01  TTH4  D/C   70700  BARNETT  HSB-204

We will read some of the most significant Native American literature of our time, primarily fiction, with some poetry and non-fiction.  In doing so, we will need to contextualize this body of work in two cultures, Western literary history and Native American oral tradition. We will consider some of the circumstances of the minority community that produces these texts, using the Lakota reservation of Pine Ridge to examine various Native American issues.

Tentative Readings

D’Arcy McNickle, The Surrounded

Sherman Alexie, The Toughest Indian in the World

Louise Erdrich, Love Medicine: new and expanded edition

Thomas King, Green Grass, Running Water

N. Scott Momaday, The Way to Rainy Mountain

Leonard Peltier, Prison Writings: My Life is my Sun Dance

Susan Power, The Grass Dancer

Leslie Marmon Silko, Ceremony

James Welch, Winter in the Blood, The Indian Lawyer

Evaluation

Regular class attendance is expected