Native literary magazine: RED INK

As noted yesterday, I'm in Tucson, visiting the American Indian Language Development Institute. Yesterday I was in Angie Hoffman's class on children's literature. Her class is outstanding. In discussion, students talked about how eye-opening Angie's class has been for them. One said she had read Meyer's TWILIGHT saga, and now after this class, is looking at Meyer's books with new eyes and insights. Students in the class work with Native children. Angie is White Mountain Apache, working on her dissertation at the University of Arizona.

In yesterday's class, students read aloud poetry. Some read poems they wrote. Marlon B. Evans (Akimel/Tohono O'odham) read a poem he wrote. After listening to him, I asked if he'd had any of his poems published. In fact, he has, and you can find them in two volumes of Red Ink Magazine. He was featured in Volume 13, No. 2, and he has four poems in the most recent volume (Vol. 14, No 1, Spring 2008). Red Ink is a student run publication at the University of Arizona, published by the American Indian Studies Program. Individual subscriptions to it are $25/year (two issues are published each year), and $35/year for an institutional subscription.

I think you'd be pleasantly surprised at what you find in Red Ink. Graphic art, photography, poetry, short stories... By new poets and established writers, too, like Simon Ortiz and Laura Tohe.

Visit Red Ink's website and place your subscription. If you appreciate Native literature, you'll love this magazine, and ought to consider using it in college lit classes. If you're a school teacher, the poems and stories are best suited for junior and senior English classes, while the graphics can be studied by 7th and 8th graders. The art on the front cover alone is worth the subscription cost. With this post is the cover of Vol. 13, #2. The art is by Ryan Redcorn. In both issues I mentioned above, you will find art by Bunky Echo-hawk. Regular readers of my blog know I especially like his work.

A special shout out here to Ashley Tsosie-Mahieu (Dine). Ashley is a graduate student at the University of Illinois. Her short story "Walk in Beauty" is published in Volume 13, #2.

Last, a warm thank you to Martha L. Dailey. Martha is Dine. I love her poem, "Reflections of Spider Woman." It reminds me of my grandmother. Here's the opening lines of that poem. It is a sample of what you'll find in Red Ink. (If I can secure permission, I'll include the entire poem. Note---I got permission!)


Reflections of Spider Woman
Martha L. Dailey

After you died, we sifted through a footlocker
found under your bed. We sorted through
your belongings and uncovered
a hidden part of your past --
turquoise jewelry, a '65 T-Bird title,
and photo after photo of memories
frozen in exact dimensions.

Mom was given a squash blossom,
Aunt Dot took the silver bracelet,
Uncle Jesse wanted the concho belt.
Like land divided into plots,
each person was given something of value--
small parts to your greater whole.

I claimed a 3 x 3 photo
of you crouched, legs kneeling,
weaving a rug on a makeshift loom.
Your fingers bent strategically,
threading colored yarn in and out,
over and under, through and through.
A map full of lines running
wild across your hands,
connecting one point to another.
One deep line tells of a time
you pawned a saddle for food.
Another line holds the tears
from the pain you withstood
at the birthing of twelve kids--
one of which is my mom.

Was I a line? or just a dot?
Did I mean enough of something
to you to be placed in an archaic
structure of memories cut into your skin?

The Old Ones say don't speak of the dead.
Your name called aloud keeps your spirit here
and not to the place where you begin again.

Eight years after your death,
I still don't call to you.

More on Tanya Landman's APACHE: GIRL WARRIOR

Last week, I posted my initial thoughts on Tanya Landman's book, and, I posted Beverly Slapin's review of the book. My copy of the book arrived a few days ago. I've read it and am sharing my thoughts today with readers of this blog, but I'll also be featuring the book in a lecture I'm giving at the University of Arizona. (As I write these words, I'm in Tucson. My hotel window is open and I'm enjoying the breeze and the qualities of the air. Dry heat. I love it. As I walked in the 108 degree heat yesterday, I reveled in the feel of that heat. I'm a guest of the American Indian Language Development Institute, an outstanding program that is now in its 29th year. If you work in a school that serves Native children, I urge you to look at the website and enroll in this summer program.)

Back to Landman:
[Note---I'm adding to this post as I spend more time with the book. Comments I add today (June 27th) will be in red typeface.]

