Welcome to March’s installment of Classroom Takeover, a new monthly feature here at Birdbrain(ed) Book Blog! Every month, a new blogger creates an ideal college class featuring a subject, author, or genre that they think doesn’t get enough attention in mainstream college classes.
This month’s class was created by Tasha B. of Truth, Beauty, Freedom and Books! Tasha always writes such wonderful reviews; it makes me horribly jealous of her. I DREAM of the day I’ll start writing as good a post as the kind she puts out– especially since she’s doing it while still in school and I’m OUT of school and still somewhat lackluster. It’s enough to make me cry, sometimes.
Just kidding. Or am I?
No, I’m totally kidding. Maybe. (Insert vaguely spooky noises here! Also if you could pass me a pack of tissues, please.)
Intro
For over two centuries, American Indians have been eloquently expressing themselves and their cultural beliefs through poetry, prose, and essays. Their writing comprises an important part of the American experience and the struggle for equality and human recognition that many people experience all over the world.
Reading List
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
Alexie is probably the most famous American Indian writer of our time, and for good reason. His novels and poetry are at once funny, poignant and meaningful. It’s impossible not to root for his characters and admire his wit. Plus, his books are just simply entertaining.
Custer Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto by Vine Deloria, Jr.
This book became an important part of the American Indian Movement because it challenged white stereotypes of Indians and helped define Native American political goals of sovereignty without assimilation. It’s also surprisingly humorous for such a serious work–as represented by the highly sarcastic title.
Walking the Rez Road by Jim Northrup
I love Northrup’s writing style, which is warm and poetic and funny and clever. In this collection of short stories, he writes about the experiences of a Vietnam vet.
American Indian Stories by Zitkala-Sa
This is an autobiography of a remarkable woman who grew up in turn-of-the-century US and became a concert violinist and renowned writer. Zitkala discusses her childhood growing up on the reservation and contrasts it with time in government boarding schools. Like Deloria, Zitkala-Sa’s life story is a model of independence and non-assimilation–which was an unusual position for the time.
House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday
Based on Momaday’s own experiences of growing up in and around the Jemenez Pueblo in New Mexico, this novel won the Pulitzer Prize in 1969 and is widely credited with creating a market for American Indian literature in mainstream publishing.
Graduate Course
Indian Singing by Gail Tremblay
Both a poet and a visual artist, this collection of poems is presented with reproductions of some of Tremblay’s art.
The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven by Sherman Alexie
One doesn’t want to pass up the opportunity to read more Sherman Alexie.
Darkness in Saint Louis Bearheart by Gerald Vizenor
An early example of the Native American Renaissance, the explosion of literary fiction by American Indians that began in the late sixties with Momaday’s novel. Vizenor is also one of the best-known professors of American Indian Studies in the country.
“A Son of the Forest” and Other Writings by William Apess, ed. Barry O’Connell
Apess was one of the first Indians to write extensively in English about the American Indian experience.
Thanks so much for participating in Classroom Takeover, Tasha! I’ve only read part of an essay by Zitkala-Sa, but I’ve been meaning to read a Sherman Alexie book for forever. How about you all? Have you delved more deeply into American Indian Lit than I have?
Right now I don’t have any Classroom Takeovers for April-December. This makes me very sad, so if YOU’D been wanting to create your own class, please check out this post here and then get to emailing me!
For previous Classroom Takeovers, check out the Classroom Takeover tag.
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