Table Of ContentNative Americans on Film
Native Americans
on Film
Conversations,
Teaching, and Theory
Edited by
M. Elise Marubbio and Eric L. Buffalohead
Copyright © 2013 by The University Press of Kentucky
Scholarly publisher for the Commonwealth, serving Bellarmine University, Berea
College, Centre College of Kentucky, Eastern Kentucky University, The Filson
Historical Society, Georgetown College, Kentucky Historical Society, Kentucky
State University, Morehead State University, Murray State University, Northern
Kentucky University, Transylvania University, University of Kentucky, University of
Louisville, and Western Kentucky University.
All rights reserved.
Editorial and Sales Offices: The University Press of Kentucky
663 South Limestone Street, Lexington, Kentucky 40508-4008
www.kentuckypress.com
17 16 15 14 13 5 4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Native Americans on film : conversations, teaching, and theory / edited by M. Elise
Marubbio and Eric L. Buffalohead.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Includes filmography.
ISBN 978-0-8131-3665-3 (hardcover : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-8131-3681-3
(pdf) — ISBN 978-0-8131-4034-6 (epub) 1. Indians in motion pictures. 2. Indians
in the motion picture industry—United States. 3. Indigenous films—United States.
4. Indian motion picture producers and directors—United States—Interviews.
5. Stereotypes (Social psychology) in motion pictures. I. Marubbio, M. Elise, 1963–
editor of compilation. II. Buffalohead, Eric L., 1965– editor of compilation.
PN1995.9.I48N38 2012
791.43'652997—dc23 2012040562
This book is printed on acid-free paper meeting
the requirements of the American National Standard
for Permanence in Paper for Printed Library Materials.
Manufactured in the United States of America.
Member of the Association of
American University Presses
Contents
List of Illustrations vii
Introduction: Talking Back, Moving Forward 1
Section One: Theoretical Conversations
Introduction to Section One 31
Dimensions of Difference in Indigenous Film 35
Houston Wood
Reading Nanook’s Smile: Visual Sovereignty, Indigenous Revisions
of Ethnography, and Atanarjuat: The Fast Runner 58
Michelle H. Raheja
Dismantling the Master’s House: The Feminist Fourth Cinema
Documentaries of Alanis Obomsawin and Loretta Todd 89
Jennifer L. Gauthier
Indigenous (Re)memory and Resistance: Video Works by
Dana Claxton 116
Carla Taunton
Section Two: Pedagogical Conversations
Introduction to Section Two 137
Native Resistance to Hollywood’s Persistence of Vision: Teaching
Films about Contemporary American Indians 141
Carole Gerster
Geographies of Identity and Belonging in Sherman Alexie’s
The Business of Fancydancing 175
Amy Corbin
vi Contents
Teaching Native American Filmmakers: Osawa, Eyre, and
Redroad 202
Angelica Lawson
“The Native’s Point of View” as Seen through the Native’s
(and Non-Native’s) Points of View 223
Sam Pack
The Dirt Roads of Consciousness: Teaching and Producing Videos
with an Indigenous Purpose 246
Beverly Singer
Section Three: Conversations with Filmmakers
Introduction to Section Three 261
“Pockets Full of Stories”: An Interview with Sterlin Harjo and
Blackhorse Lowe 265
Joanna Hearne and Zack Shlachter
Wrestling the Greased Pig: An Interview with Randy Redroad 288
M. Elise Marubbio
An Upstream Journey: An Interview with Sandra Osawa 303
Saza Osawa
Video as Community Ally and Dakota Sense of Place:
An Interview with Mona Smith 322
Jennifer A. Machiorlatti
The Journey’s Discovery: An Interview with Shelley Niro 337
Elizabeth Weatherford
Acknowledgments 359
Selected Filmography 361
List of Contributors 369
Index 373
Illustrations
The Land Has Eyes screened in Rotuma 39
Paddling a bark canoe in Ten Canoes 41
Shylock in The Ma¯ori Merchant of Venice 44
George Washington cries in Skins 49
Nanook in Nanook of the North 59
Atanarjuat’s closing credits 79
Police removing a Mi’gmaq fisherman in Incident at Restigouche 93
Cory Swan in Richard Cardinal: Cry from the Diary of a Métis
Child 94
Standoff in the Pines in Kanehsatake: 270 Years of Resistance 96
Mi’gmaq fishermen in Is the Crown at War with Us? 98
A Kainai family in Kainayssini Imanistaisiwa: The People Go On 103
Will Sampson in Images of Indians 147
Television scene from Smoke Signals 158
Inupiat whale-hunting in A Thousand Roads 162
A Euro-American performs as Chief Illiniwek in In Whose Honor? 168
Seymour in The Business of Fancydancing 182
The two selves of Seymour in The Business of Fancydancing 185
Removing the signifiers of Native identity in The Business of
Fancydancing 186
The reality of cultural dislocation in The Business of Fancydancing 186
Mouse and Aristotle in The Business of Fancydancing 193
Community depicted in The Business of Fancydancing 195
Sandra Osawa 306
viii Illustrations
Kate Smith in In the Heart of Big Mountain 307
Protesters in Lighting the 7th Fire 310
Illustration of comedian Charlie Hill 320
Ancient Traders Gallery poster City Indians 328
Mona Smith’s Bdote Memory Map 329
Cloudy Waters Web site image 333
Toby Burning as Shanna in It Starts with a Whisper 342
Tantoo Cardinal in Honey Moccasin 345
Billy Merasty and Bernelda Wheeler in Honey Moccasin 347
Kateri Walker (Mavis) and Eric Schweig (Bug) in Kissed by
Lightning 353
Kateri Walker as Mavis Dogblood in Kissed by Lightning 354
Introduction
Talking Back, Moving Forward
In the spirit of conversations and relationships, the nurturing heart of
Native Americans on Film, we introduce ourselves to you and extend an
invitation to participate in the growing network of people interested and
invested in the burgeoning field of Indigenous film. Our friendship and
respect for each other’s ideas, approaches to scholarship and teaching,
and philosophy of life have flourished over the years that we have been
colleagues. Native Americans on Film is an expression of this relation-
ship and the ones we share with the extended family of educators, schol-
ars, filmmakers, and artists we have come to know through the process
of creating this collaboration of voices. It also mirrors the philosophical
and theoretical approach we take in American Indian studies, which is
interdisciplinary and Native centered, foregrounding Indigenous ways of
knowing, teaching, and telling.
Native Americans on Film developed out of a commitment to provid-
ing our students with Native representation in our academic offerings.
Over the years we listened to our students’ and our own voices calling
for more Native-centered material that talks about the representation of
Native Americans in Hollywood and mainstream media, and about the
rapidly expanding, multifaceted Indigenous film movement. Finding the
material to provide a Native-centered approach for a variety of courses
has sometimes been very challenging. Wonderful works are in circula-
tion today, many of which we use, but often a suitable piece is merely
a fraction of another work, such as an essay within a large edition not
necessarily related to what we are teaching. Complicating the process,
much of the available printed material adheres to methods of analysis that
privilege Western genres, aesthetics, and ways of teaching film. While
these methodologies possess great value and provide useful tools, they
often fail to capture the innovations many Native films employ in merg-
ing aesthetics and reformulating genres. We thus imagined a single text
that offers theoretical approaches to understanding Native film, includes
pedagogical strategies for teaching particular films, and validates the dif-
ferent voices, approaches, and worldviews that emerge across the Indig-
enous film movement.1 We imagined Native Americans on Film.
