The Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature (Cambridge Companions to Literature)

354 Pages·2005·2.14 MB·English

by  Joy Porter

Cambridge University Press
0521822831 - The Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature
Edited by Joy Porter and Kenneth M. Roemer
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TheCambridgeCompaniontoNativeAmericanLiterature
Invisible,marginal,expected–thesewordstracethepathofrecognitionforAmerican
IndianliteraturewritteninEnglishsincethelateeighteenthcentury.ThisCompanion
chroniclesandcelebratesthattrajectorybydefiningrelevantinstitutional,historical,
cultural, and gender contexts, by outlining the variety of genres written since the
1770s,andalsobyfocusingonsignificantauthorswhoestablishedaplaceforNative
literatureinliterarycanonsinthe1970s(Momaday,Silko,Welch,Ortiz,Vizenor),
achievedinternationalrecognitioninthe1980s(Erdrich),andperformance-celebrity
statusinthe1990s(HarjoandAlexie).Inadditiontotheseventeenchapterswritten
by respected experts – Native and non-Native; American, British, and European
scholars,theCompanionincludesbio-bibliographiesoffortyauthors,maps,sugges-
tions for further reading, and a timeline which details major works of Native
AmericanliteratureandmainstreamAmericanliterature,aswellassignificantsocial,
cultural,andhistoricalevents.Anessentialoverviewofthispowerfulliterature.
JOY PORTER isalecturerintheDepartmentofAmericanStudiesattheUniversityof
Wales,Swansea,UKwheresheteachesAmericanandNativeAmericanhistoryand
literature. Previously she was Senior Lecturer in American History at Anglia
Polytechnic University, Cambridge. She is the author of To Be Indian: the Life of
Seneca-IroquoisArthurCaswellParker,1881–1955(2002).Herworkcanbefound
inavarietyofbookssuchasTheStateofUSHistory(Berg2002)andjournalssuchas
New York History and Presidential Studies Quarterly. Her next book is Native
American Freemasonry, the research for which is supported by a Leverhulme
ResearchFellowship.
KENNETH M. ROEMER, an Academy of Distinguished Teachers Professor at the
University of Texas at Arlington, has received four NEH grants to Direct Summer
SeminarsandhasbeenaVisitingProfessorinJapan,aguestlectureratHarvard,and
lecturedinVienna,Lisbon,Brazil,andTurkey.Hisarticleshaveappearedinjournals
suchasAmericanLiterature,AmericanLiteraryHistory,andModernFictionStudies.
His Approaches to Teaching Momaday’s The Way to Rainy Mountain (ed.) was
publishedbytheMLA;hisNativeAmericanWritersoftheUnitedStates(ed.)wona
WriterofYearAwardfromWordcraftCircle.Hehaswrittenfourbooksonutopian
literature,includingTheObsoleteNecessityandUtopianAudience.Hiscollectionof
personal narratives, verse, and photography about Japan is entitled Michibata de
DeattaNippon(ASidewalker’sJapan).
© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org
Cambridge University Press
0521822831 - The Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature
Edited by Joy Porter and Kenneth M. Roemer
Frontmatter
More information
THE CAMBRIDGE
COMPANION TO
NATIVE AMERICAN
LITERATURE
EDITEDBY
JOY PORTER
and
KENNETH M. ROEMER
© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org
Cambridge University Press
0521822831 - The Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature
Edited by Joy Porter and Kenneth M. Roemer
Frontmatter
More information
CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
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CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS
TheEdinburghBuilding,Cambridge,CB22RU,UK
PublishedintheUnitedStatesofAmericabyCambridgeUniversityPress,NewYork
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#CambridgeUniversityPress2005
Thisbookisincopyright.Subjecttostatutoryexception
andtotheprovisionsofrelevantcollectivelicensingagreements,
noreproductionofanypartmaytakeplacewithout
thewrittenpermissionofCambridgeUniversityPress.
Firstpublished2005
PrintedintheUnitedKingdomattheUniversityPress,Cambridge
AcataloguerecordforthisbookisavailablefromtheBritishLibrary
ISBN-13978-0-521-82283-1hardback
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© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org
Cambridge University Press
0521822831 - The Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature
Edited by Joy Porter and Kenneth M. Roemer
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To
MildredAllisonRoemer,1906–2003
BrooklynandEastRockaway,NewYork
ArthurKennethRoemer,1912–2005
EastRockaway,NewYork
and
KathleenandJohnPorter,
Derry/Londonderry,N.Ireland.
© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org
Cambridge University Press
0521822831 - The Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature
Edited by Joy Porter and Kenneth M. Roemer
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More information
CONTENTS
Listofillustrations pageix
Notesoncontributors x
Acknowledgments xvi
Anoteonindividualandtribalnames xvii
Introduction
KENNETH M. ROEMER 1
Timeline:literary,historical,andculturalconjunctions
KENNETH M. ROEMER 25
PartIHistoricalandculturalcontexts
1. HistoricalandculturalcontextstoNativeAmericanliterature
JOY PORTER 39
2. Translationandmediation
DAVID MURRAY 69
3. Womenwritersandgenderissues
ANNETTE VAN DYKE 85
PartIIGenrecontexts
4. Non-fictionprose
BERND PEYER 105
5. NativeAmericanlifewriting
HERTHA D. SWEET WONG 125
vii
© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org
Cambridge University Press
0521822831 - The Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature
Edited by Joy Porter and Kenneth M. Roemer
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LIST OF CONTENTS
6. America’sindigenouspoetry
NORMA C. WILSON 145
7. Pre-1968fiction
A. LAVONNE BROWN RUOFF 161
8. Fiction:1968tothepresent
JAMES RUPPERT 173
9. AmericanIndiantheatre
ANN HAUGO 189
PartIIIIndividualauthors
10. N.ScottMomaday:becomingthebear
CHADWICK ALLEN 207
11. SimonOrtiz:writinghome
PATRICIA CLARK SMITH 221
12. JamesWelch:identity,circumstance,andchance
KATHRYN W. SHANLEY 233
13. LeslieMarmonSilko:storyteller
ROBERT M. NELSON 245
14. GeraldVizenor:postindianliberation
KIMBERLY M. BLAESER 257
15. LouiseErdrich’sstorieduniverse
CATHERINE RAINWATER 271
16. JoyHarjo’spoetry
LAURA COLTELLI 283
17. ShermanAlexie:irony,intimacy,andagency
DAVID L. MOORE 297
Bio-bibliographies 311
Furtherreading 329
Index 331
viii
© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org
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0521822831 - The Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature
Edited by Joy Porter and Kenneth M. Roemer
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ILLUSTRATIONS
Figures
5.1 ‘‘OntheWarPath’’byMakingMedicine,Cheyenne,
August1875.(CourtesyoftheNationalAnthropological
Archives,SmithsonianInstitution.) page130
5.2 ‘‘IndianbetweenTwoCultures’’byWohaw,Kiowa,
January1877.(CourtesyofMissouriHistoricalSociety.) 131
5.3 ‘‘AclassofIndiansinFortMarionwiththeirTeacher,
Mrs.Gibbs’’byZo-Tom,Kiowa,1877.(Courtesyofthe
SouthwestMuseum,LosAngeles,California,
Neg.No.34,649.) 131
5.4 ‘‘CourtshipSceneDrawnonEnvelopedated1877’’
byunknownCheyenneartist/s,post1877.(Courtesyof
theSouthwestMuseum,LosAngeles,California,Neg.
No.37,103.) 132
Maps
1. Indiancountryintheyear1492 page62
2. Indiancountryin1776 62
3. Indian‘‘removals’’toOklahoma 63
4. FederalandstateIndianreservations 64
5. Indiangroupswithoutreservations 65
6. AlaskaNativeregionalcorporations 66
The maps are taken from American Indians: Answers to Today’s
Questions by Jack Utter. (Reproduced by permission of the University of
OklahomaPress.)
ix
© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org
Cambridge University Press
0521822831 - The Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature
Edited by Joy Porter and Kenneth M. Roemer
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NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS
CHADWICK ALLEN isAssociateProfessorofEnglishatOhioStateUniversity
andAssociateEditorofStudiesinAmericanIndianLiteratures.Heisthe
author of Blood Narrative: Indigenous Identity in American Indian and
MaoriLiteraryandActivistTexts,whichwasafinalistfortheMLAFirst
BookPrize,andarticlesandbookchaptersonthediscoursesofindigenous
activism, postcolonial and indigenous theories, and popular representa-
tionsofUSfrontiers.HeisapastPresidentoftheAssociationfortheStudy
ofAmerican IndianLiteraturesandarecipientoftwoFulbrightresearch
awardstoAotearoa/NewZealand.