Landman's book is on the shortlist for a the Carnegie Medal, a prestigious award in Britain. From the medal's website is this:

The book that wins the Carnegie Medal should be a book of outstanding literary quality. The whole work should provide pleasure, not merely from the surface enjoyment of a good read, but also the deeper subconscious satisfaction of having gone through a vicarious, but at the time of reading, a real experience that is retained afterwards.

Note that the word 'real' is in bold typeface. Also note that the book should provide a "deeper subconscious satisfaction of having gone through a vicarious" and "real experience that is retained afterwards." What does 'real' mean to the people who wrote the criteria, and what does it mean to the people who will select this year's winner of the medal? Does it mean accurate, or correct? When people say "this is the real deal" or "the real McCoy" they mean genuine. If that is the way the Carnegie considers the word, then Landman's book doesn't meet the criteria.

As Landman says in her note "I've made no attempt to produce an accurate historical novel." And, she says, the story she tells is "based on events" and "inspired" by an autobiography of Geronimo. So, what does all this look like in her book?

Landman's characters are of the "Black Mountain Apache" tribe. There is no Black Mountain Apache; that is a fictional tribe Landman created. In that fictional tribe are characters based on real people. Her characters include:

"Siki" - the main character. She and her brother, Tazhi, are "orphans." In English literature, there are a lot of characters who are orphans. This status is the impetus for a lot of journeys, in which the character seeks to learn who he/she is, and the circumstances by which he/she became an orphan. With unique characteristics, this orphan is often a hero. This orphan theme is, I think, incorrectly applied by non-Native writers creating stories about Native peoples. Based on what I know from personal experience and from study, the concept of 'orphan' (an outcast, solitary existence, abandoned, alone, without someone to care for you) doesn't apply. Paula Gunn Allen wrote about this in her book The Sacred Hoop. She said "Indians... care for their children... You never see an Indian orphan..." (p. 49 of Sacred Hoop). So, anytime I see a Native character speaking of him or herself as an orphan or described that way in the narrative, I view it as an error. Do children lose their parents? Yes. The difference is, that in our communities the child is not only the child of his or her parents, but of the community itself. Someone will take care of that child. A grandparent, an aunt, or an uncle, or an adult sibling.

"Tahzi" is Siki's little brother. He's four years old when killed by Mexicans. Brutally killed. His head is chopped off. His death opens the story. Landman writes: "Tazhi was sent to the afterlife, condemned to walk for ever headless, and alone." Native peoples, like any peoples, have ways of thinking about death. "walk for ever headless, and alone" seems rather melodramatic to me. Necessary for the story that Landman wants to tell, but it'll take some more research and conversation for me to know how well what she says fits with Apache ways.

"Golahka" - he is a "powerful young warrior" married to "Tehineh." They have three children who are killed by the Mexicans. His wife and children and Tahzi are killed at the same time in Landman's story. Their deaths bring Golahka and Siki together. As the story progresses, she will ride with him as they both seek vengeance. At the end of the story, Mexicans use big guns to fire on Golahka and Siki and others who are fighting the Mexicans. A rock is blasted loose, strikes him on the head, leaving a wound that, by the next day, will have killed him. Before he dies, though, he pulls Siki to him and says:

"We have the same heart, Siki," he whispered, his breath warm in my hair. "The same soul. We have grown from the same earth, you and I. Our roots entwine in the living rock. Hold fast to that certainty. It is the only truth that matters." So it was that in the gathering dark of that hidden valley, I became wife to Golahka. By dawn I was his widow.

The phrase "became his wife" means they had sex. Through this act, Siki is pregnant with his child. From my study of Landman's book, Golahka is based on the man commonly known as Geronimo.

"Chodini" is the leader of the Black Mountain tribe Siki and Golahka belong to. The pregnant Siki goes with him to surrender to the "White Eyes." These are the American soldiers. They kill Chodini. Chodini is Cochise.

In looking at characters, Landman strives to make them 'real' but is it ok to borrow so heavily from a peoples history, "stretching" (Landman says) things to make it all work? I'm not sure. Certainly, that is part of the craft of writing. Creating this or that, but I don't think it's ok when you're doing historical fiction. And, I especially think this is problematic when there is so little known about the actual people a book purports to be about. This medal is based on 'real' and I don't think Landman's book meets that criteria.

