Why Indigenous Literatures Matter

Part survey of the field of Indigenous literary studies, part cultural history, and part literary polemic, Why Indigenous Literatures Matter asserts the vital significance of literary expression to the political, creative, and intellectual efforts of Indigenous peoples today. In considering the connections between literature and lived experience, this book contemplates four key questions at the heart of Indigenous kinship traditions: How do we learn to be human? How do we become good relatives? How do we become good ancestors? How do we learn to live together? Blending personal narrative and broader historical and cultural analysis with close readings of key creative and critical texts, Justice argues that Indigenous writers engage with these questions in part to challenge settler-colonial policies and practices that have targeted Indigenous connections to land, history, family, and self. More importantly, Indigenous writers imaginatively engage the many ways that communities and individuals have sought to nurture these relationships and project them into the future. This provocative volume challenges readers to critically consider and rethink their assumptions about Indigenous literature, history, and politics while never forgetting the emotional connections of our shared humanity and the power of story to effect personal and social change. Written with a generalist reader firmly in mind, but addressing issues of interest to specialists in the field, this book welcomes new audiences to Indigenous literary studies while offering more seasoned readers a renewed appreciation for these transformative literary traditions.

Asserts the vital significance of literary expression to the political, creative, and intellectual efforts of Indigenous peoples. Challenges readers to critically consider & rethink assumptions about Indigenous literature, history, and politics, never forgetting the emotional connections of our shared humanity & the transformative power of story.

Elements of Indigenous Style offers Indigenous writers and editors—and everyone creating works about Indigenous Peoples—the first published guide to common questions and issues of style and process. Everyone working in words or other media needs to read this important new reference, and to keep it nearby while they’re working. This guide features: - Twenty-two succinct style principles. - Advice on culturally appropriate publishing practices, including how to collaborate with Indigenous Peoples, when and how to seek the advice of Elders, and how to respect Indigenous Oral Traditions and Traditional Knowledge. - Terminology to use and to avoid. - Advice on specific editing issues, such as biased language, capitalization, and quoting from historical sources and archives. - Case studies of projects that illustrate best practices.

Literatures, Communities, and Learning: Conversations with Indigenous Writers gathers nine conversations with Indigenous writers about the relationship between Indigenous literatures and learning, and how their writing relates to communities. Relevant, reflexive, and critical, these conversations explore the pressing topic of Indigenous writings and its importance to the well-being of Indigenous Peoples and to Canadian education. It offers readers a chance to listen to authors’ perspectives in their own words. This book presents conversations shared with nine Indigenous writers in what is now Canada: Tenille Campbell, Warren Cariou, Marilyn Dumont, Daniel Heath Justice, Lee Maracle, Sharron Proulx-Turner, David Alexander Robertson, Richard Van Camp, and Katherena Vermette. Influenced by generations of colonization, surrounded by discourses of Indigenization, reconciliation, appropriation, and representation, and swept up in the rapid growth of Indigenous publishing and Indigenous literary studies, these writers have thought a great deal about their work. Each conversation is a nuanced examination of one writer’s concerns, critiques, and craft. In their own ways, these writers are navigating the beautiful challenge of storying their communities within politically charged terrain. This book considers the pedagogical dimensions of stories, serving as an Indigenous literary and education project.

Available for the first time in one volume, Daniel Heath Justice's acclaimed Thorn and Thunder novels take Indigenous fantasy fiction beyond its stereotypes and tell a story set in a world similar to eighteenth-century eastern North America. The original trilogy--an example of green/eco-literature--is collected here in a one-volume novel.

"This book explores Indigenous American literature and the development of an inter- and trans-Indigenous orientation in Native American and Indigenous literary studies. Drawing on the perspectives of scholars in the field, it seeks to reconcile tribal nation specificity, Indigenous literary nationalism, and trans-Indigenous methodologies as necessary components of post-Renaissance Native American and Indigenous literary studies. It looks at the work of Renaissance writers, including Louise Erdrich's Tracks (1988) and Leslie Marmon Silko's Sacred Water (1993), along with novels by S. Alice Callahan and John Milton Oskison. It also discusses Indigenous poetics and Salt Publishing's Earthworks series, focusing on poets of the Renaissance in conversation with emerging writers. Furthermore, it introduces contemporary readers to many American Indian writers from the seventeenth to the first half of the nineteenth century, from Captain Joseph Johnson and Ben Uncas to Samson Occom, Samuel Ashpo, Henry Quaquaquid, Joseph Brant, Hendrick Aupaumut, Sarah Simon, Mary Occom, and Elijah Wimpey. The book examines Inuit literature in Inuktitut, bilingual Mexicanoh and Spanish poetry, and literature in Indian Territory, Nunavut, the Huasteca, Yucatán, and the Great Lakes region. It considers Indigenous literatures north of the Medicine Line, particularly francophone writing by Indigenous authors in Quebec. Other issues tackled by the book include racial and blood identities that continue to divide Indigenous nations and communities, as well as the role of colleges and universities in the development of Indigenous literary studies".

A paradigm shift in American Indian literary criticism.

This is a collection of classic and newly commissioned essays about the study of Indigenous literatures in North America. The contributing scholars include some of the most venerable Indigenous theorists, among them Gerald Vizenor (Anishinaabe), Jeannette Armstrong (Okanagan), Craig Womack (Creek), Kimberley Blaeser (Anishinaabe), Emma LaRocque (Métis), Daniel Heath Justice (Cherokee), Janice Acoose (Saulteaux), and Jo-Ann Episkenew (Métis). Also included are settler scholars foundational to the field, including Helen Hoy, Margery Fee, and Renate Eigenbrod. Among the newer voices are both settler and Indigenous theorists such as Sam McKegney, Keavy Martin, and Niigaanwewidam Sinclair. The volume is organized into five subject areas: Position, the necessity of considering where you come from and who you are; Imagining Beyond Images and Myths, a history and critique of circulating images of Indigenousness; Debating Indigenous Literary Approaches; Contemporary Concerns, a consideration of relevant issues; and finally Classroom Considerations, pedagogical concerns particular to the field. Each section is introduced by an essay that orients the reader and provides ideological context. While anthologies of literary criticism have focused on specific issues related to this burgeoning field, this volume is the first to offer comprehensive perspectives on the subject.