federal government's failure to fulfill its trust responsibilities to the band.

[14] In 1966, Diamond helped introduce the Tiguas to Vine Deloria, Jr., a noted Lakota scholar who was then serving as Executive Director of the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI).

Deloria also featured the Tiguas prominently in his seminal book, Custer Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto, highlighting the band as an important symbol of the survival of indigenous values in modern American society.

As part of the effort to secure status and aid for the band, Diamond gained the support of the Texas delegation to Congress and the Senate for Tigua tribal recognition.

It became apparent to Tiguas and their non-indigenous supporters, however, that limited state aid and economic development programs were not sufficient for tribal survival.

The legislation of the United States Congress restored eligibility to receive services from the federal government to this group, the southernmost tribe of the Pueblo peoples.