Some stats from the book.
I did some word counts. These are "at least" numbers. I may have missed occurrences of some of the words listed below.

butcher appears 4 times
slaughter appears 4 times
hacked appears 5 times
revenge appears 6 times
avenge appears 8 times
vengeance appears 10 times
ambush appears 13 times
slain/slay/slayed appears 20 times
war/warfare/warpath appears 28 times
blood/bloodied/bloodshed appears 44 times

These are powerful words of violence. The impetus for this entire story is given to the reader on the first page. This is a story of revenge. Revenge drives the protagonist. Her pursuit of revenge is unrelenting. The people she lives? They're intent on revenge, too. Rarely (relatively speaking) does Landman refer to men as men. She uses the word "warrior" to stand in for men. That word is used 233 times. In contrast, men/man/boy/boys is used 53 times.

At one point in the story, one of the "warriors" makes a hole in the roof of a church where the Mexicans are gathered for Sunday services. He drops a "chilli bomb" into the church. Other "warriors" have barred the doors so the Mexicans can't escape. They're killed by that bomb. Problem? I don't know what a chilli bomb is! I can find no references to it in any of the searches I've done. That includes searching in academic journals and books. I am finding references to it on Google, as an item being used and/or in development in India for crowd control...

Things to think about:

Is Landman aware that, all through the story, Golahka calls Siki "Little Sister" but at the end of their time together, they sleep together... Siki says "by dawn I was his wife."

On page 219, Landman talks about beauty, beauty that "makes men breathless." I'll have to check on this... My first thoughts? Native people appreciate beauty, but there's a difference. Landman's presentation aligns well with European/American notions of women and beauty.

On page 270, is this paragraph:

In revenge, Chodini tied the dead White Eyes by their ankles and dragged them behind his horse, galloping around the fort in fury, heedless of the shots that flew past him, that the White Eyes' chief might see what his actions had cost him.

Sound familiar? Hector? The Trojan War?

Apache: Girl Warrior did not win the Carnegie. It is, however, slated to be released in the US as I am Apache. A fellow critic said it has been getting a lot of buzz in the book world. I have not seen reviews of it in US journals yet. It stands to reason that US reviewers might have a more critical eye on this kind of book, but we will see.

If you want to know more about the Apache peoples, visit these sites:
White Mountain Apache Tribe
Nnee - San Carlos Apache
Chiricahua Apache Nde Nation
Jicarilla Apache Nation
Yavapai-Apache Nation
Fort Sill Apache Tribe

ALA's 2008 Conference Game: "California Dreaming"

The American Library Association is holding its annual conference in Anaheim, California June 26th thru July 2nd. Among the planned activities is a game that will take place during the conference. It is called "California Dreaming." Here is the information being sent out:

The California Myth Authority needs your help! During your normal conference routine, you'll notice clues to mysteries surrounding California history and pop culture spread out around the convention center ­ in sessions, on the exhibit floor, and in other unexpected places. Use your librarianly skills to solve the puzzles and then bring your answers to the California Myth Authority Game HQ in the new Gaming Pavilion on the exhibit floor or text us your answers to build up your score.

As more team members answer questions correctly, you can coordinate your power and claim territory throughout the state. It's a mad rush and the CMA is parceling out land in exchange for correct answers. Each hour teams will earn bonus points for controlling regions of California. Stop by the game headquarters to view the map and strategize.

The team with the most points at the end of the game wins. The highest scoring player on each team will win a prize, as will three random players from the winning team who have each submitted answers. Any attendee can join a team and play for free. Sign up at wikis.ala.org/annual2008 or come by the CMA HQ. Each player will receive a team sticker so you can identify teammates and work together to find clues and solve them.

I understand that the purpose of the game is to build community among conference attendees. The idea itself has merit, but I find this part troubling (bold mine):

As more team members answer questions correctly, you can coordinate your power and claim territory throughout the state. It's a mad rush and the CMA is parceling out land in exchange for correct answers. Each hour teams will earn bonus points for controlling regions of California.

Coordinate power. Claim Territory. Mad rush. Parceling out land. Controlling regions.

The glorification of colonization, massing of capital. While framed as a game for fun, the historical parallel to the experience of Native peoples of California is (to me) glaring. I have no doubt the game developers and ALA had only good fun and good intentions in mind, but they've missed the mark, especially given their goals of increasing diversity within ALA.

Would they create a game that celebrated slavery? I don't think so. I have no doubt they want people to learn about slavery, but would they advocate that learning via a trivia game? Again, I don't think so.