KIMBERLY M. BLAESER (Anishinaabe), a Professor of English at the
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, teaches Native American Literature,
Creative Writing, and American Nature Writing. Blaeser is an enrolled
member of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe and grew up on the White
Earth Reservation. Her publications include two collections of poetry,
Trailing You, which won the 1993 First Book Award from the Native
Writers’ Circle of the Americas, and Absentee Indians and Other Poems
(2002).SheistheauthorofGeraldVizenor:WritingintheOralTradition
andtheeditoroftwoanthologies:StoriesMigratingHome:aCollectionof
Anishinaabe Prose (1999) and Traces in Blood, Bone, and Stone:
Contemporary Ojibwe Poetry (2004). Her poetry, short fiction, essays,
and scholarly articles have appeared in widely read Canadian and
American collections, including Reinventing the Enemy’s Language and
NothingbuttheTruth.
LAURA COLTELLI isfullprofessorofAmericanliteratureattheUniversityof
Pisa.HerworksincludeessaysonAmericanpoetryandanalysesofcolonial
journalsandtravelliterature.ShehaspublishednumerousstudiesonNative
American literature, including Winged Words. American Indian Writers
Speak (1990) and Joy Harjo’s Spiral of Memory (ed., 1999). Her recent
x
© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org
Cambridge University Press
0521822831 - The Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature
Edited by Joy Porter and Kenneth M. Roemer
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LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
books include Voci dal Sudovest. Terra e identita` negli scrittori indianoa-
mericani (2002) and a volume on radical women writers, Le radici della
memoria.MeridelLeSueureilradicalismoamericanodeglianni’30(2002).
ShehaseditedItaliantranslationsofworksbySilko,Momaday,Harjo,and
Ortiz, as well as an anthology of contemporary American Indian writers.
She is the general editor of the series ‘‘Crossroads’’ devoted to American
writers,recentlyinauguratedwithacollectionofpoemsbyShermanAlexie.
ANN HAUGO, anAssistantProfessorintheSchoolofTheatreatIllinoisState
University, teaches theatre history, literature, and criticism, including
courses on American Indian theatre. Her publications on American
IndiantheatrehaveappearedinbookssuchasAmericanIndianTheatre:
a Reader, The Color of Theatre: Race, Culture, and Contemporary
Performance, and The Blackwell Companion to American Drama, and
in various academic journals and periodicals. She has served as Project
AssociatewithProjectHOOP(HonoringOurOriginsandPeoplethrough
Native Theatre, Education, and Community Development) and as
ConsultanttotheNativeAmericanWomenPlaywrights’Archive.
DAVID L. MOORE is Associate Professor of English at the University of
Montana. He teaches and publishes on Native American and American
literatures, and has taught previously at the University of South Dakota,
Salish Kootenai College, and Cornell University. He was the recipient of a
Post-Doctoral Fellowship at the Society for the Humanities at Cornell
UniversityandoftheFacultyResearchFellowshipinWesternStudiesatthe
O’ConnorCenterfortheRockyMountainWest.Hispublicationsinclude
aneditedvolumeofAmericanIndianQuarterlyaswellasnumerousarticles
andessaysinkeyjournalsandcollectionsfromCambridge,PrenticeHall,
Gale,Nebraska,NewMexico,Smithsonian,andotherpublishers.Currently
heisworkingonabookonNativeAmericanredefinitionsofAmerica.
DAVID MURRAY is Professor of American Literature and Culture in the
School of American and Canadian Studies, University of Nottingham,
England. He is the author of Forked Tongues: Speech, Writing and
Representation in North American Indian Texts (1992) and Indian
Giving: Economies of Power in Early Indian–White Exchanges (2000),
andhaseditedLiteraryTheoryandPoetry(1989)andAmericanCultural
Critics(1995),aswellasessaysandarticlesonNativeAmericantopics.
ROBERT M. NELSON isaProfessorofEnglishattheUniversityofRichmond,
whereheteachesavarietyofcoursesinNativeAmericanliterature.Heisa
xi
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