The problem is, not enough people know enough about California's history---from the perspective of the indigenous people who were and are there. I think, some day, people will know, and games like this will not be developed. Getting there, though, will take a lot of study, a lot of work, and a lot of courage. Are you up for that? I hope so.

Paulette Molin's AMERICAN INDIAN THEMES IN YOUNG ADULT LITERATURE

Yesterday I posted an essay by my colleague, Paulette F. Molin, about activities found in the American Automobile Association's magazine. If you're a member of AAA, take a look at her essay. If you're a classroom teacher or librarian, consider using her essay and the online material for a lesson on critical media literacy. Paulette has been studying curriculum materials since the 1970s.

Paulette has an excellent book out that librarians and teachers should add to their shelves: American Indian Themes in Young Adult Literature. In her foreword is a letter from Genevieve Bell, the woman Scholastic hired to vet (fact check) Ann Rinaldi's My Heart Is on the Ground. Here's part of that letter:

I completely sympathize with the critical review of Rinaldi's work that has proliferated both on the Internet and off it. There is much in the book that is offensive, and I did say so to Scholastic. Indeed, there is much more in this book that is offensive that I missed, which is why I urged Melissa Jenkins [of Scholastic] to get a Lakota person to read it. She knew that I was not Native American. However, I also contracted with Scholastic to fact-check the manuscript and thought it only appropriate that my name be attached to that act. Again, I can only reflect on the naivete that made me think that my comments would be taken seriously enough to change the course of the publication. I am deeply sorry that they did not. And I apologize for the offense that I have given, however, inadvertently (xv).

The book has three sections (Contemporary Literature, Historical Fiction, and Nonfiction). In "Contemporary Literature," you can read her discussion of Lipsyte's three books The Brave, The Chief, and Warrior Angel or see what she has to say about Will Hobbs or Ben Mikaelsen. Course, she also talks about books that are well-done, such as Cynthia Leitich Smith's Rain Is Not My Indian Name.

In the bibliography is an extensive list of articles that will be of interest to librarians and scholars alike. One example: a scholar might want to look at Mary Gloyne Byler's 1974 article in Library Journal, "The Image of American Indians Projected by non-Indian Writers."

Like Through Indian Eyes and A Broken Flute (both subtitled The Native Experience in Books for Children), this is one of those books that belongs in every library.

As noted yesterday, the book is available from Oyate. It was published in 2005 by Scarecrow.

Stereotypes in AAA's magazine

Today, I am pleased to share an essay written by Paulette F. Molin. Paulette is on the board of directors for Wordcraft Circle, and is an enrolled member of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe from White Earth. Among her writings is an excellent book called American Indian Themes in Young Adult Literature. The book is available from Oyate. I've referenced it on this site before, and its on my list of recommended books, but I realized (today) that I've not written specifically about it. Tomorrow, I'll do that. For now, here's her essay.

_______________________

Paulette F. Molin, June 19, 2008

Just as I was about to discard the May/June 2008 issue of Going Places: The Magazine for Today’s Traveler, a publication of AAA, a stereotypical image caught my eye, part of a pitch for Going Places’ interactive website, "Making Tracks for Kids." Looking further, I read this: "Meet Allaquippa, an Iroquois maiden named after the famous queen! Tell a tall tale, build a family tree, play a game and learn about Native American life and the history of Pittsburgh." See http://aaagoingplaces.com/gp_makingtracks/mj08/mt_reading.asp

If you make tracks to the May/June 2008 issue of Making Tracks, an interactive website of games and activities for kids,” to “Meet Alliquippa, an Iroquois maiden,” you will not find anything new. Instead, you will encounter the usual stereotypes about American Indians.

“Meet Alliquippa” features a cartoon “maiden,” fictionalized as a descendant of “Alliquippa, a Seneca Queen” in the piece. The historical Aliquippa, a sachem or leader of a band of Mingo Seneca near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, flourished during the first half of the eighteenth century. She garners only three sentences in “Meet Alliquippa,” described in the fictional Alliquippa’s voice: “One legend says that my ancestor Alliquippa, a Seneca Queen, set up camp many years ago where the three rivers meet near Pittsburgh. And it was there she met George Washington, who was on a military mission near her camp. The two became friends, the legend says.”

The Alliquippa cartoon image, like mascots and other caricatures, masks the actual history and contemporary status of Native people. This particular fictional “maiden” sports black hair hanging in two pig tails, wears feathers (the main one, green with red and white accents), and is decked out in a short top and slit skirt with generic Indian designs. Posed in a stereotypical stance, Aliquippa stands with her arms folded under a fringed wrap against a backdrop recognizable as a Plains star quilt design. She wears a bit of a smile, perhaps to reveal that she is friendly (in keeping with text such as, “Meet Alliquippa, our Seneca friend”). In one section, the Alliquippa figure is positioned above a photograph of an unidentified Iroquois male (actually, it is the Seneca leader Cornplanter, but he remains anonymous in the piece, with neither his name nor his history revealed).

The website’s stereotypical visual depiction is reinforced by the text, which fails to provide even the most basic information about the Seneca, such as identifying the tribal group as a member nation of the Iroquois Confederacy (the piece describes the Seneca as “one of the six tribes that make up the Iroquois Nation”). Furthermore, “Meet Alliquippa” does not identify any of the Seneca communities in the United States and Canada (among them, Cattaraugus, Allegany, and Tonawanda reservations in New York, the Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma, and Seneca citizens in Ontario). Although the website mentions “the Iroquois’ ‘Six Nations,’ it does not adequately describe or discuss the Haudenosaunee (“people of the longhouse”), neglecting to identify the member nations (Cayuga, Mohawk, Onondaga, Seneca, Oneida, and Tuscarora). In fact, the word “Confederacy” does not appear in the piece. “Meet Alliquippa” also overlooked an opportunity to identify and discuss the Seneca as “Keepers of the Western Door” of the Haudenosaunee or its specific role as a member nation.

“Meet Alliquippa” glosses over the role of women, especially rich among the Haudenosaunee, failing to address the contradiction between citing a historical female leader (“my ancestor Alliquippa, a Seneca Queen”) with its statement, “Men are the political leaders in our tribe.” Furthermore, the piece does not explain why the historical Alliquippa was called “Queen,” a European term of royalty. The clan system receives similar treatment (“The Seneca tribe is made up of clans: Turtle, Bear, Hawk, Heron and Wolf, among others”).

“Meet Alliquippa” also talks down to children, relying on clichés or exaggerated exclamations —“dance to the beat of your very own drum with our creative craft! “…the senators are like tribal council members who report to a chief—the president!” “A whole clan of 60 people could live in one longhouse! “ “But today, we live in houses or apartments, just like you!” The website also makes the fictional Alliquippa serve as the voice for the Seneca, substituting ersatz words for what tribal members would and could say about their own culture. The reading list offers no relief, listing only two books associated with the Seneca, both of them centered on myths or legends.

Unfortunately, the activities are along the same lines. “Create a Drum Craft” trivializes drums, which have deep religious and cultural significance in tribal societies, and reduces them to playtime craft. “Use a couple of beads,” the instructions direct, “to finish off your Iroquois drum below!” The activity is accompanied by an unidentified photograph of what appears to be a group of nineteenth-century Plains Indians, giving the impression that tribal groups are interchangeable. The text accompanying the activity conveys the notion that Europeans, not Native Americans, were settlers: “Many Native American tribes lived in Western Pennsylvania around the time it was settled. One of the tribes was the Iroquois.” In other words, Native American residence does not count as settlement in this contrived version of American history.

Another activity, “A Silly Piece of History,” is introduced by these words: “Every piece of land was ‘discovered’ by someone; from the first American who crossed over the Bering Strait thousands of years ago, to the European explorers who came later.” This self-serving narrative would have children believe that all “discoveries” are equal, neglecting to impart factual information about the European colonization of the Americas. Furthermore, it summarizes the indigenous presence in the Americas to “Bering Strait” origins, one Euro-American theory.

“Seneca Sling,” another activity, is merely a computer slingshot game, designed for participants to launch cyber rocks at animals and fish. The visual is stereotypical and cartoonish, featuring a headband-wearing, generic Indian male in a canoe. This activity is violent, playing out the killing of all manner of species and linking it to Indians. The fourth activity, “Build a Family Tree,” is introduced by these words: “History isn’t just about famous explorers and Indians.” In other words, this statement tells children that famous explorers and Indians are mutually exclusive.

Make Tracks away from this website. There are better materials available online and in print, including exciting works by contemporary Seneca and other Haudenosaunee authors.